"But your greater intimacy abroad," he went on to ask, "Georgina? for it was abroad that these notes seem to have been written. Did you receive none such before your departure?"
"Oh! I can scarcely tell. Sometimes we were left in doubt, the evening before, whether our party was to take place on the following day or not, and he wrote to me to know _how_ it was to be. Then I sometimes returned fatigued with our day's excursion, and a note of inquiry would arrive. Then another morning would come flowers, another music, and with all these came notes."
"Very seldom, for you know I hate writing; and when I did it was only a literal word of reply to some question about the hour at which we were to ride or dine out. The notes themselves will tell you this, Glenmore, for they complain of never being answered."
"But if you did not answer, you valued them, Georgina, or you would not have preserved them."
"Yes," she replied, "I liked the attention they proved; but that was all. _I_ meant no harm; and though Lady Tenderden frequently knew of the circumstance, she never reproved me for receiving them."
"Did Lady Tenderden," exclaimed Lord Glenmore with surprise, "never tell you you were in the wrong, or, at least, imprudent?"
"No--no," Lady Glenmore answered with some hesitation, and as if endeavouring to recollect herself.
"You hesitate, Georgina. Did Lady Tenderden, I ask you pointedly, never make any remark on Mr. Leslie Winyard's attentions to you?"
"What was it?" asked Lord Glenmore, with breathless impatience.
"She told me that I should not encourage Mr. Leslie Winyard _alone_; that it was bad taste to have but one cavalier; that he would grow tired of me if I did not divide my preference."
"Gracious heaven!" exclaimed Lord Glenmore, striking his hands together; "and is it to this guardianship that I have intrusted you?--But the picture, Georgina, the picture! tell me, how came the picture of that man in your possession?"
"His picture!" repeated Lady Glenmore with surprise.
"Yes," rejoined Lord Glenmore sternly; and taking it from beneath the papers, pointed to it.
"Oh! I remember now; I had totally forgotten it. But one day, when I was writing, he came up to me. We had been talking, the evening before, of remembering people and their features in absence, and I had declared my inability to recall any one, however intimate, to my memory, when I did not see them; and then he said he could not bear me to forget him, and he would put his portrait in my _porte-feuille_, which I conclude he did; but indeed, indeed I have never looked at it or thought of it since;"--and she raised her eloquent eyes, streaming with tears, full in Lord Glenmore's face.