Wild Heather
was tired of sitting up half the night and of going to endless dances and listening to innumerable empty compliments, and being smiled at by men whom I could not take the faintest interest in, and whose names I hardly remembered. But as the summer came on faster and faster, and the London season advanced to its height, I did enjoy my morning walks with Morris. Lady Helen had said something about my having a horse to ride, but up to the present I was not given one, and consequently I walked with Morris, and we invariably went into Hyde Park or Kensington Gardens.

I remember a day early in May, when I unexpectedly met Captain Carbury. I was sitting on a chair, with Morris next to me, when I saw him in the distance. He pushed rapidly through a crowd of people, and came up to my side. He took a chair close to mine.

"Can't you get your maid to walk about for a short time?" he said. "I have something of great importance I want to say to you."

I turned towards Morris.

"Morris, will you kindly go to the first entrance and buy me two shillingsworth of violets?" I said to the girl.

Morris rose at once to do what I asked.

"That's right," said Captain Carbury, when we were alone. "I have such a strange thing to tell you, Miss Grayson."

"That isn't my name now," I said.

"I beg your pardon," he replied, turning a little red, "Miss Dalrymple." Then he added: "I have been wanting to see you for weeks, but did not know how to manage it."

"But was there any difficulty?" I asked. "You know where my father and Lady Helen live. You could have called."

He coloured and looked down on the ground.

"We have met at last," he said, after a pause, "and now I have this to tell you."

"What?"

"You saw Dorothy Vinguard once, didn't you?"

"The girl you are engaged to? Of course."

"I am not engaged to her any longer; our engagement is broken off."


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