“Oh, Mr. Arthur, you did come back,” and forgetting,
in her great joy, that Arthur was a gentleman, and she a
waiting-maid, Edith wound her arms around his neck, and
kissed him twice ere he well knew what she was doing.

For an instant the haughty young man felt a flush of
insulted dignity, but it quickly vanished when he saw the
tall form of Richard bending over the little girl and heard
him saying to her,

“Have you no welcoming kiss for me?”

“Yes, forty hundred, if you like,” and in her delight
Edith danced about the room like one insane.

Thrusting the locket slily into Arthur's hand, she whispered.

“I slept with her last night, and dreamed it was not
the first time either. Will you ask her when you see her
if she ever knew me?”

“Yes, yes,” he answered, making a gesture for her to
stop as Richard was about to speak.

“Edith,” said Richard, winding his arm around her,

[figure description] Page 060.[end figure description]

“Edith, I have come to take you home — to take you to
Collingwood to live with me. Do you wish to go?”

“Ain't there ghosts at Collingwood?” asked Edith,
who, now that what she most desired was just within her
reach, began like every human being to see goblins in the
path. “Ain't there ghosts, at Collingwood? — a little boy
with golden curls, and must I sleep in the chamber with
him?”

“Poor child,” said Richard, “You too, have heard
that idle tale. Shall I tell you of the boy with golden
hair?” and holding her so close to him that he could feel
the beating of her heart and hear her soft, low breathing,
he told her all there was to tell of his half-brother Charile,
who died just one day after his young mother, and was
buried in the same coffin.

They could not return to Collingwood that night, and
the evening was spent in the private parlor which Arthur
engaged for himself and his blind friend. It was strange
how fast they grew to liking each other, and it was a
pleasant sight to look at them as they sat there in the
warm firelight which the lateness of the season made
necessary to their comfort — the one softened and toned
down by affliction and the daily cross he was compelled
to bear, the other in the first flush of youth when the
world lay all bright before him and he had naught to do
but enter the Elysian fields and pluck the fairest flowers.

It was late when they separated, but at a comparatively
early hour the next morning they assembled again, this
time to bid good-by, for their paths hereafter lay in different
directions.

“You must write to me, little metaphysics,” said Arthur,
as with hat and shawl in hand he stood in the depot on
the east side of the Hudson.

“Yes,” rejoined Richard, “she is to be my private
amanuensis, and shall let you know of our welfare, and
now, I suppose, we must go.”

[figure description] Page 061.[end figure description]

It was a very pleasant ride to Edith, pleasanter than
when she came with Arthur, but a slight headache made
her drowsy, and leaning on Richard's arm she fell asleep,
nor woke until West Shannondale was reached. The
carriage was in waiting for them, and Victor sat inside.
He had come ostensibly to meet his master, but really to
see the kind of specimen he was bringing to the aristocratic
halls of Collingwood.

Long and earnest had been the discussion there concerning
the little lady; Mrs. Matson, the housekeeper,
sneering rather contemptuously at one who heretofore
had been a servant at Brier Hill. Victor, on the contrary,
stood ready to espouse her cause, thinking within himself
how he would teach her many points of etiquette of
which he knew she must necessarily be ignorant; but
firstly he would, to use his own expression, “see what
kind of metal she was made of.”

Accordingly his first act at the depot was to tread upon
her toes, pretending he did not see her, but Edith knew
he did it purposely, and while her black eyes blazed with
anger, she exclaimed,

“You wretch, how dare you be so rude?”

Assisting Richard into the carriage, Victor was about
to turn away, leaving Edith to take care of herself, when
with all the air of a queen, she said to him,

“Help me in, sir. Don't you know your business!”

“Pardonnez, moi,” returned Victor, speaking in his
mother tongue, and bowing low to the indignant child,
whom he helped to a seat by Richard.

An hour's drive brought them to the gate of Collingwood,
and Edith was certainly pardonable if she did cast
a glance of exultation in the direction of Brier Hill, as
they wound up the gravelled road and through the handsome
grounds of what henceforth was to be her home.

“I guess Mrs. Atherton will be sorry she acted so,” she
thought, and she was even revolving the expediency of

[figure description] Page 062.[end figure description]

putting on airs and not speaking to her former mistress,
when the carriage stopped and Victor appeared at the
window all attention, and asking if he should “assist Miss
Hastings to alight.”

In the door Mrs. Matson was waiting to receive them,
rubbing her gold-bowed spectacles and stroking her heavy
silk with an air which would have awed a child less self-assured
than Edith. Nothing grand or elegant seemed
strange or new to her. On the contrary she took to it
naturally as if it were her native element, and now as she
stepped upon the marble floor of the lofty hall she involuntarily
cut a pirouette, exclaiming, “Oh, but isn't this
jolly! Seems as if I'd got back to Heaven. What a
splendid room to sing in,” and she began to warble a wild,
impassioned air which made Richard pause and listen,
wondering whence came the feeling which so affected him
carrying him back to the hills of Germany.

Mrs. Matson looked shocked, Victor amused, while the
sensible driver muttered to himself as he gathered up his
reins, “That gal is just what Collingwood needs to keep
it from being a dungeon.”

Mrs. Matson had seen Edith at Brier Hill, but this did
not prevent her from a close scrutiny as she conducted
her to the large, handsome chamber, which Richard
in his hasty directions of the previous morning had
said was to be hers, and which, with its light, tasteful
furniture, crimson curtains, and cheerful blazing fire seemed
to the delighted child a second paradise. Clapping her
hands she danced about the apartment, screaming, “It's
the jolliest place I ever was in.”

“What do you mean by that word jolly?” asked Mrs.
Matson, with a great deal of dignity; but ere Edith could
reply, Victor, who came up with the foreign chest, chimed
in, “She means pretty, Madame Matson, and understands
French, no doubt. Parley vous Français?” and he
turned to Edith, who, while recognizing something

[figure description] Page 063.[end figure description]

familiar in the sound, felt sure he was making fun of her and
answered back, “Parley voo fool! I'll tell Mr. Harrington
how you tease me.”

Laughing aloud at her reply, Victor put the chest in
its place, made some remark concerning its quaint appearance,
and bowed himself from the room, saying to her as
he shut the door,

“Bon soir, Mademoiselle.”

“I've heard that kind of talk before,” thought Edith,
as she began to brush her hair, preparatory to going down
to supper, which Mrs. Matson said was waiting.

At the table she met with the old man, who had seen
her alight from the carriage, and had asked the mischievous
Victor, “Who was the small biped Richard had brought
home?”

“That,” said Victor. “Why, that is Charlie turned
into a girl.” And preposterous as the idea seemed, the
old man siezed upon it at once, smoothing Edith's hair
when he saw her, tapping her rosy cheeks, calling her
Charlie, and muttering to himself of the wonderful process
which had transformed his fair-haired boy into a
black-haired girl.

Sometimes the utter impossibility of the thing seemed
to penetrate even his darkened mind, and then he would
whisper, “I'll make believe it's Charlie, any way,” so
Charlie he persisted in calling her, and Richard encouraged
him in this whim, when he found how much satisfaction
it afforded the old man to “make believe.”

The day following Edith's arrival at Collingwood there
was a long consultation between Richard and Victor concerning
the little girl, about whose personal appearance
the former would now know something definite.

“How does Edith Hastings look?” he asked, and after
a moment of grave deliberation, Victor replied,

“She has a fat round face, with regular features, except
that the nose turns up somewhat after the spitfire order,

[figure description] Page 064.[end figure description]

and her mouth is a trifle too wide. Her forehead is not
very high — it would not become her style if it were.
Her hair is splendid — thick, black and glossy as satin,
and her eyes,— there are not words enough either in the
French or English language with which to describe her
eyes — they are so bright and deep that nobody can look
into them long without wincing. I should say, sir, if put
on oath, there was a good deal of the deuce in her eyes.”

“When she is excited, you mean,” interrupted Richard.
“How are they in repose?”

“They are never there,” returned Victor. “They roll
and turn and flash and sparkle, and light upon one so uncomfortably,
that he begins to think of all the badness he
ever did, and to wonder if those coals of fire can't ferret
out the whole thing.”

“I like her eyes,” said Richard, “but go on. Tell me
of her complexion.”

“Black, of course,” continued Victor, “but smooth as
glass, with just enough of red in it to make rouge unnecessary.
On the whole I shouldn't wonder if in seven or
eight years' time she'd be as handsome as the young lady
of Collingwood ought to be.”

“How should she be dressed?” asked Richard, who
knew that Victor's taste upon such matters was infallible,
his mother and sister both having been Paris mantuamakers.

“She should have scarlet and crimson and dark blue
trimmed with black,” said Victor, adding that he presumed
Mrs. Atherton would willingly attend to those matters.

Richard was not so sure, but he thought it worth the
while to try, and he that night dispatched Victor to Brier
Hill with a request that she would, if convenient, call
upon him at once.

“Don't tell her what I want,” he said, “I wish to surprise
her with a sight of Edith.”

Victor promised obedience and set off for Brier Hill,

[figure description] Page 065.[end figure description]

where he found no one but Rachel, sitting before the
kitchen fire, and watching the big red apples roasting upon
the hearth.

“Miss Grace had started that morning for New York,”
she said, “and the Lord only knew when she'd come
home.”

“And as he probably won't tell, I may as well go back,”
returned Victor, and bidding Rachel send her mistress to
Collingwood as soon as she should return, he bowed himself
from the room.

As Rachel said, Grace had gone to New York, and the
object of her going was to repair the wrong done to Edith
Hastings, by taking her a second time from the Asylum,
and bringing her back to Brier Hill. Day and night the
child's parting words, “You'll be sorry sometime,” rang
in her ears, until she could endure it no longer, and she astonished
the delighted Rachel by announcing her intention
of going after the little girl. With her to will was
to do, and while Victor was reporting her absence to his
master, she, half-distracted, was repeating the words of
the matron,

“Has not been here at all, and have not heard from her
either! What can it mean?”

The matron could not tell, and for several days Grace
lingered in the city, hoping Arthur would appear, but as
he failed to do this, she at last wrote to him at Geneva,
and then, in a sad, perplexed state of mind, returned to
Shannondale, wondering at and even chiding old Rachel
for evincing so little feeling at her disappointment.

But old Rachel by this time had her secret which she
meant to keep, and when at last Grace asked if any one
had called during her absence, she mentioned the names
of every one save Victor, and then tried very hard to
think “who that 'tother one was. She knowed there
was somebody else, but for the life of her she couldn't” —
Rachel did not quite dare to tell so gross a falsehood,

[figure description] Page 066.[end figure description]

and so at this point she concluded to think, and added
suddenly,

“Oh, yes, I remember now. 'Twas that tall, longhaired,
scented-up, big-feelin' man they call Squire Herrin'ton's
vally.”

“Victor Dupres been here!” and Grace's face lighted
perceptibly.

“Yes, he said mouse-eer, or somethin' like that — meanin'
the squire, in course — wanted you to come up thar as
soon as you got home, and my 'pinion is that you go to
oncet. 'Twont be dark this good while.”

Nothing could be more in accordance with Grace's feelings
than to follow Rachel's advice, and, half an hour later,
Victor reported to his master that the carriage from
Brier Hill had stopped before their door. It would be
impossible to describe Mrs. Atherton's astonishment when,
on entering the parlor, the first object that met her view
was her former waiting-maid, attired in the crimson merino
which Mrs. Matson, Lulu, the chambermaid, and Victor
had gotten up between them; and which, though not
the best fit in the world, was, in color, exceedingly becoming
to the dark-eyed child, who, perched upon the
music-stool, was imitating her own operatic songs to the
infinite delight of the old man, nodding his approval of
the horrid discords.

“Edith Hastings!” she exclaimed, What are you doing
here?” Springing from the stool and advancing towards
Grance, Edith replied,

“I live here. I'm Mr. Richard's little girl. I eat at
the table with him, too, and don't have to wash the dishes
either. I'm going to be a lady just like you, ain't I, Mr.
Harrington?” and she turned to Richard, who had entered
in time to hear the last of her remarks.

There was a world of love in the sightless eyes turned
toward the little girl, and by that token, Grace Atherton
knew that Edith had spoken truly.

[figure description] Page 067.[end figure description]

“Run away, Edith,” he said, “I wish to talk with the
lady alone.”

Edith obeyed, and when she was gone Richard explained
to Grace what seemed to her so mysterious, while she
in return confessed the injustice done to the child, and
told how she had sought to repair the wrong.

“I am glad you have taken her,” she said. “She will
be happier with you than with me, for she likes you best.
I think, too, she will make good use of any advantages
you may give her. She has a habit of observing closely,
while her powers of imitation are unsurpassed. She
is fond of elegance and luxury, and nothing can please
her more than to be an equal in a house like this. But
what do you wish of me? What can I do to assist you?”

In a few words Richard stated his wishes that she
should attend to Edith's wardrobe, saying he had but
little faith in Mrs. Matson's taste. He could not have
selected a better person to spend his money than Grace,
who, while purchasing nothing out of place, bought always
the most expensive articles in market, and when at last
the process was ended, and the last dressmaker gone from
Collingwood, Victor, with a quizzical expression upon his
face, handed his master a bill for five hundred dollars, that
being the exact amount expended upon Edith's wardrobe.
But Richard uttered no word of complaint. During the
few weeks she had lived with him she had crept away
down into his heart just where Charlie used to be, and
there was nothing in his power to give which he would
withhold from her now. She should have the best of teachers,
he said, particularly in music, of which she was passionately
fond.

Accordingly, in less than a week there came to Collingwood
a Boston governess, armed and equipped with all
the accomplishments of the day; and beneath the supervision
of Richard and Victor, Grace Atherton and Mrs.
Chapen, Edith's education began.

p593-073 CHAPTER IX. WOMANHOOD.

[figure description] Page 068.[end figure description]

Eight times have the Christmas fires been kindled on
the hearths of Shannondale's happy homes; eight times
the bell from St Luke's tower has proclaimed an old year
dead, and a new one born; eight times the meek-eyed
daisy struggling through the April snow, has blossomed,
faded and died; eight times has summer in all her glowing
beauty sat upon the New England hills, and the mellow
autumnal light of the hazy October days falls on
Collingwood for the eighth time since last we trod the
winding paths and gravelled walks where now the yellow
leaves are drifting down from the tall old maples and lofty
elms, and where myriad flowers of gorgeous hue are lifting
their proud heads unmindful of the November frosts
hastening on apace. All around Collingwood seems the
same, save that the shrubs and vines show a more luxurious
growth, and the pond a wider sweep, but within there
is an empty chair, a vacant place, for the old man has gone
to join his lost ones where there is daylight forever, and
the winter snows have four times fallen upon his grave.
They missed him at first and mourned for him truly, but
they have become accustomed to live without him, and
the household life goes on much as it did before.

It is now the afternoon of a mild October day, and the
doors and windows are opened wide to admit the warm
south wind, which, dallying for a moment with the curtains
of costly lace, floats on to the chamber above, where
it toys with the waving plumes a young girl is arranging
upon her riding hat, pausing occasionally to speak to the
fair blonde who sits watching her movements, and whose

[figure description] Page 069.[end figure description]

face betokens a greater maturity than her own, for Grace
Atherton's family Bible says she is thirty-two, while Edith
is seventeen.

Beautiful Edith Hastings. Eight years of delicate nurture,
tender care and perfect health have ripened her into
a maiden of wondrous beauty, and far and near the people
talk of the blind man's ward, the pride and glory of
Collingwood. Neither pains nor money, nor yet severe
discipline, have been spared by Richard Harrington to
make her what she is, and while her imperious temper
has bent to the one, her intellect and manners have expanded
and improved beneath the influence of the other,
and Richard has not only a plaything and pet in the little
girl he took from obscurity, but also a companion and
equal, capable of entering with him the mazy labyrinths
of science, and astonishing him with the wealth of her
richly stored mind. Still, in everything pertaining to her
womanhood she is wholly feminine and simple-hearted as
a child. Now, as of old, she bounds through the spacious
grounds of Collingwood, trips over the grassy lawn,
dances up the stairs, and fills the once gloomy old place
with a world of melody and sunlight. Edith knows that
she is beautiful! old Rachel has told her so a thousand
times, while Victor, the admiring valet, tells her so every
day, taking to himself no little credit for having taught
her, as he thinks, something of Parisian manners. Many
are the conversations she holds with him in his mother
tongue, for she has learned to speak that language with a
fluency and readiness which astonished her teachers and
sometimes astonished herself. It did not seem difficult to
her, but rather like an old friend, and Marie at first was
written on every page of Ollendorff. But Marie has faded
now almost entirely from her mind, as have those other
mysterious memories which used to haunt her so.
Nothing but the hair hidden in the chest binds her to the
past, and at this she often looks, wondering where the

[figure description] Page 070.[end figure description]

head it once adorned is lying, whether in the noisy city
or on some grassy hillside where the wild flowers she
loves best are growing, and the birds whose songs she
tries to imitate, pause sometimes to warble a requiem for
the dead. Those tresses are beautiful, but not so beautiful
as Edith's. Her blue-black hair is thicker, glossier, more
abundant than in her childhood, and is worn in heavy
braids or bands around her head, adding greatly to her
regal style of beauty. Edith has a pardonable pride in
her satin hair, and as she stands before the mirror she
steals an occasional glance at her crowning glory, which
is this afternoon arranged with far more care than usual;
not for any particular reason, but because she had a fancy
that it should be so.

They were going to visit Grassy Spring, a handsome
country seat, whose grounds lay contiguous to those of
Collingwood, and whose walls were in winter plainly discernible
from the windows of the upper rooms. It had
recently been purchased and fitted up somewhat after the
style of Collingwood, and its owner was expected to take
possession in a few days. Edith's heart always beat faster
when she heard his name, for Arthur St. Claire was
one of the links of the past which still lingered in her
remembrance. She had never seen him since they parted
in Albany, and after his leaving college she lost sight of
him entirely. Latterly, however, she had heard from
Grace, who knew but little more of him than herself,
that he was coming into their very neighborhood; that
he had purchased Grassy Spring, and was to keep a kind
of bachelor's hall, inasmuch as he had no wife, nor yet a
prospect of any. So much Edith knew and no more.
She did not dare to speak of Nina, for remembering her
solemn promise, she had never breathed that name to any
living being. But the picture in the glass, as she ever
termed it, was not forgotten, and the deep interest she felt
in Grassy Spring was owing, in a great measure, to the
fact that Nina was in her mind intimately associated with

[figure description] Page 071.[end figure description]

the place. Sooner or later she should meet her there, she
was sure; should see those golden curls again, and look
into those soft blue eyes, whose peculiar expression she
remembered as if it were but yesterday since they first
met her view.

“It is strange your cousin never married; he must, by
this time, be nearly twenty-seven,” she said to Grace,
thinking the while of Nina, and carelessly adjusting the
jaunty hat upon her head.

“I think so too,” returned Grace. “When quite young
he was very fond of the ladies, but I am told that he now
utterly ignores female society. Indeed, in his last letter
to me, he states distinctly that he wishes for no company
except occasional calls in a friendly way.”

“Been disappointed, probably,” suggested Edith, still
thinking of Nina, and wondering if Arthur did love her
so very much as to put faith in no one because of her
treachery.

“It may be,” said Grace; “and if so, isn't it a little queer
that he and Mr. Harrington should live so near each other;
both so eccentric; both so handsome and rich; both been
disappointed; and both so desirable as husbands?”

“Disappointed, Mrs. Atherton! Has Mr. Harrington
been disappointed?” and the rich bloom on Edith's cheek
deepened to a scarlet hue, which Grace did not fail to
notice.

Her friendship for Edith Hastings had been a plant of
sluggish growth, for she could not, at once, bring herself
to treat as an equal one whom she formerly held as a servant,
but time and circumstances had softened her haughty
pride, while Edith's growing popularity, both in the
village and at Collingwood, awakened in her a deep interest
for the young girl, who, meeting her advances more
than half the way, compelled her at last to surrender, and
the two were now as warm friends as individuals well can
be when there is between them so great a disparity of

[figure description] Page 072.[end figure description]

years and so vast a difference in disposition. In Grace's
heart the olden love for Richard had not died out, and
hitherto, it had been some consolation to believe that no
other ear would ever listen to the words of love, to
remember which continually would assuredly drive her
mad. But matters now were changed. Day by day,
week by week, month by month, and year by year, a rose
had been unfolding itself at Collingwood, and with every
opening petal had grown more and more precious to the
blind man, until more than one crone foretold the end; and
Grace Atherton, grown fonder of gossip than she was
wont to be, listened to the tale, and watched, and wondered,
and wept, and still caressed and loved the bright, beautiful
girl, whom she dreaded as a powerful rival. This it
was which prompted her to speak of Richard's disappointment;
and when she saw the effect produced upon Edith,
it emboldened her to go on, and tell how, years and years
ago, when Richard Harrington first went to Europe, he
had sued for the hand of a young girl whom he met there,
and who, while loving him dearly, shrank from walking
in his shadow, and gave herself to another.

“I must not tell you the name of this faithless girl,”
said Grace. “It is sufficient that her refusal made Richard
gloomy, eccentric and misanthropical; in short, it
nearly ruined him.”

“My curse be on the woman's head who wrought this
ruin, then,” said Edith, her black eyes flashing with something
of their former fire.

She had forgotten the scene in the kitchen of Brier Hill
when Rachel whispered to her that Grace Atherton was
in love, and she had now no suspicion that the calm, white-faced
woman sitting there before her was the being she
would curse. Neither was her emotion caused, as Grace
imagined, by any dread lest the early love of Richard
Harrington should stand between herself and him. The
thought that she could be his wife had never crossed her

[figure description] Page 073.[end figure description]

brain, and her feelings were those of indignation toward
a person who could thus cruelly deceive a man as noble
and good as Richard, and of pity for him who had been
so deceived.

“I will love him all the more and be the kinder to him
for this vile creature's desertion,” she thought, as she beat
the floor nervously with the little prunella gaiter, and this
was all the good Grace Atherton had achieved.

Edith had cursed her to her face, and with a sigh audible
only to herself she arose and said laughingly, “It's
time we were off, and you've certainly admired that figure
in the glass long enough. What do you think of yourself,
any way?”

“Why,” returned Edith, in the same light, bantering
tone, “I think I'm rather jolie, as I used to say. I wonder
where I picked up that word. Victor says I must
have had a French nurse, but I'm sure I was too poor for
that. I wish I knew where I did come from and who I
am. It's terrible, this uncertainty as to one's birth. I
may be marrying my brother one of these days, who
knows?”

“See rather that you do not marry your father,” retorted
Grace, following Edith as she tripped down the stairs
and down the walk, whipping the tufts of box as she went,
and answering to Grace who asked if she did not sometimes
find her duties irksome at Collingwood. “Never,
never. The links of my chains are all made of love
and so they do not chafe. Then, too, when I remember
what Richard has done for me and how few sources
of happiness he has, I am willing to give my whole
life to him, if need be. Why, Mrs. Atherton, you can't
imagine how his dark features light up with joy, when
on his return from riding or from transacting business
he hears me in the hall, and knows that I am there to
meet him,” and Edith's bright face sparkled and glowed
as she thought how often the blind man had blessed her

[figure description] Page 074.[end figure description]

with his sightless but speaking eyes, when she gave up
some darling project which would take her from his side
and stayed to cheer his solitude.

They had mounted their horses by this time, and at
the speed which characterized Edith's riding, dashed down
the road and struck into the woods, the shortest route to
Grassy Spring. With the exception of Collingwood,
Grassy Spring was the handsomest country seat for miles
around, and thinking, as she continually did, of Nina,
Edith rather gave it the preference as she passed slowly
through the grounds and drew near to the building.
Grace had seen the housekeeper, Mrs. Johnson, a talkative
old lady, who, big with the importance of her office,
showed them over the house, pointing out this elegant
piece of furniture and that handsome room with quite as
much satisfaction as if it had all belonged to herself.

In the third story, and only accessible by two flights
of stairs leading from Arthur's suite of rooms, was a large
square apartment, the door of which Mrs. Johnson unlocked
with a mysterious shake of the head, saying to the
ladies, “The Lord only knows what this place is for
Mr. St. Claire must have fixed it himself, for I found it
locked tighter than a drum, but I accidentally found on
the but'ry shelf a rusty old key, that fits it to a T. I've
been in here once and bein' you're his kin,” nodding to
Grace, “and t'other one is with you, it can't do an atom
of harm for you to go. He's took more pains with this
chamber than with all the rest, and when I asked what
'twas for, he said it was his “den,” where he could hide if
he wanted to.”

“Don't go,” whispered Edith, pulling at Grace's dress.
“Mr. St. Claire might not like it.”

But Grace felt no such scruples, and was already across
the threshold, leaving Edith by the door.

“It's as bad to look in as to go in,” thought Edith, and
conquering her curiosity with a mighty effort, she walked

[figure description] Page 075.[end figure description]

resolutely down stairs, having seen nothing save that the
carpet was of the richest velvet and that the windows
had across them slender iron bars, rather ornamental than
otherwise, and so arranged as to exclude neither light nor
air.

Grace, on the contrary, examined the apartment thoroughly,
thinking Mrs. Johnson right when she said that
more pains had been taken with this room than with all the
others. The furniture was of the most expensive and elegant
kind. Handsome rosewood easy-chairs and sofas
covered with rich satin damask, the color and pattern corresponding
with the carpet and curtains. Ottomans, divans
and footstools were scattered about — pictures and
mirrors adorned the walls, while in one corner, covered
with a misty veil of lace, hung the portrait of a female in
the full, rich bloom of womanhood, her light chestnut
curls falling about her uncovered neck, and her dreamy
eyes of blue having in them an expression much like that
which Edith had once observed in Nina's peculiar eyes.
The dress was quite old-fashioned, indicating that the picture
must have been taken long ago, and while Grace gazed
upon it her wonder grew as to whose it was and whence
it came.

“Look at the bed,” said Mrs. Johnson, and touching
Grace's elbow, she directed her attention to a side recess,
hidden from view by drapery of exquisite lace, and containing
a single bed, which might have been intended for
an angel, so pure and white it looked with its snowy covering.

“What does it mean?” asked Grace, growing more
and more bewildered, while Mrs. Johnson replied in her
favorite mode of speech.

“The Lord only knows — looks as if he was going to
make it a prison for some princess; but here's the queerest
thing of all,” and she thumped upon a massive door, which
was locked and barred, and beyond which her prying eyes
had never looked.

[figure description] Page 076.[end figure description]

Over the door was a ventilator, and Grace, quite as curious
as Mrs. Johnson, suggested that a chair or table be
brought, upon which she, being taller than her companion,
might stand and possibly obtain a view.

“What do you see?” asked Mrs. Johnson, as Grace, on
tip-toe, peered into what seemed to be a solitary cell, void
of furniture of every kind, save a little cot, corresponding
in size with the fairy bed in the recess, but in naught else
resembling it, for its coverings were of the coarsest,
strongest materials, and the pillows scanty and small.

Acting from a sudden impulse, Grace determined not to
tell Mrs. Johnson what she saw, and stepping down from
the table, which she quickly rolled back to its place, she
said,

“It's nothing but a closet, where, I dare say, Mr. St.
Claire will keep his clothes when he occupies his den.
You must not let any one else in here, for Arthur might
be offended.”

Mrs. Johnson promised obedience, and turning the rusty
key, followed her visitor down the two long flights of
stairs, she, returning to her duties, while Grace went to
the pleasant library, where, with her hat and whip upon
the floor, Edith sat reading the book she had ventured to
take from the well-filled shelves, and in which she had
been so absorbed as not to hear the slight rustling in the
adjoining room, where a young man was standing in the
enclosure of the deep bay window, and gazing intently at
her. He had heard from Mrs. Johnson's daughter that
some ladies were going over the house, and not caring to
meet them, he stepped into the recess of the window just
as Edith entered the library. As the eye of the stranger
fell upon her, he came near uttering an exclamation of
surprise that anything so graceful, so queenly, and withal
so wondrously beautiful, should be found in Shannondale,
which, with his city ideas still clinging to him, seemed
like an out-of-the-way place, where the girls were buxom,

[figure description] Page 077.[end figure description]

good-natured and hearty, just as he remembered Kitty
Maynard to have been, and not at all like this creature of
rare loveliness sitting there before him, her head inclined
gracefully to the volume she was reading, and showing to
good advantage her magnificent hair.

“Who can she be?” he thought, and a thrill of unwonted
admiration ran through his veins as Edith raised
for a moment her large eyes of midnight blackness, and
from his hiding-place he saw how soft and mild they were
in their expression. “Can Grace have spirited to her retreat
some fair nymph for company? Hark! I hear her
voice, and now for the solution of the mystery.”

Standing back a little further, so as to escape observation,
the young man waited till Grace Atherton came
near.

“Here you are,” she said, “poring over a book as usual.
I should suppose you'd had enough of that to do in reading
to Mr. Harrington — German Philosophy, too! Will
wonders never cease? Arthur was right, I declare, when
he dubbed you Metaphysics!”

“Edith Hastings!” The young man said it beneath his
breath, while he involuntarily made a motion forward.

“Can it be possible, and yet now that I know it, I see
the little black-eyed elf in every feature. Well may the
blind man be proud of his protegé. She might grace the
saloons of Versailles, and rival the Empress herself!”

Thus far he had soliloquised, when something Grace
was saying caught his ear and chained his attention at
once.

“Oh, Edith,” she began, “you don't know what you
lost by being over squeamish. Such a perfect jewel-box
of a room, with the tiniest single bed of solid mahogany!
Isn't it queer that Arthur should have locked it up, and
isn't it fortunate for us that Mrs. Johnson found that rusty
old key which must have originally belonged to the
door of the Den, as she says he calls it?”

[figure description] Page 078.[end figure description]

Anxiously the young man awaited Edith's answer, his
face aglow with indignation and his eyes flashing with anger.

“Fortunate for you, perhaps,” returned Edith, tying on
her riding-hat, “but I wouldn't have gone in for anything.”

“Why not?” asked Grace, walking into the hall.

“Because,” said Edith, “Mr. St. Claire evidently did not
wish any one to go in, and I think Mrs. Johnson was
wrong in opening the door.”

“What a little Puritan it is!” returned Grace, playfully
caressing the rosy cheeks of Edith, who had now joined
her in the hall. “Arthur never will know, for I certainly
shall not tell either him or any one, and I gave Mrs.
Johnson some very wholesome advice upon that subject.
There she is now in the back-yard. If you like, we'll go
round and give her a double charge.”

The young man saw them as they turned the corner of
the building, and gliding from his post, he hurried up the
stairs and entering the Den, locked the door, and throwing
himself upon the sofa, groaned aloud, while the drops
of perspiration oozed out upon his forehead, and stood
thickly about his lips. Then his mood changed, and pacing
the floor he uttered invectives against the meddlesome
Mrs. Johnson, who, by this one act, had proved that she
could not be trusted. Consequently she must not remain
longer at Grassy Spring, and while in the yard below Mrs.
Johnson was promising Grace “to be as still as the dead,”
Arthur St. Claire was planning her dismissal. This done,
and his future course decided upon, the indignant young
man felt better, and began again to think of Edith Hastings,
whom he admired for her honorable conduct in refusing
to enter a place where she had reason to think she
was not wanted.

“Noble, high-principled girl,” he said. “I'm glad I told
Mr. Harrington what I did before seeing her. Otherwise

p593-084 [figure description] Page 079.[end figure description]

he might have suspected that her beauty had something
to do with my offer, and so be jealous lest I had designs
upon his singing-bird, as he called her. But alas, neither
beauty, nor grace, nor purity can now avail with me, miserable
wretch that I am,” and again that piteous moan, as
of a soul punished before its time, was heard in the silent
room.

But hark, what sound is that, which, stealing through
the iron-latticed windows, drowns the echo of that moan,
and makes the young man listen? It is Edith Hastings
singing one of her wild songs, and as the full rich melody
of her wonderful voice falls upon his ear, Arthur St.
Claire bows his head upon his hands and weeps, for the
music carries him back to the long ago when he had no
terrible secret haunting every hour, but was as light-hearted
as the maiden whom, as she gallops away on her
swift-footed Arabian, he looks after, with wistful eyes,
watching her until the sweep of her long riding-skirt and
the waving of her graceful plumes disappear beneath the
shadow of the dim woods, where night is beginning to
fall. Slowly, sadly, he turns from the window — merrily,
swiftly, the riders dash along, and just as the clock strikes
six, their panting steeds pause at the entrance to Collingwood.