"BABY FINGERS, WAXEN TOUCHES."

—Amelia B. Welby.

The telegraphic message that flashed across the ocean to Lulu Conway with such mournful tidings never reached her; she was already on the ocean, homeward bound, having just received the letter that told of Willard's illness at Memphis. It was not until she reached home in May, and was safely domiciled at Ocean View, that Bruce went into Norfolk and brought back the sad-faced mother, whose mourning weeds were the first indication to Lulu of her bitter bereavement.

Mrs. Winans, too, was domiciled safely at home again, to the great delight of honest Norah, who had been left in entire charge of the stately Winans' mansion, and had fretted herself almost to a shadow in anticipation of losing her mistress by that "fatal yellow fever." Even now Norah was hardly morally convinced that this were really she. But as the days went by and the young lady's cheek began to gather color and roundness again, and her soft, unwonted laugh to wake the sweeping echoes of the large, silent house, Norah's doubts were displaced by joyful certainty, and she began to hope that a happier life for the young lady was presaged by her returning smile and lighter spirits.

Norah did not know that the hope springing softly in the wife's heart had such sure foundation to build upon. Grace had withheld from her the fact that General Winans was coming home in May, and Norah's secret thoughts and misgivings on this subject were many.

Poor Norah had never forgiven herself for the loss of the little child that had been left in its father's care to be so strangely spirited away. She reproached herself always, in her sensitive soul feeling herself entirely to blame, and humbly wondering sometimes how Mrs. Winans could abide the sight of her, much less her daily personal attendance; while Mrs. Winans herself, always just, gentle, and considerate to her domestics as to others, never blamed her in the least, really was fond of the honest creature, and in her sensitive dread of new faces around, would not have consented to be deprived of Norah. Indeed, her whole domestic staff had entered her service when she came as a bride to Senator Winans' new and beautiful home, and were likely to remain as long as they behaved passably well. She never drew a tight rein on the poor creatures, following as nearly as she could, in her daily life, the golden rule.

A charmingly affectionate billet from Mrs. Conway, the morning succeeding their return to Ocean View, invited Grace to come out and see them, as they were all in the deepest grief for the poor, dear captain—Lulu, indeed, being excessively shocked and ill, with the physician in close attendance.

The afternoon found Gracie springing from her phaeton at the gates of Ocean View, where John, as of old, met her with an adoring smile on his dark visage.

"And what is the news with you, John?" she asked, good-naturedly, as she saw that some unusual news agitated his shallow brain. "What have you been doing all this time with yourself?"

"Only jist gittin' married, Miss Grace," he responded, with a glittering smile, "to jist the prettiest yaller gal ole mis' eber owned! You 'members of Julie, de chambermaid?"

Grace supplemented her uncontrollable smile with a solid congratulation in the shape of a bridal gift from her well-filled porte-monnaie, and swept on to the house.

Mrs. Conway and her nephew met her in the hall, both unaffectedly glad to see her, and in the midst of much whispering, they left Bruce below, and went up to Lulu's chamber.

It was so dark in here that Grace, coming directly in from the May sunshine, at first saw nothing; then, as the gloom cleared away a little, she distinguished Mrs. Clendenon's black-robed form sitting near the bed where Lulu lay, white, and still, and grief-stricken, under the white draperies, with a tiny mite of a girl-baby (prematurely hurried into the world by grief that oftenest hurries people out of it) on her arm.

She stooped and kissed the quivering lips that tried to speak, but could not; and, indeed, what could either say that breathed aught of comfort to that shocked and distressed young spirit whose life hung vibrant on a quivering thread? Silence was perhaps the best comforter then, and Grace took the little newcomer in her arms, and gently diverted the young mother's thoughts by tracing vague resemblances to its handsome parents in the pink and infinitesimal morsel of life—and what a power there is in a simple baby-life sometimes!

Lulu's pain was softened momentarily by this idle feminine chatter and small talk so vigorously maintained, and her tears remained awhile unwept in their fountains, while now and then a low whisper to her old friend showed how welcome and appreciated was that visit.

"If baby lives," she murmured in an undertone to Grace, "we mean to call it Grace Willard, for you—and—brother," with a falter over the name. "I think he would have liked it so."

And Mrs. Winans has hard work to keep back her own tears at the memories that flow while she holds Lulu's mite of a girl in her arms—thronging memories of her own early days of motherhood—her nestling baby-boy, her darling so rudely torn from her breast. She is glad when the afternoon wanes and it is time to go for she cannot bear to sit there smiling and outwardly content with that heavy, aching heart.

"Gracie"—Lulu draws her down to whisper with pink lips against her ear—"you may expect him—General Winans—at any hour. He gets into Norfolk to-day. We traveled from Europe together, but he had to stop in Washington on business, and gets here this evening, I think. Will you be glad, dear?"

She cannot answer. Her heart is in a great whirl of painful feelings. Her baby! She wants her baby! The unhealed wound in the mother-heart will not be satisfied thus. Lulu's motherhood has thrilled that aching chord afresh; the years that have passed are but a dream, and she longs to hold her rosy, laughing boy again to her tortured breast. Mother-love never grows cold nor dead, mother-grief never can be healed nor even seared. It "lives eternal" in the mother's breast, the most exquisite joy, the most exquisite searching pain the human heart can know.

"You are going to be so happy," Lulu whispers again in her loving tone, "and, Gracie," with a fluttering sigh. "I have been so happy in anticipating your happiness!"

Touched to the depths of her warm heart Grace bends to leave a tender kiss on the pale brow, and promising to come again, goes out. Her adieus are hastily made to the rest, and once more in the little pony phaeton she skims over the miles between her and home. The bright roses that blossom on her cheeks are sources of undisguised admiration to Norah, who opines that Mrs. Winans ought to drive every evening.

"Never mind about that, Norah," she answers, indifferently; "only please brush my curls over fresh, and give me a pretty white muslin dress to wear this evening."

And Norah obeys in secret wonder at her mistress' suddenly-developed vanity.

She is lovely enough to be vain when Norah turns her off her hands as "finished." All that golden glory of ringlets ripples away from the fair, pure brow enchantingly, sweeping to her dainty waist in a sweet girlish fashion. A faint flush covers her cheeks, two stars burn in the violet depths of her eyes, her lips are unwontedly tender and sweet. The slim, perfect figure is draped in the misty folds of a snowy muslin, whose loose sleeves falling open, leave bare her dimpled white arms and hands. The low frill of misty lace leaves the white curve of her throat exposed, with no other ornament than a tea-rose budding against its lovely whiteness. So as lovely as one can fancy Eve, fresh from the hands of her Creator, the beautiful, unhappy, wronged young wife passed from her dressing-room and into that lovely shrine of her garnered griefs that saw what the world saw not—the desolation of that sensitive heart—the nursery of her loved, lost baby!