In after-days, in long after-years when the memory of Lavender House was to come back to Hetty Thornton as one of the sweetest, brightest episodes in her existence--in the days when she was to know almost every blade of grass in the gardens, and to be familiar with each corner of the old house, with each face which now appeared so strange, she might wonder at her feelings to-night, but never even then could she forget them.