Life at Poplar-grove was much as it had been, the previous summer; still and bright. The mornings were spent in Carry's pleasant sewing-room, from which male visitors were rigorously excluded; in the afternoon, were the siesta, and ride or walk; at night, music and social chat. Carry feared that this monotony, while it suited her wishes and employments, might be less agreeable to her friend; that she would miss the gay whirl, the intoxicating incense of her city career. But Ida was contented, even happy. Beloved and caressed by the whole household, in the home of kindred tastes and feeling; and above all, with the firm hope that her life-long search was at last ended; her wild cravings laid to rest beneath the waves, which welling from the unsealed fountain, had risen higher and higher, until her soul was overflowing with love and rapture;—she revelled in the quiet hours of friendly communion, and the sweeter seasons of witching reverie. Carry knew nothing of the spring of her happiness. She saw that her mind had acquired a more healthy tone;—that her affections had expanded, and attributed it to the influence of friendship;—to a strength of mind, which had determined the world should be what it chose to have it;—to anything but the true cause,—an idolatry that left no room for suspicion or discontent. Once Carry alluded to the twilight promenade, when Ida had told her of her forebodings of the wane of their love, after the nuptials, which were now fast approaching; and was answered by a warm embrace and smile, which said those fears were quelled, and might have betrayed to more prying eyes, the enchantment that had exorcised them. Her evening improvisations entranced, not only the parlor-circle, but drew to the windows a larger audience from without, spellbound by her heart-melodies. All her delight was not in memory. Letters came and went;—from Charley and Mrs. Dana; and gossiping notes from Anna Talbot and other of "the girls." These, Carry enjoyed with her, and asked no questions about those which she did not see. Morton's were what he engaged they should be; sincere and friendly, without a hint that could alarm her delicacy. They were tinctured with a sadness, she did not comprehend, until she noticed his many references to his sister's sufferings, and his anxiety on her account. It was her turn to console; and her most valued treasure was the letter, in which he thanked and blessed her.

Carry was to be married the last of July. The middle of June brought Mrs. Dana and the children, under Charley's protection. For the week of his stay, he was the life of the house. One cloud was upon the spirits of all;—Lynn was missed and mourned, and by none, with more sorrowful tenderness, than by his vivacious friend; but he was unselfish even in this. Ida could win him to speak of their loss; to the others, he never mentioned it of his own accord. She was correct in saying that he had grown more communicative and affectionate. He seemed to have transferred to her the watchful love that had been Lynn's safeguard and solace.

"Nothing changes you, Mars' Charley?" said Uncle Ike, the plantation patriarch, halting at the piazza steps one afternoon, when he had crawled out into the sunshine.

"I should like to say the same for you, Uncle Ike; time and sickness have not treated you as well as you deserve."

"Better'n I desarve, Mars' Charles!—heap better'n I desarve! Time for me to be packed and shoed for my journey. I'se lived in these low-grounds of sorrow, nigh 'pon ninety years, and many' the young folks I've seen step down into the grave before me. When I heard that poor, handsome Mars' Lynn had gone too, 'pears-like I was ready to grumble 'cause 'twant me—but 'twas the Almighty's will, Mars' Charles,—'twas his will. It 'joices me to see you so well and lively—jest like you used to be. You don't take trouble, I reckon, Marster."

"No; it's against my principles;—beside, we'll have a plenty given to us."

"Fact, Marster! You ain't knowed much yet; but 'the evil days will come, when you shall say, I have no pleasure in them!'"

Charley kept his seat upon the step for some time after the old man had gone:—once he sighed heavily. Ida was in the parlor, and longed to go out to him, for she guessed the tenor of his thoughts, but doubted the propriety of intruding upon them. He got up, presently, and began to walk the porch, whistling an opera air. Spying her through the window, he came in. "You are ruining your eyes and health with this eternal stitching;" said he. "As I live, you are boring holes in that piece of cloth, for the pleasure of sewing them up again! No wonder woman's work is never ended! What are you making?"

"A handkerchief." She displayed the corner, in which she was embroidering, "Carry Carleton."

"Where are the others?" he inquired.

"Mrs. Dana is in the nursery; Carry asleep; Dr. Carleton and Arthur abroad."

"Come, walk with me!" requested he. "Any handkerchief,—a wedding mouchoir—can wait an hour."

Their course was along the brink of a deep ravine; overshadowed by large old trees; and bridged by fallen trunks. The sides were grass-grown, and at the bottom rolled the rivulet, which had fretted out the gorge; blending its complainings with the low rush of the wind through the forest.

"So one feeling often wears away the soul!" remarked Charley, reflectively. "Man is but clay after all!"

"You! the champion of your species—turning against them!" exclaimed Ida.

"No. I am still an unbeliever in the total corruption of our nature; a doctrine so opposed to reason and experience, that I will never assent to it, if it is preached at me until doomsday. But this is a miserably unsatisfactory life!"

"Yet the world says you enjoy it."

"And do you, an adept in concealment, credit a man's outward show!"

"At least, I do not practise this accomplishment upon my friends;" replied Ida, piqued.

"Did I say that you did? I am not sure that I could not prove this point, too;—but we will let it pass for the present. I believe you to be what you appear to me. Carry would never forgive one who impugned your sincerity;—and what would Mr. Germaine say?"

This was a gentleman of the neighbourhood, whose marked attentions to Ida subjected her to the raillery of the Poplar-grove household.

"Nonsense!" said she, laughing. "He has never been beyond the outermost court of my heart."

"I own his does not appear likely to be the hand to unlock the penetralia. This is the spot I wanted to show you. Is it not a fairy nook?"

It was a mossy bank at the foot of a venerable sycamore, from whose branches the trailing vines touched their heads. A spring of the clearest crystal bubbled among its roots.

"Oh! for a fairy goblet!" said Ida.

"It is easily made, if these leaves are large enough," answered Charley. He gathered some, but they were too irregularly-shaped to suit his purpose. "It is a simple process," said he, as he failed, after several trials, to convey a thimbleful of water to his amused companion; "but as the man said who tried to fly and couldn't—'there is every thing in knowing how to do it.' I never like to be outdone, even in trifles. I saw some leaves as we came along that I know will do—excuse me a moment, and I will get them."

He was gone before she could object; and she strolled idly around the giant trunk of the sycamore, admiring the al fresco boudoir, of which it was the centre ornament. She set her foot upon something harder than the soft carpet—it was a small morocco case, which she picked up, with an ejaculation of surprise, and without a thought of who had dropped it, opened. She had nearly let it fall, as Carry's lovely face smiled at her from within. "Arthur has been here," was her comment, but a glossy curl untwined itself from an envelope labelled in Charley's hand—"The seat under the honeysuckle. May 1st, 18—," a date four years back. There was no impropriety in his having Carry's likenesss;—they had long been in feeling what they were shortly to become in name—brother and sister; but her heart beat so with indefinable terror that she could not stand;—it was as though, instead of the senseless case, another heart, its every throbbing revealed, lay in her hand.

"You are tired waiting, I suppose, but I had a longer search than—"

The glow of a stormy sunset rushed to his face as he saw the miniature she did not attempt to conceal. She had never conceived of the dormant passion which now awoke in his eye and form; but she did not quail.

"I found this over there, and opened it thoughtlessly, not suspecting what it was or to whom it belonged. I am very sorry."

The storm passed while she was speaking. The man's wonderful self-command was master. He dipped up the water with a careful hand; the leafy cup did not quiver.

"Do you like it? is it cool?"

"Yes—thank you."

He drank draught after draught himself, threw away the leaves, and resumed his seat upon the bank.

"There is no help for it, Ida! you must hear what I did not intend you ever should; not that I disdain your sympathy, but it is a rule with me not to disturb my friends with troubles, which they cannot alleviate. I do not know what suspicions have been forced upon you; if they are of the honor and affection I owe my brother, or of her fidelity to him, they are groundless. That picture was painted for me before I had any intimation that his was the prize I foolishly hoped to secure. I relinquished her; but this is the amulet which has saved me in many temptations. Although hope was no more, memory remained; and vice could not mate with the visions of purity that memory recalled. There has not been a time since I first saw her, a laughing babe, just liberated from her nurse's arms, when I have not loved her more than any other earthly being. As boy and man I have thought, studied, labored for her alone. When I quitted home to seek my fortune, she was still a child, who clung weepingly to me, and kissed me as fondly as she did her father. It was the last time! At my next visit she was away at school;—at the second I obtained that curl. She was then fifteen; innocent and loving, full of jesting surprise at 'Charley's mannish ways,' and hurt that I would not call her 'sister.' She did not ask this the ensuing summer. Lynn was with me; and in the confidence of a hope that saw no cloud ahead, I imparted to him my dreams and desires, and engaged him to take her portrait secretly. I went back to New York, and wrote to her father, asking his sanction of the proposal I could not delay. The letter was upon my desk, ready for the post, when one arrived from Arthur. He was not to blame for his silence; I had been as reserved to him; but he entreated my forgiveness for hiding this, his only secret, from me. She knew it now;—her father's only objection was their youth—a 'fault,' he remarked, jocosely, 'which will mend with time.' In place of the letter to my guardian, I forwarded one to my brother, congratulating him upon his happy engagement to the woman I idolized. He is worthy of her, if a mortal can be. I can see that it is best. He has talents and energy, and loves her as she should be loved—I am rough and eccentric, caring and striving for nothing, now that my guiding star has set."

"Charley! Charley! you shall not so defame yourself!" cried Ida bursting into tears. "You—the kindest—most generous of men! you are worthy of her! Oh! I wish it could be!"

"Hush! hush! I would not have it otherwise. I came home last summer, and saw them together without a pang of selfish regret; and gloried in my subjugation of a passion their betrothal made sinful, until our ride to 'the Castle.' My arm saved her from mutilation or death, and instead of thanksgiving, sprang up a horrible envy, that I had rescued her for him. It was momentary, but the repentance was bitter. I abhor myself when I think of it. I have never fancied since that I did not love her. I know it as well now that another month will make her his bride, as I did when hope was highest. Poor Lynn! it grieved him to his dying day!"

Silence and tears was a fitting reply to this narration. It came to Ida, like sudden death to a festival; producing not only sorrow and dismay, but a trembling insecurity—an awful whisper—"Who next?" Did human love, then, always terminate in misery? Was there no remedy? She wanted Charley to speak again, and say that he had some source of comfort; or at least, strength for the last, greatest trial. His words put this hope to flight.

"I have borne as much as I can;—if it be cowardly to avert further suffering, I am not brave. I have business in the West next month, which could, but shall not be postponed. John will not know of it in time to provide a substitute. Arthur will be disappointed; I would spare him this trifling pain, if I were certain that I should not give him more by remaining. I shall not wear this after the marriage—I may become a castaway without it, for aught I know. When Lynn died, I said, 'My secret is buried with him.' I have committed what the Machiavelis of the day would call an unwise act," added he, smiling; "'consigned it to the keeping of a woman'—but I have no fears for its safety with you. Do not let it prey upon your spirits. I would not caution a less sympathetic nature. Be happy, Ida,—it is your manifest destiny; and I am still disinterested enough to 'rejoice with those who do rejoice.' The sun is setting—you shall not go to the house with that woe-begone face. Smile! or I don't stir."

He laughed at her attempt. "Rather hysterical,—with that sob treading upon its heels; but it will do. Come, sister!"

Ida could have cried more heartily at an expression and tone, that reminded her of Lynn; but he was resolute in not allowing it.

Carry was upon the piazza. "My dear friends!" cried she, running to meet them. "Where have you been! here's a house full of company, and I have sent scouts in every direction. Did not you hear or see them?"

"'I heard the owls scream, and the crickets cry;'" said Charley. "Who is here, that we can prefer to each other's society?"

"Your forest ramble has taught you gallantry. You'll find him but a dull scholar, Ida—why, there are Messrs. Faulkner, Euston and Germaine, impatiently waiting the belle's appearance."

"Irresistible—more irresistible—most irresistible! Are you going off to beautify, Miss Ida? Don't hurry—I will tell them we got lost or drowned in the woods."

When the girls went down, it was candle-light; and the "Irresistibles" were laughing themselves black in the face, over the piano, and the "funniest of fellows," who was entertaining them by an original parody upon "Oh no! I never mention her!"