"You are quite right," said Buckingham, "if you really think you are under any obligation to the story-teller."
"Why, of course I am," she exclaimed, with wide-open surprise. Then she blushed in turn,--first a little color of half-indignant rebuke, then a warm hue as she thought of her unnecessary earnestness, then a deep crimson as there rushed over her the sudden recollection of the hours she had spent in Buckingham's company, and the silent admiration which she had bestowed from the shelter of ignorance upon this gentleman who now sat composedly before her. It was by an effort of self-control that she did not spring from her seat and leave the room. The effort blanched her face. It was as she sat thus, her eyes cast down, her lips set, her countenance pale, that Mrs. Martindale returned.
"My cousin will be here presently," she said, as she entered the room. And then her eye fell on Miss Vila and glanced quickly at Mr. Buckingham, who was nervously fingering his stick. "Meanwhile," she added, with a mischievous look, "I will ask you to remain with us, as Mr. Wilding will be obliged to see you here. Lillie, you have the gentleman's card. It seems awkward to wait for the formality of Henry's introduction. Will you have the kindness to make us acquainted?"
Miss Vila gravely performed the ceremony.
"Your cousin is fortunate in finding friends in town, Mrs. Martindale," said Buckingham; "for a collegian coming here freshly, especially one in a special course, is apt to be slow in breaking through the hedge which divides the college from the town."
"Yes, he is quite fortunate," said his cousin. "I exercise an influence over him. You know we exercise an influence over students, don't you?"
"I supposed that was what the town was for."
"When they are away from home and parents and all those refining influences, we serve as substitutes. Henry is away, not so much from his parents, who are dead, as from the lady to whom he is engaged. That is why I feel bound to exercise an influence over him." Mrs. Martindale made this explanation with a serious air, but Buckingham, whose eye never stayed far from Miss Vila, detected that young lady casting a reproachful, not to say indignant, glance at the speaker. Miss Vila, indeed, made a motion as if to leave, but, with another quick blush, as if she had betrayed a secret thought, settled again into her chair. To tell the secret, she had a sudden misgiving that her reckless friend might take it into her head to make ingenuous revelations concerning her.