Helen anticipated, the young ladies of the town, her most intimate friends and former school-mates, came in a body that afternoon to see her. The reception formally opened in the great parlor down-stairs, but it was not many minutes before they all found themselves in Helen's chamber fluttering about and chattering like doves in their spring plumage.

“There's no use putting it off longer,” Ida Tarpley, Helen's cousin, laughed; “they are all bent on seeing your things, and they will simply spend the night here if you don't get them out.”

“Oh, I think that would look so vain and silly in me,” Helen protested, her color rising. “I don't like to exhibit my wardrobe as if I were a dressmaker, or a society woman who is hard up and trying to dispose of them.”

“The idea of your not doing it, dear,” Mary King, a little blonde, said, “when not one of us has seen a decent dress or hat since the summer visitors went away last fall.”

“Leave it to me,” Ida Tarpley laughed. “You girls get off the bed. I want something to lay them on. If it were only evening I'd make her put on that gown she wore at the Governor's ball. You remember what the Constitution's society reporter said about it. He said it was a poet's dream. If I ever get one it will be in a dream. You must really wear it to your dance, Helen.”

“My dance?” Helen said, in surprise.

“Oh, I hope I'm not telling secrets,” Ida said; “but I met Keith Gordon and Bob Smith in town as I came on. They had a list and were taking subscriptions from all the young men. They had already enough put down to buy a house and lot. They say they are going to give you the swellest dance that was eyer heard of. Bob said that it simply had to surpass anything you'd been to in Augusta or Atlanta. Expense is not to be considered. The finest band in Chattanooga has already been engaged; the refreshments are to be brought from there by a caterer and a dozen expert waiters. A carload of flowers have been ordered. It is to open with a grand march.” Ida swung her hands and body comically to and fro as if in the cake walk, and bowed low. “Nobody is to be allowed to dance with you who hasn't an evening suit on, and then only once. They are all crazy about you, Helen. I never could understand it. I've tried to copy the look you have in the eyes hundreds of times, but it won't have the slightest effect.”

“There's only one explanation of it,” Miss Wimberley, another girl, remarked; “it is simply because she really likes them all.”

“Well, I really do, as for that,” Helen said; “and I think it is awfully nice of them to give me such a dance. It's enough to turn a girl's head. Well, if Ida really is going to pull out my things, I'll go down-stairs and make you a lemonade.”

Later in the afternoon the young ladies had all gone except Ida Tarpley, who lingered with Helen on the veranda.

“I'm glad the girls didn't have the bad taste to embarrass you by questioning you about Mr. Sanders,” Ida said. “Of course, it is all over town. Uncle spoke of the possibility of it to some one and that put it afloat. I'm anxious to see him, Helen. I know he must be nice—everything, in fact, that a man ought to be, for you always had high ideals.”

Helen flushed almost angrily, and she drew herself erect and stood quite rigid, looking at her cousin.

“Ida,” she said, “I don't like what you have just said.”

“Oh, dearest, I'm sorry, but I thought—”

“That's the trouble about a small town,” Helen went on. “People take such liberties with you, and about the most delicate things. Down in Augusta my friends never would think of saying I was actually engaged to a man till it was announced. But here at home it is in every mouth before they have even seen the gentleman in question.”

“But you really have been receiving constant attentions from Mr. Sanders for more than a year, haven't you, dear?” Miss Tarpley asked, blandly.

“Yes, but what of that?” Helen retorted. “He and I are splendid friends. He has been very kind and thoughtful of my comfort, and I like him. He is noble, sincere, and good. He extended the sweetest sympathy to me when I went down there under my great grief, and I never can forget it, but, nevertheless, Ida, I have not promised to marry him.”

“Oh, I see, it is not actually settled yet,” Miss Tarpley said. “Well, I'm glad. I'm very, very glad.”

“You are glad?” Helen said, wonderingly.

“Yes, I am. I'm glad because I don't want you to go away off down there and marry a stranger to us. I really hope something will break it up. I know Mr. Sanders must be awfully fond of you—any man would be who had a ghost of a chance of winning you—and I know your aunt has been doing all in her power to bring the match about—but I understand you, dear, and I am afraid you would not be happy.”

“Why do you say that so—so positively?” Helen asked, coldly.

“Because,” Ida said, impulsively, “I don't believe a girl of your disposition ever could love in the right way more than once, and—”

“And what?” Helen demanded, her proud lips compressed, her eyes flashing defiantly.

“Well, I may be wrong, dear,” Miss Tarpley went on, “but if you were not actually in love before you went to Augusta, you were very near it.”

“How absurd!” Helen exclaimed, with a little angry toss of her head.

“Do you remember the night our set drove out to the Henderson party? I went with Mr. Garner and Carson Dwight took you? Oh, Helen, I met you and Carson walking together in the moonlight that evening under the apple-trees in the old meadow, and if ever a pair of human beings really loved each other you two must have done so that night. I saw it in his happy, triumphant face, and in the fact, Helen dear, that you allowed him to be with you so much, when you knew other admirers were waiting to see you.”

Helen looked down; her face was clouded over, her proud lip twitched.

“Ida,” she said, tremulously, “I don't want you ever again to mention Carson Dwight's name to me in—in that way. You have no right to.”

“Yes, I have,” Ida protested, firmly. “I have the right as a loyal friend to the best, most suffering, and noblest young man I ever knew. I read you like a book, dear. You really cared very, very much for Carson once, but after your great loss you never thought the same of him again.”

“No, nor I never shall,” Helen said, firmly. “I admire him and shall treat him as a good friend when we meet, but that will be the end of it. Whether I cared for him or not, as girls care for young men, is neither here nor there. It is over with.”

“And all simply because he was a little wild at the time your poor brother—”

“Stop!” Helen said; “don't argue the matter. I can only now associate him with the darkest hour of my life. I'm tempted to tell you something, Ida,” and Helen bowed her head for a moment, and then went on in an unsteady voice. “When my poor brother's trunk was brought home, it was my duty to put the things it contained in order. There I found some letters to him, and one dated only two days before Albert's death was from—from Carson Dwight. I read only a portion of it, but it revealed a page in poor Albert's life that I had never read—never dreamed could be possible.”

“But Carson,” Ida Tarpley exclaimed; “what did he have to do with that?”

Helen swallowed the lump in her throat, and with a cold, steely gleam in her eyes she said, bitterly: “He could have held out his hand with the superior strength you think he has and drawn the poor boy back from the brink, but he didn't. The words he wrote about it were light, flippant, and heartless. He treated the whole awful situation as a joke, as if—as if he himself were familiar with such unmentionable things.”

“Ah, I begin to understand it all now!” Ida sighed. “That letter, coupled with Cousin Albert's awful death, was such a terrible shock that you cannot feel the same towards Carson. But oh, Helen, you would pity him if you knew him now as I do. He has never altered in his feelings towards you. In fact, it seems to me that he loves you even more deeply than ever. And, dear, if you had seen his patient efforts to make a better man of himself you'd not harbor such thoughts against him. You will understand Carson some day, but it may then be too late. I don't believe a woman ever has a real sweetheart but once. You may marry the man your aunt wants you to take, but your heart will some day turn back to the other. You will remember, too, and bitterly, that you condemned him for a youthful fault which you ought to have pardoned.”

“Do you think so, Ida?” Helen asked, her soft, brown eyes averted.

“Yes, and you'll remember, too, that while his other friends were trying to help him stick to his resolutions you turned against him. He's going to make a great and good man, Helen. I've known that for some time. He is having his troubles, but even they will help him to be stronger in the end. His greatest trial is going on right now, while folks are saying that you are going to marry another man. Pshaw! you may say what you like about Mr. Sanders' good qualities, but I know I shall not like him,” concluded Ida, with a smile, as she turned to go. “He is a usurper, and I'm dead against him.”

Helen remained on the veranda after her cousin had left till the twilight gathered about her. She was about to go in, as it was near tea-time, when she heard a grumbling voice down the street and saw old Uncle Lewis returning from town, driving his son, the troublesome Peter, before him.

“You go right thoo dat gate on back ter dat house, you black imp er 'straction!” he thundered, “er I'll tek er boa'd en lambast de life out'n you. Here it is night-time en you ain't chop no stove-wood fer de big house kitchen, en been lyin' roun' dem cotton wagons raisin' mo' rows wid dem mountain white men.”

“What's the matter, Uncle Lewis?” Helen asked, as the boy sulkily passed round the corner of the house and the old man, out of breath, paused at the steps.

“Oh, Missy, you don't know what me'n' Mam' Lindy got to bear up under. We don't know how ter manage dat boy. Lindy right now is out'n 'er head wid worry. Buck Black come tol' us 'bout an hour ago dat Pete en some mo' triflin' niggers was down at de warehouse sassin' some mountain white men. Buck heard Pete say dat Johnson en his gang couldn't whip him ergin dout gittin' in trouble, en dey was in er inch of er big row when de marshal busted it up. Buck ain't no fool, fer a black man, Missy, en he told me'n' Lindy ef we don't manage ter git Pete out'n de company he keeps dat dem white men will sho string 'im up.”

“Yes, something has to be done, that's plain,” said Helen, sympathetically. “I know Mam' Linda must be worrying, and I'll go down to see her this evening. It doesn't seem to me that a town like this is best for a boy like Pete. I'll speak to father about it, Uncle Lewis. It won't do to have Mammy bothered like this. It will kill her. She is not strong enough to stand it.”

“Oh, Missy,” the old man said, “I wish you would try ter do some'n'. Me'n' Lindy is sho at de end er our rope.”

“Well, I promise you I'll do all I can, Uncle Lewis,” Helen said, and, much relieved, the old negro trudged homeward.