"I think you might," said the Colonel, gently; "I could find you a quiet
animal, and to have you with Conrade would be such a protection to him,"
he added, as the boys had rushed out of the room.
"Yes; perhaps, dear boy. But I could not begin alone; it is so long
since I rode. Perhaps when you come back from Ireland."
"I am not going to Ireland."
"I thought you said--" said Fanny looking up surprised; "I am very glad!
But if you wished to go, pray don't think about us! I shall learn to
manage in time, and I cannot bear to detain you."
"You do not detain me," he said, sitting down by her; "I have found what
I was going in search of, and through your means."
"What--what do you mean! You were going to see Miss Williams this
afternoon, I thought!"
"Yes, and it was she whom I was seeking." He paused, and added slowly,
as if merely for the sake of dwelling on the words, "I have found her!"
"Miss Williams!" said Fanny, with perplexed looks.
"Miss Williams!--my Ermine whom I had not seen since the day after her
accident, when we parted as on her deathbed!"
"That sister! Oh, poor thing, I am so glad! But I am sorry!" cried the
much confused Fanny, in a breath; "were not you very much shocked?"
"I had never hoped to see her face in all its brightness again," he
said. "Twelve years! It is twelve years that she has suffered, and of
late she has been brought to this grievous state of poverty, and yet the
spirit is as brave and cheerful as ever! It looks out of the beautiful
eyes--more beautiful than when I first saw them,--I could see and think
of nothing else!"
"Twelve years!" repeated Fanny; "is it so long since you saw her?"
"Almost since I heard of her! She was like a daughter to my aunt at
Beauchamp, and her brother was my schoolfellow. For one summer, when
I was quartered at Hertford, I was with her constantly, but my family
would not even hear of the indefinite engagement that was all we could
have looked to, and made me exchange into the --th."
"Ah! that was the way we came to have you! I must tell you, dear Sir
Stephen always guessed. Once when he had quite vexed poor mamma by
preventing her from joking you in her way about young ladies, he told
me that once, when he was young, he had liked some one who died or was
married, I don't quite know which, and he thought it was the same with
you, from something that happened when you withdrew your application for
leave after your wound."