"Thank you; I will forward it to-morrow. She will join me at A----. We return there in about a fortnight."
"It was a most extraordinary occurrence," said Egerton, slowly stirring his cup round and round, "that I should have been in the same church with you at Carrington, and not know it. Why did you not speak to me--call to me--shy a prayer-book at my head! anything, rather than let me miss the good of which I was in search?"
"What a stupid numskull I was not to translate the instinctive feeling of your presence correctly, instead of pooh-poohing it away, after our friend Winter's fashion; however, all's well now. Give my kindest remembrance to Mrs. O'Toole when you write."
"Certainly," said Kate, "I shall not fail."
"Your cousin, Lady Desmond, is in Ireland, so Burton told me; he is a capital fellow; but Dashwood was away, God knows where; and he was the only person it appears who had any trace of you. Do you know where he is?"
"No, he told me he was going to fish in Ireland when I saw him last."
"So Lord Effingham is off to St. Petersburgh, Miss Vernon," said Langley, at this juncture.
Kate felt that Fred's eye was on her, and coloured deeply, as she merely bowed in assent.
"Curious place to winter in," he continued.
Then Winter made some observations about the freezing of the Neva, and the Russian costume; and he and Langley talked on for a good while standing on the hearth-rug, and sipping their tea; but Egerton was silent, for some time; and Kate did not like to look at him; at last he asked--
"Oh yes," answered Mrs. Winter for her. "Sing that pretty new song you got yesterday, my love."
"No, no," cried Egerton, eagerly, "an old one for me--dare I ask for 'The Serenade,' if it would not distress you. I have so often longed to hear it again."
She went to the piano, and struck the well-remembered arpeggio chords so long unheard; she strove to steady her voice, as it rose tremulous with its rich sweetness and deep expression; Egerton leant on the piano, wrapt in memory and contemplation. Kate proceeded very well to the end of the first verse; but there, at the sustained note to which her grandfather had so loved to listen, she faltered, paused, and covering her face with both her hands, for an instant, hastily left the room.