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‘Whom does she resemble, Colonel Hayward?’

The Colonel turned round again and gave his questioner a look. He looked at her as if he wanted to know how far he could trust her. And then his eyebrows and his mouth worked. ‘Of some one—a lady—who has been long dead,’ he replied, ‘and her name—her name!’

‘You are very serious, Colonel; it is not only a passing interest? It is really something—something! Oh, forgive me. I cannot have her disturbed. She is all quivering with imagination and wonder.’

‘Mrs. Bellendean, there is some mystery about this girl. Why should she wonder, why should she be disturbed? Me, yes. I am much disturbed. It is something—of which I have not spoken for years. Oh, if Elizabeth were only here!’

‘Then come with me to my room,’ Mrs. Bellendean said; ‘if we stay here we shall be interrupted every moment. I am beginning to get excited myself. Come this way. The window is always open, and nobody will know we are there.’

She turned for a moment and waved her hand to Joyce, who had just taken her place at the head of the band; then, turning up a side path, led Colonel Hayward round an angle of the house to the open window of a little morning-room. ‘Here,’ she said,—‘we can talk in quiet here.’