necessary duty!) Dubourg was sitting with his back to the window. Lucilla
faced me opposite to him. Her cheeks were flushed with pleasure. She held
in her lap a pretty little golden vase. Her clever fingers were passing
over it rapidly, exactly as they had passed, the previous evening, over
my face.

"Shall I tell you what the pattern is on your vase?" she went on.

"Can you really do that?"

"You shall judge for yourself. The pattern is made of leaves, with birds
placed among them, at intervals. Stop! I think I have felt leaves like
these on the old side of the rectory, against the wall. Ivy?"

"Amazing! it _is_ ivy."

"The birds," she resumed. "I shan't be satisfied till I have told you
what the birds are. Haven't I got silver birds like them--only much
larger--for holding pepper, and mustard, and sugar, and so on. Owls!" she
exclaimed, with a cry of triumph. "Little owls, sitting in ivy-nests.
What a delightful pattern! I never heard of anything like it before."

"Keep the vase!" he said. "You will honor me, you will delight me, if you
will keep the vase."

She rose and shook her head--without giving him back the vase, however.

"I might take it, if you were not a stranger," she said. "Why don't you
tell us who you are, and what your reason is for living all by yourself
in this dull place?"