'I think there is every hope. I think it is almost certain you will
come home.'

'O Julian, how glad I am!'

'But suppose there should be a surprise for you when you come home,
Milly,--a change that you may not quite like, at first?'

'What change?'

'Has your father told you nothing?'

'Nothing, except about his journeys from place to place, and not
much about them. He has written very seldom during the last six
months.'

'He has been too much engaged, I suppose; and it's rather like him
to have said nothing about it. How would you like a stepmother,
Milly?'

She gave a little cry, and grew suddenly pale.

'Papa has married again!' she said.

Julian Stormont drew a newspaper from his pocket, and laid it before
her, pointing to an announcement in one column:

'On May 18th, at the English legation in Paris, William Darrell,
Esq., of Thornleigh, Yorkshire, to Augusta, daughter of the late