It is an April day, and Venice is lying under a brilliant sun, which brings out all the beryl sheen of its translucent waterways, the gleam of its marvelous domes, the Byzantine color that still clings to the front of its palaces, and all the life of its picturesque and varied humanity. It is the last which specially appeals to the interest of a man who has strolled from the Piazza San Marco into the Piazzetta, and watches the animated movement along the Riva de’ Schiavoni, that meeting-place of Italy and the Orient, with eyes that take in every variety of the types passing before him. And when they grow tired of water-carriers and gondoliers, of soldiers and sailors, of Italians, Greeks, Austrians, and Orientals, they have but to look beyond on the fairest scene in the world—the wide, green plain of shining water, as the Grand Canal opens into the lagoon, the isle of San Giorgio with its cluster of picturesque buildings, and far to seaward the Armenian Convent of San Lazare.

But the picture grows too dazzling after a while, and the observer, turning, walks toward the palace of the Doges, entered under the Saracenic arches into its great court, and ascending the Giant’s Stairway passed into those gorgeous saloons where the sumptuous life of old Venice still glows on the walls in that Venetian art which in glory of coloring excels every other school. The usual number of tourists, with open guide-books, were scattered through the apartments, filling even the dread chamber of the Council of Ten with their light chatter; but the newcomer avoided them, lingered only in comparatively empty rooms, and presently wandered into the Hall of the Great Council, whence he passed out of an empty window to a balcony, where he found himself on a level with the top of the column which bears the winged lion, and overlooking from this higher elevation the same wide, beautiful picture of sea and sky, of glittering domes and sun-tinted campanili, which he had lately seen from below.

On a seat conveniently placed in a corner of the balcony he sat down, and with his back against the stone wall of the Ducal Palace, with the famous lion smiling familiarly upon him, and with the scene of all the past glory and triumphs of Venice before his eyes, he fell easily into that waking dream which Venice above all places has power to produce. For where else is the setting of the past so perfectly preserved? From the gorgeous frescoes of Tintoretto and Paul Veronese, one steps forth to look on the unchanged scene—palaces, columns, quays, luminous sea, and dazzling sky—of the great events they represent, and to ask one’s self if the stately pageants will not soon come forth to meet the victorious galleys laden with the spoils of the East, or to accompany the Doge when he goes forth in state to wed the Adriatic?

Into some such dream this man had fallen, when his pleasant solitude suffered an interruption. Through the open window a figure suddenly stepped, and advancing to the balustrade stood before him outlined against the horizon of sea and sky. For a moment he was inclined to regard with impatience this new object, obtruded into the foreground of the picture he had been contemplating with so much satisfaction; then it dawned upon him that, so far from marring, it rather added a new and charming element to this picture. For it was the figure of a young girl, tall and graceful, with an indescribable beauty in the carriage of the small, shapely head and the lines of the neck and shoulders. Her attitude, too, was full of unconscious grace, as she stood gazing seaward; and since her back was turned toward him, he could admire this grace at his leisure, together with the picturesque drapery of her dress, which was made of some fabric as soft and clinging in quality as it was harmonious in color.

But presently she turned her face toward the great lion of St. Mark, and presented to his view what he instantly decided to be the loveliest profile he had ever seen—a profile as clearly cut as that of a head on an antique cameo, but with a peculiarly delicate grace of its own, and with coloring as exquisite as the tints of a flower. She was smiling as she looked at the lion—who stonily regarded her from his pedestal—and she made such a delightful picture in her youth and beauty, that the man behind her held his breath, fearing lest some chance movement should betray his presence and cause her to disappear.

But, instead of this, she was presently joined by another figure, that of a young man, who stepped through the window and walked up to her side with an air of easy familiarity.

“By Jove!” said the newcomer, “I don’t wonder that you come out here for relief from those miles of pictures! Their effect is positively stupefying.”

“To you, perhaps, it may be,” said the young lady, in a very sweet voice, with a slightly mocking accent. “But it was not because I felt stupefied that I came out, but because the greater picture tempted me. When one has Venice before one’s eyes, one hardly cares to look at paintings.”

“That is exactly my opinion,” said the young man, “so let us go down and get into a gondola and float about. That is the principal thing to do, besides lounging in the piazza.”

“Then suppose you go and lounge in the piazza,” said the young lady. “I am very well satisfied where I am,” and as she spoke she turned again toward the railing, with the air of one who did not mean to stir.

“Oh, I am very well satisfied to stay here—with you,” said her companion, leaning beside her.

At this point it occurred to the unobserved listener behind that the time had come for him to retire. Solitude was charming, and charming also was the contemplation of a single graceful figure in the foreground of a noble picture; but a conventional pair of young people engaged in a conventional flirtation was more than he could endure. With a sense of disgust and vexation he rose, and entered again the Hall of Council.

Over this magnificent apartment various groups were scattered, some studying the frescoes of battles and triumphs, others following the frieze of Doges’ portraits, and pausing before the vacant panel across which is thrown a black curtain and on which is painted the name of Marino Faliero, and the short sentence, “Decapitati pro criminibus,” while others were occupied with Tintoretto’s vast Paradiso. Among the latter was a pretty, fashionably dressed young woman, who, seated on a chair before the immense picture, had transferred her attention from it to the costumes of a pair of English girls, whose dresses were as ill-fitting as their complexions were blooming, and who appeared to be studying the great composition in detail, unconscious of the critical glances of the animated fashion-plate behind them.

This little scene attracted the notice of the idler from the balcony, and as he advanced, drawn rather by amusement than by any special interest on his own part in the Paradiso, the lady of the chair turned her eyeglass upon him. A moment later she had dropped it and risen to her feet, exclaiming:

“What, Lennox—Mr. Kyrle!”

Lennox Kyrle—for it was he—started and looked at her for an instant; then he held out his hand, saying, quietly:

“This is a very unexpected pleasure, Mrs. Meredith.”

Fanny Meredith turned from white to red, and red to white again. His composure seemed to rebuke her agitation and that slip of the tongue—“Lennox.” Moreover, she could not forget that this was the first time they had met since parting as lovers. But she recovered herself quickly, and, glancing up as she gave him her hand, said, a little reproachfully:

“I knew you at once, though you have changed, but you were not sure of me.”

“Yet you have not changed,” said he, smiling and wondering—so quick is thought!—as he looked into her upturned face, where he had found the charm which once enslaved him. She had not changed, he was quite right about that; but where was there inspiration for any of the rapture and agony of passion in this blooming, piquant, commonplace countenance? As he held the hand which he had once so eagerly coveted, he thanked Heaven for that old disappointment, while he said, “But I could not expect to meet you here.”

“As easily as I could expect to meet you,” she answered, “though it is true I heard that you had gone to Egypt as a war correspondent. But the war has been over for some time.”

“For something like half a year,” he replied; “but I have been up the Nile, and, had it not been for a sudden summons calling me home, I might be emulating Stanley in equatorial Africa now.”

“I should think you would rather be here,” said Mrs. Meredith, with a little shudder. “We have lately come, and I am delighted with Venice.”

“Most people are,” said Lennox; “and by ‘we’ you mean, I presume, Mr. Meredith and yourself?”

“And the Joscelyns. We joined them in Paris. You know the Joscelyns? No? Well, at least”—with a sudden laugh and blush—“you remember AimÉe?”

“AimÉe!” he repeated, in a puzzled tone. Then suddenly there flashed upon him the memory of the old sea wall of St. Augustine, of the tide murmuring at his feet, of the stars shining overhead, and of a sweet, frightened voice saying, “I am sent to tell you that Fanny can not come.” The name, which he had forgotten, brought the scene back like a picture, and with it also another scene—an orange grove at sunset, its alleys filled with golden light, its glistening foliage meeting like an arcade above, and a pair of dark eyes gazing half-beseechingly, half-defiantly into his, while the same sweet voice said, “As for me, I will never speak!” Remember her! How could he ever forget the delicate, childlike creature, with her unbending loyalty? His eyes, which time had not rendered less brilliant and keen, gave a flash of recollection as he turned them on Mrs. Meredith, saying, “You mean the young cousin whom you sent—”

“Yes,” she interrupted, looking around with a quick glance. “Pray, be more cautious. If it were suspected, there would be trouble even yet. It is a great bore to have a jealous husband! And you know you are supposed to have been AimÉe’s lover.”

Mr. Kyrle drew his brows together, and lifted a head which was not without natural haughtiness a little higher. He thought that the bad taste of this speech was only equaled by its impertinence.

“I am aware,” he said, stiffly, “of the deception which you induced your cousin to assist you in practicing at the time of which you speak; but I hardly thought it possible that even you could have allowed such an impression to remain until now.”

“You are as flattering as ever, I perceive,” said Fanny, coolly. “‘Even you’—that means, I suppose, that you consider me bad enough for anything, and yet are a little surprised that I have been bad enough for this! But, you see, if it was a matter of necessity at the time, it has been equally a matter of necessity ever since. And it did AimÉe no harm; whereas to have told the truth, then or later, would have done me great harm.”

“I remember that she described herself as of no importance,” said Kyrle, “and it seems that you fully shared the opinion.”

“Yes,” answered Fanny, calmly, “that was what we both thought, she and I, when I sent her on that unlucky errand. I shall never forgive Mr. Meredith for not going home and to bed like a Christian that night! But, as it turned out, she was really a person of much importance. She inherited a great South American fortune, and she is now an heiress and beauty of the first rank.”

“And yet,” cried Kyrle, with the old indignation rushing over him, “you have suffered her to rest under—”

“The aspersion of having been on the point of eloping with you,” said Fanny, with a subdued, wicked laugh. “Yes, it was a necessity of the situation, and I will say for AimÉe that she is the most generous creature I ever knew. I really can not see why you should look so indignant. Pray, do you think it such a horrible thing to have been on the point of eloping with you?”

“I think,” he answered, haughtily, “that it is a shameful injustice to allow a young girl to rest under the imputation of having been about to elope with any one when she is altogether innocent of it.”

“We went over all that and settled it at the time,” said Mrs. Meredith, impatiently, “and it is much too late to unsettle it now. It is ancient history—dead, buried, forgotten. Besides, no one knows anything about it except Mr. Meredith; and there is surely not much to harm AimÉe in one person’s knowledge. Percy Joscelyn suspects something—you may remember that he found you with AimÉe on that awfully unlucky day—but he does not know anything. He will, however, look upon you as having been her lover, and the whole Joscelyn clan will be thrown into consternation by your appearance. They watch the poor child, and every man who approaches her, like so many dragons. How amusing”—with another irrepressible laugh—“it is that you should have turned up just now!”

“At the cost of depriving you of some amusement,” he said, coldly, “I shall not renew my acquaintance with your cousin—if acquaintance it could be called. The last thing I am capable of is of annoying one who has already been the victim of such an injustice.”

“But why should you annoy her?” inquired Fanny—whom time had evidently not robbed of any of her volatile qualities—opening her eyes. “And you don’t know, really, what you will lose. She is charming! Every one admires her immensely.”

“I shall not have the opportunity of doing so,” replied Kyrle, more stiffly than ever, for he said to himself that this woman was insufferable. “I am leaving Venice almost immediately, and since I may not have the pleasure of seeing you again, I shall therefore bid you adieu—”

“Not just yet,” said Fanny, with a note of malicious triumph in her voice. “Here is an old friend to whom you must speak first.—AimÉe, my dear, let me recall Mr. Kyrle to your recollection.”

Kyrle turned, full of anger, which changed in a moment by some miraculous process into satisfaction, for who should stand before him, with wondering eyes and faintly flushing cheeks, but the lovely lady of the balcony!

And she was lovelier even than he had imagined, with a face in which all fine issues of thought and feeling seemed to meet. She looked surprised, yet the gentle, curving lips smiled as it were irresistibly, while she said, with the composure of a woman of the world, “I recollect Mr. Kyrle perfectly, though I should not have known him.”

“Nor I you,” Lennox answered, bowing deeply. “But I have never forgotten you.”

It did not occur to him until after the words were spoken what a lover-like sound they might have to any one under that false impression which he had just resented. But when he lifted his head it was to meet a pair of eyes which at once enlightened him with regard to the interpretation of which they were susceptible. These eyes belonged to the young man whom he had already seen on the balcony, and whom Mrs. Meredith now introduced as Mr. Joscelyn.

Percy Joscelyn had not forgotten the man whom he found with AimÉe on the momentous occasion when he went to announce the great change in her fortunes, and he instantly identified this bronzed stranger as that man, even before hearing the name which he had taken care to remember. It was therefore natural enough that his eyes should express suspicion and dislike when Lennox met them.

But this immediate proof of Fanny’s assertion, that he would be regarded as “AimÉe’s former lover,” did not irritate Kyrle as might have been expected. On the contrary, he was conscious of a sense of amusement which he would not have believed possible a moment earlier. It was the appearance of Joscelyn which wrought this change. A few minutes before he had, unconsciously to himself, envied this man; now he was transformed into an object if not of envy, at least of apprehension to the latter. It was impossible not to feel that the situation had its elements of interest. He looked at the beautiful girl standing before him, a smile still on her lips, but her gentle, high-bred composure otherwise unchanged, and felt that, after all, the suspicion of having been her lover was one which he could cheerfully support.

AimÉe, on her part, regarding him with the deep, soft eyes he remembered well, was thinking of the sea wall, the star-lighted tide, and the young lover who had taken his disappointment with such fiery disdain. There rose before her, too, a memory of the orange grove at sunset, and the generous anger which had burned there for her rather than for himself. She knew well that most men in his place would have given scant thought at such a time to any one so insignificant as she had been, and therefore, remembering his deep concern for the false position in which she was placed, she had held Lennox Kyrle in grateful remembrance during all the years since their one day of brief acquaintance.

Yet it was characteristic of the woman, as it had been characteristic of the girl, to forget herself for others; and so at this moment she was thinking less of herself and her own singular connection with that past story, than of the two before her, who had been lovers once and now were strangers. She was wondering how they felt on meeting again face to face, and how much or how little the memory of the past thrilled them. Fanny she knew too well to expect any depth of feeling from her; but how was it with Lennox Kyrle?

Meanwhile, amid all these memories, it was necessary that some one should sustain conversation with the usual commonplaces; and of this Mrs. Meredith was fortunately fully capable.

“I was never more surprised than when I looked up and saw Mr. Kyrle a few minutes ago,” she said to AimÉe. “And yet there was really no reason to be surprised at all.”

“Not in these days, when everybody goes everywhere,” said Lennox, “and the acquaintance one parted with in Europe yesterday, one meets to-morrow in China. Especially a wanderer like myself may be met anywhere.”

“You are a wanderer, then?” said AimÉe.

“Yes,” he answered. “I am a person with whom you are intimately acquainted—‘our special correspondent,’ and therefore my duties take me to many places.”

“They have brought you to a very delightful place now,” said she.

“My own inclination has brought me here,” he replied, and as he uttered the words he saw a quick flash of suspicion in Percy Joscelyn’s eyes again.

“Have you been here long?” asked Fanny. “We came about a week ago; and we are doing our sight-seeing so leisurely that we have hardly as yet seen anything at all, except what can be perceived from a gondola.”

“I arrived only a day or two ago from Alexandria,” answered Kyrle, “but I am inclined to think that, for a time, what one perceives from a gondola—that is, Venice herself—may be best of all.”

“It is,” said AimÉe. Upon which the young man beside her, speaking for the first time, observed:

“It might be, if Venice were better preserved; but one grows tired of looking at so much decay. In fact, in my opinion, we have been here quite long enough.”

“Then, my dear Percy,” said Mrs. Meredith, coolly, “I advise you to take your departure for any place that you like better, for we, who have come to Venice for a month, mean to stay.”

It was not a very amiable glance which Mr. Joscelyn bestowed upon the speaker, but he did not answer save by this glance. He turned instead to AimÉe, and said:

“We seem to have lost the rest of our party. Shall we not go and look for them?”

Before AimÉe could reply to this proposal, the entrance of a party of four made reply unnecessary, for it was at once apparent that these were the missing persons whom it was proposed to seek. Yet they had the appearance themselves of seeking, rather than of needing to be sought, for as they entered they all looked around, and perceiving the group before the Paradiso, eagerly advanced toward it.

The foremost of these newcomers was a tall, elaborately dressed young lady—young, at least by courtesy—whose commonplace prettiness was spoiled by an exceedingly artificial appearance and manner. With her were a faded, languid, elderly woman, possessing much natural elegance and traces of great beauty; a man of about sixty, carefully got up with padding and hair-dye to look not more than forty; and a rotund, florid, genial man of thirty-five or thereabouts. As these advanced the young lady spoke:

“I thought we should never find you! Where have you been hiding yourselves?”

“We have been hiding ourselves where you see us,” replied Mrs. Meredith. “When I lose people, I always make a rule of quietly sitting down and letting them find me, instead of running about trying to find them. So I have been sitting here for half an hour in a conspicuous position; and, as a reward, I have been found—not only by you, but by an old acquaintance who has most unexpectedly appeared.—Mrs. Joscelyn, let me present Mr. Kyrle.”

Mr. Kyrle bowed to the elderly lady, who at once put up her eyeglass to examine him, with an alacrity which indicated that his name was not unknown to her. He was then presented to Major Joscelyn, to Miss Joscelyn and to Mr. Meredith; and he was aware of being regarded with more or less active suspicion by all of them except Miss Joscelyn, who smiled as graciously as women of her order generally do upon an apparently eligible man.

“I—ah—hum—have heard of Mr. Kyrle,” observed Major Joscelyn, in a tone which intimated that he had heard no good of Mr. Kyrle. Then he fixed a pair of prominent eyes upon the young man and inquired if he had been long in Venice.

“Only a few days,” Lennox answered, carelessly.

“Ah—a few days! And you are leaving soon?”

“That depends altogether upon circumstances,” replied Kyrle, who in fact intended to leave in a day or two, but had no desire to gratify Major Joscelyn by telling him so; for already he felt an animus of dislike against these people, not only because of their attitude toward himself (for that, being the result of misconception, only amused him), but from their appearance and manner. “They are self-seeking and insincere,” was his judgment, as his glance passed rapidly from face to face; and then, turning to the lovely, candid countenance of AimÉe, he thought, “She is like a dove among hawks.”

Major Joscelyn giving no other reply to his last remark than a disapproving “Hem!” Miss Joscelyn took up the conversation, and remarked that Mr. Kyrle probably found Venice attractive.

“Very attractive—especially within the last half hour,” he replied, with deliberate malice.

The Joscelyns looked at each other, while Mr. Meredith glanced at his wife, and the latter said, quickly:

“Of course, it has become more attractive within the last half hour. What is pleasanter than meeting old friends unexpectedly? Mr. Kyrle is on his way to America from Egypt,” she added in general explanation, “and it is the merest chance that we should have met him.”

No one remarked that it was a fortunate chance. On the contrary, silence appeared to indicate an altogether different opinion. After a moment, Major Joscelyn observed that they had probably seen enough of the Palace of the Doges for one morning, and that it was time to think of returning to the hotel.

There was a general movement, and it is likely that Lennox would have taken a final farewell of the party there and then, had not AimÉe turned to him with a smile sweet enough to atone for any degree of incivility on the part of the others, saying, “And have you, too, had enough of the Ducal Palace?”

“For the present,” he answered; and availing himself of what seemed a tacit permission, he walked by her side as the party passed from the great hall, along corridors and down staircases to the court below.

Those few minutes completed the impression which she had already made upon him; and an impression in which her beauty played a small part in comparison with the gracious simplicity of her manner and the charm of her voice and glance. There was much in this voice and glance to remind him of the girl who had carried Fanny Berrien’s message to him, who had so timidly offered him her sympathy and compassion, and who had sat by his side under the orange boughs. Yet, save in the dark sweetness of the eyes and the gentle cadence of the tones, there was surely little in common between that frightened child and this stately young lady.

If he had only known it, however, there was the great thing in common that she was offering him now, the same sympathy that she had offered then. She was too young, and of too limited experience, to have learned the power of change which lies in time, and it seemed to her that he must inevitably be deeply moved by such an unexpected meeting with the woman he had once loved; and her gentle kindness was the involuntary form in which she expressed this feeling. But naturally no one could be aware of this—not even Kyrle himself. He thought that she simply meant to atone for the incivility of her friends; the latter cast alarmed glances upon one another; and Fanny Meredith was no nearer the truth than any one else, in saying to herself: “AimÉe is certainly the best creature in the world! She is throwing herself into the breach to prevent Tom from being jealous.”

When they reached the Piazza there was a slight pause of the party, and Kyrle felt that he was expected to take leave. “Since I have been so fortunate this morning, I hope to be fortunate again,” he said to AimÉe in clearly audible tones. “I shall trust to have the pleasure of meeting you again.”

“Oh, no doubt,” answered she, readily. “People who know each other can not possibly fail to meet in Venice. But will you not come to see us? We are at the Grand Hotel.—Fanny, surely you mean to ask Mr. Kyrle to come to see you?”

“Mr. Kyrle knows that I shall be delighted to see him,” replied Mrs. Meredith, “but really we are at home so seldom that it hardly seems worth while to ask him to come. As you have just observed, people must meet when they are in Venice; and their best chance to meet is away from home, rather than at home. Nevertheless, I hope you will take the chance of finding us in,” said she, to Kyrle.

“I shall prefer to take the chance of finding you elsewhere, since you are more likely to be abroad,” replied he.

“And elsewhere is so much pleasanter than at home,” interposed Miss Joscelyn. “The Belle Arti, now—have you been to the Belle Arti, Mr. Kyrle?”

Mr. Kyrle replied that he had not. “I have not been sight-seeing since my arrival,” he said, “but only lounging.”

“Oh, but you must certainly see the Belle Arti,” said the young lady with animation. “You can have no idea of the Venetian school of art until you have studied it there.”

“I have no doubt Mr. Kyrle is aware of that, Lydia,” said Fanny Meredith, dryly; “but since we have exhaustively done the Belle Arti—at least I hope we are done with it—he is not likely to meet us there, and it was of meeting us that he was speaking.”

“It was certainly of meeting you that I was thinking,” said Lennox.

“Hum—ah!” said the major, addressing his party, “shall we move on?”

Kyrle watched them with a smile as they moved away across the sunshiny square. He was saying to himself that it would go hard with him if he did not see again the beautiful eyes he had been looking into, and hear the sweet voice which had just bidden him such a kindly adieu.

It was no later than the evening of the same day before he met the party again. He was idly sauntering around the arcades of the Piazza, brilliant with lights and filled with the sound of many tongues, when he heard a voice say, “Oh, there is Mr. Kyrle!” and turning, he encountered Fanny Meredith’s bright glance. She was sitting at one of the tables near the door of a cafÉ, with AimÉe, Mr. Meredith, and young Joscelyn, taking coffee and ices, and as Lennox paused she went on, gayly:

“Come and join us. You look lonely, and we are stupid. We know each other so well that each knows exactly what the other will say; so, like Punch’s married lovers during the honeymoon, we are ready to welcome a friend, or even an enemy, so he prove entertaining.”

“But how if one should not prove entertaining?” asked Kyrle, who needed no second bidding to take a vacant chair by her side.

“Then you must have made very poor use of your opportunities,” said she, “and changed very much besides—must he not, AimÉe?”

This was audacious, Kyrle thought; but glancing at AimÉe, he was reassured by her smile.

“When I knew Mr. Kyrle, I was not very well able to judge of his powers of entertainment,” she said, “though I have no doubt they were great.”

“On the contrary, they have always been of a very limited order,” said Kyrle. “I am immensely flattered, however, by Mrs. Meredith’s kind recollection, and only regret my inability to justify it.”

“You have at least improved in modesty,” said Mrs. Meredith.

“A man who has been in the desert six months should be modest when he returns to civilization,” he answered. “Perhaps it is because I have been in the desert,” he added, looking around, “that it seems to me one hardly needs better entertainment than this scene.”

“It is very bright and interesting for a while,” said Mr. Meredith; “but fancy coming here every evening of your life, as these Venetians do! One would think that it would grow monotonous in time.”

“To a stranger it would certainly grow monotonous in a short time,” said Kyrle; “but those who have all their interests, social or otherwise, here, and who have a strong attachment to this which has been the frame of their life from its beginning, and the frame of the life of Venice through all her history, are not likely to grow weary of it.”

“I think,” said AimÉe, “that even a stranger might require some time to grow weary of it—such a picture in such a frame!”

“That would depend entirely upon the stranger,” said Lennox, regarding her with a smile.

And indeed she was herself a picture worth regarding as she sat in the light of the brilliant lamps; her fair, delicate face shadowed by a large hat covered with curling plumes, and her liquid eyes full of pleasure as she looked over the gay life of the Piazza, or turned to the solemn front of the great cathedral lifting its domes and minarets against a sky of hyacinth blue.

“It is a very pretty scene,” said Percy Joscelyn, superciliously, “but I think it quite possible to grow tired of it. There is so much sameness. Now, the boulevards—”

“Percy is a very good American; his idea of heaven is a Paris boulevard,” said Fanny Meredith. “I am fond of the boulevards myself, but, for a change, I call this delightful.”

Lennox agreed with her. He did not ask himself why it was so delightful, but he felt a sense of thorough and complete satisfaction, as he sat, joining in the light, idle conversation, commenting on the motley throng which ebbed and flowed around them, and drinking a cup of black coffee as if it were nectar.

Presently Mr. Meredith suggested a return to their hotel, but this was at once negatived by his lively wife. “The moon is well up by this time,” she said. “Let us go out in a gondola. It will be charming to float about for an hour or so.”

“Good Heaven!” said the husband, “have you not been floating about enough during the course of the day? It seems to me that we hardly exist out of a gondola, unless we are in a church or a picture gallery.”

“Well, then, you need not come,” said she, laughing; “but I know AimÉe would like to go—would you not, AimÉe?”

“I am always ready for a gondola,” was the smiling reply.

“Percy will go. He is always ready for a gondola too,” pursued Fanny. Then she turned to Kyrle. “Will you join us?” she asked.

“I shall be delighted,” he replied, trying not to make the commonplace words too eager.

“Then we are a nice partie carrÉe, and we will go at once,” said she, rising and taking a shawl from the back of her chair.

No one inquired how far Mr. Meredith approved of the arrangement. He was left smoking a cigar in front of the cafÉ, while the partie carrÉe proceeded to the Riva in search of a gondola.

As was to be expected, Percy took possession of AimÉe, while Lennox found himself walking by the side of his old love. Neither of them spoke for a minute or two; then Fanny turned and glanced at him with a mischievous smile.

“Time has its recompenses as well as its revenges occasionally,” she said. “Are you meditating on that?”

He looked at her and was forced to return her smile. “You are as full of diablerie as ever,” he said, “but if you have no sense of compassion, have you not any compunction?”

“Compassion!—compunction! What fine, large words! But why should I have either?” she asked. “You do not need compassion, I am sure; and as for compunction—you could not expect me to be sorry now?”

“Certainly not,” he answered, with alacrity. “Regret for what has resulted so well would be entirely out of place—for you, that is. For me, however—”

“Are you trying to insinuate that you have any regret?” said she, with a laugh. “Ah, that pretense is shallow! I have had such long experience that I can tell, the moment that I look into a man’s eyes, whether he feels the smallest bit of sentiment; and you—as far as I am concerned—you have not enough to put on the point of a pin! Do you think it strange of me to talk in this way?”—He did think so, and his face no doubt betrayed as much. “But I have a reason. I want you to understand that I am not under any foolish delusion about you, as some women would be. I am anxious that you should trust me, and let me be your friend.”

“Pray believe that I trust you entirely,” said Lennox—who did not trust her at all.

“But a friend—I am much honored; yet I do not know that I have special need of a friend at present.”

“You will never have greater need,” said she, emphatically, “for you have fallen in love with AimÉe, and, unless I am your friend, the Joscelyns will not suffer you even to speak to her.”

“I can well believe that,” said he, involuntarily. Then he paused and laughed. “But have I fallen in love with the young lady whose name is so suggestive of that emotion?” he asked.

“You are the person to answer the question,” replied Fanny; “but I should say there was no doubt of it. I have been watching you for the last hour, and the entire scheme has matured beautifully in my mind.”

He looked at her again—curious, interested, uncertain what to make of her. The pretty, piquant face he had once known so well, was full of animation and amusement as she turned it toward him, meeting his puzzled glance.

“You are ungrateful,” she said; “you do not trust me; and yet I am anxious to do you a great service.”

“Granting that I need a service,” said he, “forgive me if I ask—why should you wish to do it?”

“Now, that is more than ungrateful,” said she. “It is giving me credit for no fine feeling at all. Though I jest, do you think I do not remember how badly I treated you once? It is all over now—and no doubt you are grateful enough that it is so. But still the fact remains. I did treat you badly, and I should like to be able to feel that I had made some amend for it. So much for you. Now for AimÉe”—her voice changed slightly. “Well, I owe a great deal to AimÉe, and I would do a great deal for her. When it was a question of serving me, she did not think of herself at all; and, though I may be frivolous and shallow, I do not forget this.”

“She certainly did not think of herself at all,” Kyrle agreed—looking at the graceful figure moving in front of them, and remembering the sea wall of St. Augustine.

“I always said I would repay her if I could,” Fanny went on, “and I do not think I can repay her better than by rescuing her from the hands that have possession of her now, and saving her from marrying Percy Joscelyn.”

The last shot struck home. Kyrle was himself astonished at the sense of consternation with which he started. “Is that thought of?” he asked.

“They think of it,” Fanny replied. “They are ready to move heaven and earth to accomplish it; but”—the tone of gleeful malice which he had heard before came into her voice—“I think we may defeat them, you and I, if you will say the word.”

“What word is it that you wish me to say?” he asked.

She looked up into his face again with bright eyes. “What word can it be,” she replied, “except the simple assertion that you wish to marry AimÉe?”

Fortunately for Kyrle, he had no opportunity to answer at the moment. They had by this time reached the Riva, and Joscelyn, turning, said, “Here is a gondola.”

A few minutes later they were afloat on the broad expanse of moonlight-flooded water, with Venice—marvelous, mystical, beautiful—lying around them. The cabin had been removed from the gondola, and the ladies took the two cushioned seats, while the young men threw themselves down at their feet. And so they glided out into the silver night.

Surely it was an hour worth living for! The brilliant lights from the quays streamed over the water and were reflected in the still depths below, like an enchanted city; but this illumination paled before the splendor of the moonlight that reigned supreme, making all things visible, yet veiling every defect of time, for other defects in Venice there are none. Under this magic light the “glorious city of the sea” has all her ancient glory still; one sees no longer the decay which has fallen over her palaces, but only the loveliness which made her the wonder of the world. Past islands, palaces, and domed churches they glided with that smooth, noiseless movement which is half the charm of a gondola, and were soon on the broad lagoon, where the booming of the Adriatic surf upon the Lido came to their ears like distant thunder—the only sound which broke the silence around them.

The others talked, but AimÉe said little. She leaned back on the broad, easy seat, and the white radiance falling over her seemed to intensify all that was spiritual in her beauty, until she looked rather like a fair dream of a woman than a creature of flesh and blood. Lennox pulled his hat low over his eyes in order that he might watch her unobserved. His blood was still bounding from that suggestion of Fanny Meredith’s before they entered the boat. It had taken away his breath, yet he felt as if in some intangible way it had drawn him nearer to this exquisite creature. It seemed to make that a possibility of which he had not ventured to dream; and as he watched the lovely face he was ready to utter with emphasis the word desired. Here on the shining water, with the moon beloved of lovers in all ages looking down, he felt his youth reawakening with a sense of power and resolve. He did not think of difficulties or doubts; he only yielded himself to the strange, sweet enchantment which had so unexpectedly overwhelmed him.

Presently Fanny looked at him curiously, “Why have you grown so silent?” she asked. “You and AimÉe are not the most lively companions one might choose.”

“Lively!” repeated Lennox. “If you wanted liveliness, you should have remained on the Piazza. This is not the place for it.”

“It seems to me that all places are the better for it,” said she; “but perhaps that is because I am a Philistine. However, since you don’t think this a place for liveliness, suppose you sing something. It is certainly a place for music, and we have left all the musicians behind.”

They had indeed left those gondolas full of singers, which haunt the Grand Canal and hover around the hotels of Venice, far behind, and were floating in the silence of the lustrous night near San Lazare. Lennox hesitated and looked at AimÉe, who turned her glance on him.

“Do you sing?” she asked.

“Sing?” repeated Fanny. “He used to sing divinely! I suppose he has not forgotten that in the desert.”

“Oh, no,” said Lennox, with a laugh. “I have floated on the Nile and sung to myself many a night.”

“Sing to us now, then, will you not?” said AimÉe.

There was no insistence in her tone, only a courteous request; but he complied immediately, as he would no doubt have complied had she asked him to take a plunge into the sea. Nor did he require more than an instant to decide what he would sing. As he watched her uplifted face with the moonbeams falling on it, he had been thinking of a song of Heine’s, and the music—Schumann’s music—was in his throat, as it were; so he began at once:

He sang “divinely,” as Fanny had said, for Nature had given him a voice of the finest order—a pure, melodious tenor—and, though it had never received much training, there was something in it to-night which took the place of training and made it unnecessary—a thrill of emotion, a depth of expression, which art can never teach. When the full, soft notes sank over the last cadence, Fanny cried out with admiration, and even Mr. Joscelyn condescended to say, “Bravo!”

But AimÉe did not speak at once, and it was only when Lennox looked into her “flower-face pure and white,” that she said, “You have a great gift, Mr. Kyrle, and a great power to bestow pleasure.”

The words were kind, but what was there in the voice that seemed to Kyrle’s ear like a touch of frost? The exaltation of his mood sank under it, and he suddenly seemed in his own eyes to wear very much the aspect of a fool. What had he been doing? Singing out his heart to unsympathetic ears, led away by the magic of the night and the fairness of a face which, after all, was the face of a stranger, or, worse yet, of one who knew him only as the lover of Fanny Meredith. What had possessed him to take leave of his senses in this manner? Was this what was likely to happen to a man when he came out of the desert and found himself in unaccustomed contact with civilization again? Did the first lovely face on which he looked lead his senses astray?

But even as he scornfully asked the question he knew that it was not so; that the spell of this face had its root deep in the past, in that golden evening when he sat under the orange trees and tried in vain to shake the grateful loyalty of a child. He knew now that he had never forgotten that child, and the deep impression which her absolute unselfishness had made on him, an impression deeper because it had been contrasted with such utter selfishness on the part of another. He had seemed to come very near to that little maiden of the past in the hour when her nature and her heart had been, as it were, laid bare before him; and so it was to no stranger that he had so quickly surrendered his own heart, which had long been swept and garnished and empty of any occupant.

Meanwhile Mrs. Meredith was clamoring for another song. “You are surely not going to stop with one!” she cried. “We want another, and yet another—don’t we, AimÉe?”

“Just as many as Mr. Kyrle will give us,” responded AimÉe, smiling.

It was easier to sing than to talk; so Kyrle again lifted his voice, this time in a Spanish serenade as full of the spirit of passionate romance as a Spanish night. But something had gone from the singer’s voice, and, charming as was the song, no one was moved and thrilled as by the first.

Fanny Meredith was right in saying that the Joscelyns watched AimÉe and every man who approached her like dragons. And from their point of view, this was natural enough. Had not AimÉe’s fortune lifted them out of poverty and the embarrassments resulting therefrom, to a condition of affluence where all things became easy and agreeable? And could they be expected to surrender the advantages of this fortune without a struggle? It was true that they had enjoyed these advantages for five or six years, in which time Major Joscelyn, through whose hands the income passed, had made not a few excellent investments on his own account; and that AimÉe, as soon as she attained her majority, had settled an independence on her mother. Yet these things did not make them one whit more inclined to surrender any part of the heritage which they had grown to consider their own. Since it was, however, undeniable that AimÉe, although the most gentle and yielding of human beings, had certain rights in her own property which the law would secure to her, and which a husband, should she marry, might be brutal enough to claim in her behalf, it became necessary that she should marry some one who could be trusted to consider the Joscelyn interest of primary importance; and this could only be one of the Joscelyns themselves. It was therefore early decreed in the family councils that Percy Joscelyn should in time marry the young heiress. There had been considerable consternation when he returned with her from St. Augustine and reported a mysterious lover already on the horizon; especially since inquiries drew no information concerning this person from AimÉe. “He was a gentleman whom I knew,” she said, and not even her mother could obtain from her anything more.

Then Major Joscelyn solemnly announced that any such thing as a probable or possible love affair must be promptly nipped in the bud, and that the quickest and most complete way to accomplish this was to take the girl abroad. Her education, which up to this time had been of the most desultory order, furnished a good plea, and the entire Joscelyn family conveyed themselves at once to foreign fields. They had never returned to America. Nothing would have been easier than to place AimÉe in a French or German school, where she would not have required the attention of her entire family; but that would not have given an excuse for a residence in Paris, which they all found very agreeable. So a handsome establishment was mounted, and after its expenses were paid, besides the investments on the major’s account already mentioned, there was not a great deal to spare for AimÉe’s education. Expensive masters, therefore, she never had; but very good though not fashionable teachers can be obtained in Paris for low prices, and it was not in AimÉe’s nature to make any demands for herself. She took eager advantage of the scant opportunities allowed her, and accomplished an education for which she had little to thank her guardians.

There was some uneasiness in the family mind when the time of her majority approached; but it passed quietly, and, whether through indifference, or ignorance of the full extent of her power, she made no attempt to take the control of her income from Major Joscelyn’s hands. So things had gone on as usual, and the family were hoping that before very long Percy might come into possession of the much-coveted fortune, when who should appear on the scene but Fanny Meredith! At once the Joscelyns felt that the time had come when they would have to fight for AimÉe. They no longer had legal control of her movements; and although she still yielded submission to the wishes of her mother (which meant the wishes of Major Joscelyn), they instinctively felt that it would not do to try this submissiveness too far. So, when Mrs. Meredith proposed that AimÉe should join her husband and herself in a tour through Italy, the Joscelyns held a council of war, and decided that, while it was impossible to allow her to go, it was equally unadvisable to strain obedience too far. The brilliant mind of Major Joscelyn again found the remedy. “We will all go,” he said. “It is not—ahem!—what one would desire, to wander about Italian cities for several months; but AimÉe can not be trusted with this flighty woman, who would not only introduce all manner of—hum—dangerous acquaintances to her, but who would delight to undermine our influence. Neither will it do to positively refuse to let her go; so we must sacrifice ourselves and accompany her.”

The sacrifice, therefore, to Fanny Meredith’s great disgust, was made. The family picked themselves up, and in solid phalanx accompanied their heiress to Italy, keeping vigilant watch and ward over her and over every possible dangerous acquaintance whom she made. But they were little prepared for the unkind stroke of Fate which brought Lennox Kyrle across their path. That his appearance in Venice was an accident they did not believe for an instant. They strongly suspected that Fanny Meredith had, together with him, planned this appearance to take place when AimÉe should have been removed from her family environment. They congratulated themselves that so much, at least, had been frustrated by their foreseeing vigilance, but they had not the least doubt that Kyrle had come with the determination to secure her hand and fortune, if that desirable end could be attained by unholy arts and incredible audacity. What was to be done to frustrate and check this audacity? Such was the question the family met in solemn conclave to consider on the day after the undesirable intruder had appeared.

“He is not to be shaken off easily,” said Percy Joscelyn, “for Mrs. Meredith encourages him in every way. Last night she not only invited him to join us as we sat outside Florian’s, but she proposed going out in a gondola, took him along, and made him sing. He sings uncommonly well—confound him!—and almost made love to AimÉe before my eyes.”

“The fellow’s impudence seems to be equal to anything!” said the major. “And how did AimÉe receive his—ah—advances?”

“You can never tell much about AimÉe,” his son answered. “She is quiet, and she’s deep. She didn’t seem responsive, but that signifies nothing. Under ordinary circumstances I might think that he had made no impression on her; but these are not ordinary circumstances, and the trouble is that we don’t know what the extent of their first acquaintance was. Although Mrs. Berrien denied it, I shall always believe that there had been some love-making going on between them in St. Augustine.”

“And yet AimÉe was certainly not very attractive at that time,” observed Miss Joscelyn.

“There’s no accounting for tastes,” said her brother, curtly, “and facts are facts. I saw him give her a locket—something which, you know, she always declined to explain.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Joscelyn, with a sigh, “she was very obstinate and as close as wax. But I have always had an idea that he was not a lover, because, in the first place, she said so—and AimÉe always told the truth—and, in the second place, because she never seemed to have any fancy for lovers, like other girls.—You know, Lydia, how often you have remarked that AimÉe was so old-fashioned in this respect.”

“Yes,” assented Lydia, “but, as Percy says, AimÉe is deep, and I don’t really feel that I know very much about her. As for the matter of the locket, though,” added the speaker with a sudden gleam of intuition, “that was as likely as not one of Fanny Meredith’s tricks. She was an outrageous flirt!”

“If I thought so!” exclaimed Percy Joscelyn, with a start. His eyes flashed as he spoke. Many a score had he to pay Fanny Meredith, who in truth took a malicious pleasure in frustrating his attempts to establish a claim upon AimÉe; and if it were possible to bring anything out of the past against her, how delighted he would be to use it remorselessly! “But there is not the least proof of such a thing,” he said, almost resentfully, to his sister.

“No; it was only an idea that occurred to me,” she replied; “but I know what Fanny Berrien was, and I believe that, if you could induce AimÉe to speak, you would find that it was so.”

“Then, in that case,” said the major, “you don’t believe the man was AimÉe’s lover at all?”

“It does not matter what she believes,” Percy somewhat rudely interposed. “Opinions, without any ground of proof, amount to nothing. I know what I saw, and I know that the fellow has eyes only for AimÉe now; and that Mrs. Meredith, as I have already said, encourages him by every means in her power.”

“Then,” said the major, sharply, “one thing is certain: AimÉe can not be allowed to go out with the Merediths.”

“How will you prevent it?” Percy asked. “The last thing advisable is to force her to declare her independence of us, and any ill-judged attempt at control would do this. Nothing would please Mrs. Meredith better than to prompt her to such a course. No; watchfulness is our only resource—watchfulness, and perhaps stratagem. If it were possible to leave Venice now—”

“That would be the best thing,” said the major, “only—ah—what is to prevent this objectionable person from following us?”

“If that were all,” said Percy, “I should leave at once, and trust to luck or the shortness of his purse to prevent his following. But the real objection is that we could not be certain that AimÉe would consent to go; and we could neither force her to do so nor leave her with the Merediths. So, departure is not to be thought of. We must fight the thing out by watchfulness and stratagem, as I have said.”

“Watchfulness—yes,” said his father, “that is plain, and of course necessary; but what stratagem do you propose?”

“I propose, for one thing, that some person shall always take charge of Mr. Kyrle, and prevent him from devoting himself to AimÉe.”

“But how is any one to take charge of Mr. Kyrle—without his consent?” asked Mrs. Joscelyn, feebly.

“A man’s consent is always taken for granted where a lady is concerned,” young Joscelyn answered. “Lydia, here, might be equal to the delicate task, I think. All that is required is that she shall quietly take possession of Mr. Kyrle on all occasions, and make it impossible for him to attach himself to AimÉe.—It is a task after your own heart,” he went on, addressing his sister with more than the suspicion of a brotherly sneer in his tone “I have seen you on many occasions monopolize men very much against their will. Do you think you can manage the same thing with Kyrle?”

A flush rose to her cheek and was visible through the powder that covered it. “You are as insulting as usual,” she said.

“On the contrary, I am most flattering,” he returned, suavely—for he felt that Lydia’s assistance was essential at this juncture of affairs. “Only a woman of rare powers can do these things. A stupid woman or a clumsy woman can never succeed in them. It requires a peculiar tact to take possession of a man and keep him fastened to your side whether he likes or not.”

“I understand perfectly all that you mean to imply,” she said, coldly; “and if I do this thing it is not out of regard for you or your plans, but because I have an object of my own in it.”

“Whatever your object,” her brother replied, “only do the thing, and I shall be satisfied, and never doubt your powers again.”

But while the family council was thus laying plans for keeping AimÉe and her old acquaintance apart, Fortune, which sometimes takes up weapons and fights for those who have neither heart nor power to fight for themselves, had most unexpectedly brought them together.

It was quite early in the morning, soon after he had taken that light collation which on the Continent is called the first breakfast, that Kyrle, sauntering on the Piazza and asking himself whether he should fulfill his engagement of calling on Mrs. Meredith, or whether he should, more sensibly, leave Venice, these old entanglements, and new perils, behind him, suddenly perceived a lady, accompanied by her maid, just entering the great portal of the cathedral. He had not sat behind that figure the day before and studied it in vain. He recognized at once the elegant outlines, the graceful carriage, and without a moment’s hesitation he followed her into the church, as he had long ago followed her into the Florida orange grove.

Who does not know by sight or by fame that wonderful interior in whose darkness lies hid the spoils of the Orient, and whose ancient pavement in its undulations seems to imitate the waves of the sea that cradles it? Kyrle knew it well; but just now he was not thinking of gorgeous mosaics, or marvelous carving, of columns of verd-antique, jasper, or porphyry; his eyes were searching the gloom of the vast edifice for the figure which had entered a few minutes before, and some time elapsed before he discovered what he sought, in a chapel where a priest was saying mass and a small congregation were assembled.

As he drew near the chapel, struck by the infinitely picturesque scene—the rich, jewel-incrusted altar, the priest in his golden vestments, the contrasts of rank and costume in the forms kneeling on the pavement—he suddenly saw AimÉe, her maid on one side, on the other a Venetian girl with a black lace shawl thrown over such red-gold hair as Titian painted, while a shaft of sunlight from some high, remote window brought out the delicate fairness of her face from the shadowy obscurity around. Satisfied with having found the object of his search, Kyrle paused, and, leaning against a pillar, waited until the service was over and those who had assisted thereat were dispersing. Then he stepped from the shadow of the pillar and presented himself to AimÉe. She looked a little surprised, but greeted him quietly, and together they walked toward the entrance.

“I was about to remark that I am fortunate to meet you,” Kyrle said presently, “but one should pay a sacred edifice the compliment of being strictly truthful while within its walls, shouldn’t one? And the truth in this case is that I saw you come in and followed you. I am thinking of leaving Venice to-day.”

If he had intended to surprise her by the announcement, he must have been disappointed by the calmness with which she replied: “You are leaving Venice to-day? Is not that sooner than you anticipated?”

“I had made no plans,” he answered. “When I paused here, I did not intend to linger more than a few days. And now, though I am strongly tempted to remain, I—Well, I think I had better go.”

Almost every one has had occasion to learn more than once in life the extreme difficulty of keeping all trace of strong feeling out of the voice. Kyrle was conscious of being somewhat exasperated with himself and Fate, as he uttered the last words, and naturally the inflection of his tone betrayed the feeling. AimÉe glanced at him quickly—involuntarily, it appeared—and in the light of that glance there suddenly flashed upon him an understanding of what interpretation she might give to his words. Her eyes seemed to say, “Ah, is that it!” But before he could collect his thoughts sufficiently to know how to explain himself, she had looked away again and was saying in her clear, low voice: “If you think it best, of course you are right to go. And one should not attempt to change your resolution.”

“No one is likely to attempt to change it,” he replied, with a slight laugh. “But I think you misunderstand me a little,” he added, after a pause, with a sudden impulse of candor. “We were once thrown together very singularly; I am sure you do not forget this any more than I do. Therefore, since we are not strangers, will you let me speak to you frankly?”

“Surely, if you wish to do so,” she answered; but he saw that she looked a little startled.

“Do not be afraid,” he said, quietly. “I have no intention of saying anything that you need hesitate to hear. But may I ask you to sit down for a moment?”

They were now in the atrium, or inner porch of the church. AimÉe hesitated for an instant, then, turning to her maid, said in French:

“Go to the Merceria and make the purchases of which you spoke. I will wait for you here.”

“Oui, mademoiselle,” replied the girl, without the change of a feature, and forthwith departed.

Kyrle could hardly believe his good fortune, but as AimÉe sat down on one of the stone benches fixed against the wall, he said, gratefully:

“You are very kind—as kind as I remember you of old. And I have no more forgotten how kind you were then, than I have ceased to thank Heaven for the message you so bravely brought me.”

She looked up at him and he saw in her face that she was astonished.

“But—” she began, and then paused.

“But you thought that I meant something else a minute ago,” he said. “You thought I meant that I found it best to go because I felt the old attraction reviving. Is it not so?”

She dropped her eyes. “Was it not natural that I should think so?” she asked.

“Perhaps it was natural,” he answered, “but you were mistaken. My only sentiment with regard to that past folly is one of sincerest thankfulness for my escape. The last time we sat like this together—have you forgotten the evening in the orange grove?—I told you that my fancy for Fanny Berrien was dead, killed by her duplicity to me and her selfishness toward you. I may have been a little melodramatic, but I meant exactly what I said. From that day to this her memory has not cost me a pang. As for Mrs. Meredith, she is a very pretty and amusing person, who acted altogether according to her kind, and to whom for her conduct toward myself I bear no malice whatever. On the contrary, my sentiment toward her is one of lively gratitude—although I have never forgiven her for her conduct toward you.”

AimÉe had lifted her eyes now, and was looking at him again very steadily. It was as if she were deciding in her own mind the question of his sincerity. Then she said, with her old simplicity and directness:

“But why do you wish to tell this to me?”

“Because,” he answered, “whether I go or whether I stay, I do not wish you to regard me as the victim of a hopeless passion for the wife of Mr. Meredith.”

“I should scarcely have thought that,” she answered; “but it was surely natural to fancy that you might remember—with pain—”

“Oh, no; it is no matter for pain,” he said, as she hesitated—“only for a light-comedy smile and sigh. Fancies of that sort come and go like dreams. One must know many of them before one learns what love really is.”

She turned her dark, meditative eyes away from him. On one side was the interior of the marvelous old church, gleaming with marbles and precious stones; on the other the sunshiny Piazza, with its graceful arcades and flocks of sheeny pigeons. She looked toward the last as she said:

“I do not think I like such an idea.”

“You?” he said, quickly. “No; how could you like it? It is not meant to apply to natures like yours.”

“Is it not?” she asked, with a smile. “But how can you tell that, when you know nothing of my nature?”

“Do you think I know nothing of your nature?” he asked, smiling also. “If I had time, and you did not consider me too presumptuous, I might prove the contrary, for you forget all that you showed me once—all the courage, the unselfishness, the humility. But I do not forget. And has no one ever told you that you carry your soul on your lips and your heart in your eyes?”

“No,” she replied, “I do not remember that any one ever told me so before—at least not exactly. But perhaps Fanny means the same thing when she tells me that my face is ‘ridiculously transparent.’”

“It is only a different way of stating the same thing,” said Kyrle, and then they both laughed.

“But seriously,” said he, after a moment, conscious of a very pleasant sense of camaraderie with this beautiful companion, “have you no idea how you revealed yourself to me at that last meeting of ours under the orange trees? How I can see you this moment, as you were then—such a delicate, childlike creature, but with a strength of resolution against which I arrayed all my strength in vain! And then, when you opened your heart and told me the sad story of your life, and how it was gratitude which made you so resolute—do you think I could ever forget anything so touching? Many a time, in the years which have passed since then, I have thought of that scene, and said to myself, ‘God bless that child wherever she may be, for she has a heart as tender as it is brave!’”

Something in his voice told her that he was speaking genuinely, without the least insincerity or thought of effect, and she could not but give him a grateful glance from the same dark eyes which had impressed him with their wonderful power of expression on the occasion of which he spoke. “You are very kind,” she said, trying to speak lightly, “to have remembered an obstinate child so long!”

“You were certainly very obstinate,” he said; “but how brave you were! To think of your having had the courage to go alone to the sea wall that night, and to think of the selfishness and cowardice that sent you! Pardon me for asking the question, but has no opportunity ever occurred for you to set yourself right in that matter?”

She shook her head. “How could it?” she asked. “Fanny has never had the courage to tell her husband the truth. But nothing disagreeable has arisen from it—to me, I mean,” she added, a little hurriedly. “You know you were afraid of that.”

“Yes,” he said. “I am very glad that you have never been annoyed; still, it is a shame that such a belief should be in the mind of any one with regard to you.”

He spoke out, quickly and hotly, the indignation that on this subject was always within him and ready to find expression; but he was sorry the next moment for the words when he saw a swift blush rise into her face, as with the sudden realization of what the belief was to which he alluded. Angry with himself, he went on hastily:

“This being so—I mean, the burden of Mrs. Meredith’s conduct being still borne by you—I feel that I am bound to abstain on my part from anything which might cause you the least annoyance; and so I have determined to go away. There shall not be the least misapprehension about you, arising from any act of mine.”

So much was truth; but, like many other people, Kyrle did not find it advisable to tell all the truth. He could not say, “Also, I am going, because if I stay I shall fall in love with you, and that will never do, for I am a poor man, and you are a rich woman.” But this was in his mind, even while the temptation was growing greater every instant to forget both of these stubborn facts. AimÉe was silent for a moment, and then—for the old courage, as well as the old simplicity, was still strong in her—she looked at him with her brave, direct glance, and said:

“If this is your reason for leaving Venice, I hope that you will not think of going. Your presence does not cause me the least annoyance; and I should be more sorry than I can tell you if mine were such an annoyance to you that we could not even remain in the same city. For, do you think I forget that if you are in a false position, it was my obstinacy that placed, or at least kept you there? How earnestly you appealed to me, and I could not yield! And are you now to be the sufferer by being driven away from this heavenly place? No, Mr. Kyrle, there is no justice in that. I will not allow it!”

He could have smiled at the energy with which she spoke, partly because he read in it the old generous spirit, taking no heed or thought of herself, and partly because, in urging him to remain, she proved that she so little suspected the chief reason why departure seemed to him necessary. What he would have answered it is hard to say, for at that moment the maid, bearing some packages, made her appearance, and AimÉe, rousing to the consciousness that there was something very unconventional in this prolonged conversation, rose rather hastily, bade him good-morning, and walked away.

---

“Going to leave Venice?” said Fanny Meredith. “What an absurd idea! What do you mean by it?”

The time was two hours later than when, standing in the shadow of the cathedral porch, Kyrle had watched AimÉe cross the sunshine-flooded Piazza; and the place was the privacy of Mrs. Meredith’s sitting-room in the Grand Hotel. The two people who occupied it were alone together for the first time since they had parted as lovers; but it is safe to say that this thought was not in the mind of either of them. Kyrle, leaning back in a deep chair, was gazing absently out of the window at the beautiful proportions of Santa Maria della Salute just across the Grand Canal, while Mrs. Meredith, with her pretty brows knitted, was gazing at him.

“I mean,” he said slowly, in reply to her last words, “that I think it is the only wise course open to me.”

She threw herself back with an impatient gesture. “You are as incomprehensible as ever!” she exclaimed. “Now, what on earth do you mean by the only wise course open to you?”

“Briefly, then,” said Kyrle, “you were shrewd enough to observe last night that I am in danger of falling in love with Miss Vincent—”

“Oh, no,” said Fanny, shaking her head, “I observed that the thing was already accomplished.”

“There you are mistaken,” said he; “it is not already accomplished. Or if it were,” he added, lamely, “there is the more reason for my going away, since I only expose myself to useless pain by remaining.”

“But why useless pain?” asked she. “Have you so faint a heart that you are afraid of Percy Joscelyn as a rival?”

“Not at all,” answered he, calmly. “But it is quite impossible for me to become his rival. Have you not told me that Miss Vincent is a great heiress?”

“Yes; she has a large fortune in her own right, and without any restrictions—happy girl!”

“I hope it may prove for her happiness,” said Kyrle, rather gloomily, “but it is an effectual bar to any hope on my part. A newspaper correspondent would hardly be a fit parti for such an heiress.”

“And whose fault is it that you are a newspaper correspondent?” asked Mrs. Meredith, with a malice born of past recollections. “But, in my opinion, that is all nonsense,” she went on, briskly. “Birth and social position are the things to be considered, rather than a mere accident of money.”

“The accident of money is what the world considers,” said he, “and I must consider it also. For myself, I have perhaps thought of it too little. If so, I am punished by finding it now an insuperable barrier between myself and the woman I might love.”

Fanny opened her lips to speak, but apparently thought better of it before any words escaped. She closed them again and sat silent for a moment, evidently reflecting. Then she looked at Kyrle with an expression of resigned regret.

“I remember how ob—that is, determined you are,” she said; “so I suppose there is nothing to be gained by arguing the matter. But since your mind is so fully made up, why should you run away? I thought that was the resource of weakness and indecision.”

“No doubt it is,” said he, falling into the artful trap, “and I felt very weak last night, I assure you. But, after all, there is no reason why I should go at once—” looking out at the enchanting sea and sky, and remembering AimÉe’s last words. “A day or two can not matter, and it is nobody’s affair but my own if I choose to pay for present pleasure by future pain.”

“Oh, dear, no—not anybody’s affair at all,” said Fanny. “And then, you can so easily take another trip to Egypt and forget all about it. I really wish you would stay,” she added, persuasively. “We might have such a pleasant time wandering about Venice! And a man need not abjure the society of a woman because he thinks her too rich to marry.”

“No, certainly not,” said Lennox, though he knew in his heart that this was sophistry. “Well, at least I will not go to-day. I will stay as long as I first intended—that is, two or three days longer.”

“How nice of you!” said Fanny, with a gleam of triumph in her eyes. “And you will also stay to breakfast?”

“You are very kind, but not to-day. If you are going anywhere this afternoon, however, and will allow me to join you—”

“We are going out to the Lido. Meet us there, and we can all return together. And one word—don’t mind the incivility of the Joscelyns. They are uncivil because they are afraid of you.”

“I am very well aware of that,” said he, with a smile. Then his heart sank, and his voice also, as he added, “But if they only knew it, they have no cause for fear.”

“They are wiser than to believe that. And so am I,” thought Fanny; but she took very good care not to utter her thought aloud.

Somewhat to Mrs. Meredith’s and also to Kyrle’s own surprise, he had no incivility to encounter from any of the Joscelyns when he joined their party on the Lido that afternoon. The heads of the family received him courteously, if stiffly, and Miss Joscelyn greeted him like an old friend. Indeed, by what means he could not for the life of him tell, she soon managed to monopolize his attention, calling upon him for the little services which no gentleman can refuse to render to a woman, and presently drawing him aside from the rest of the party to walk with her on the beach, while she discoursed to him of many things in heaven and earth which did not interest him in the least. His judgment upon her, meanwhile, was uncompromising.

“A mass of silliness and affectation,” he said to himself, but in this he did her some injustice. She was not only less silly than he imagined—possessing, in fact, a good deal of shrewdness—but at the present time she had an object in view in her discursive conversation which his irritated and distracted mind was far from perceiving.

For it is to be feared that, had pearls of wit and wisdom dropped from her lips, they would have fallen on equally inattentive ears. Kyrle had said sternly to himself, while on his way to the Lido, that he would be very careful not to devote himself to AimÉe; that, because she had asked him to remain in Venice, he was the more bound not to cause her the faintest shadow of annoyance by attentions that might be misconstrued; and that he would only allow himself the pleasure of seeing and of talking to her, as any other chance acquaintance might. But to renounce voluntarily some happiness for which Nature longs is one thing, and to have it forcibly placed beyond reach by outside agency is another. Even if the happiness in question is no more than looking into a pair of soft, dark eyes, and listening to ordinary sentences uttered in a sweet voice, one may be supported in voluntary renunciation by a sense of virtue which is altogether lacking in feeling that the matter is taken out of one’s own power. So Kyrle chafed inwardly against the quiet but resolute hold of Miss Joscelyn upon his attention, even while he said to himself that it was in a degree what he had intended, and that he was glad of an opportunity to prove to these people what an absurd fiction it was that he had ever been AimÉe’s lover.

Yet all the time he was conscious of an insistent desire, the hunger of the heart which comes with love, to renew the charm of that half hour in the atrium of St. Mark’s, to take up the thread of conversation where they had dropped it, and feel again that sense of sympathy and comradeship, of understanding and being understood, which had quickened all his being into new life. And, instead of this, he was pacing the beach with Lydia Joscelyn, and lending half an ear to what he called in his own mind empty twaddle.

Twaddle it might be, but empty—that is, devoid of meaning—it was not. Lydia, with an art which did her credit, approached slowly but surely to the point she had distinctly in view; and presently she touched it.

“Percy tells me that you sing beautifully, Mr. Kyrle,” she said. “He declares that he never heard anything finer than your singing in the gondola last night. You must come out with us to-night and let me hear you. I adore fine singing. I wonder that AimÉe never mentioned that you had such a fine voice.”

Kyrle, roused from partial abstraction by the sound of AimÉe’s name, fell unconsciously into the trap. “I do not think that Miss Vincent knew anything about my voice,” he replied, “so it would have been difficult for her to say anything about it.”

“No!” said his companion, opening her eyes. “I thought I had understood that you were quite old friends.”

This roused him thoroughly, for the tone implied much more than the words. The indignation which was ever ready to be excited on this point rose within him, as it had risen before that day. He determined that nothing should induce him to lend his aid to Fanny Berrien’s deception, and allow these people to fancy injurious things of AimÉe. Miss Joscelyn was a little startled by the haughtiness of his glance as he turned it on her.

“I could esteem nothing more of an honor,” he said, stiffly, “than to have been either an old or a new friend of Miss Vincent. But, in point of fact, our acquaintance in the past was very slight, as your knowledge that she was quite a child at the time might inform you.”

“Oh!” said Miss Joscelyn. Even her self-possession had need to recover itself after this douche of cold water. But, while she exclaimed mentally that he was a perfect churl, her resentment was accompanied by a sense of triumph. “There is a mystery,” she thought, “and I am sure that Fanny Meredith is at the bottom of it!” With a laudable desire of probing further, therefore, she went on:

“We have all misunderstood a little, then,” she said, with some significance. “There has been an impression created—not so much by AimÉe as by Mrs. Meredith—that you were friends in a very particular sense. I think,” she added, with an air of carefully weighing her words, “that it is a pity such an impression should be allowed to remain, if it does AimÉe an injustice.”

“If such an impression exists,” said Kyrle, with emphasis, “it certainly does Miss Vincent the greatest injustice, and should not be permitted to remain. I repeat that my acquaintance with her was very slight, and that I thought of her only as a child, though I was struck by some qualities very remarkable in a child, which she displayed.”

“It is singular, since your acquaintance with her was so slight, that you should have been able to discover these qualities,” observed Miss Joscelyn, innocently, “for AimÉe is very reserved, very secretive, one may say, in her nature.”

“There were circumstances which called out the qualities,” said Kyrle, briefly; for he began to understand that he was being subjected to a process vulgarly known as pumping, and he had no idea of either gratifying Miss Joscelyn’s curiosity or betraying Fanny Meredith’s secret, unless defense of AimÉe should make the last absolutely necessary.

“It is rather difficult to imagine what circumstances calculated to draw out remarkable qualities could have thrown together a shy child like AimÉe and a young man like yourself,” said Miss Joscelyn, musingly. She glanced at him, and since the expression of his face said plainly that he declined to be communicative regarding these circumstances, she proved her talent for cross-examination by a swift and unexpected diversion:

“What a very attractive girl Fanny Berrien was at that time! Speaking of your acquaintance with AimÉe reminds me that it was during that winter in Florida she became engaged to Mr. Meredith. It was said that she jilted another man shamefully—some one to whom she had been engaged a long time—in order to marry him.”

“Very likely,” responded Kyrle, feeling bound to make some comment. “I should imagine that Mrs. Meredith was never inclined to limit herself in strings to her bow.”

“She was always a dreadful flirt!” said Lydia, shaking her head with an air of virtuous reprobation. “I fancy Mr. Meredith does not know a quarter of her escapades.”

“Are we not always informed that, where ignorance is bliss, only folly would desire to be wise?” replied Kyrle, impatiently. “But shall we not return to your party? I think I see some one waving to us.”

Some one was indeed waving energetically and when they reached the group they found them in readiness to embark on the return voyage. In fact, the Merediths, AimÉe, and Percy Joscelyn already filled one gondola. Fanny met Kyrle’s crestfallen look with a mocking gleam in her eye.

“All things do not come to him who waits too long,” she said, oracularly. “Had you been a little earlier, I might have offered you a place with us; but now you will have to return as you came, alone, unless Lydia allows you to recline at her feet.”

“We shall be very happy if Mr. Kyrle will come with us,” said the major, blandly.

But Mr. Kyrle declined, more emphatically than was necessary. His own gondola was waiting, he said, and (this the merest and vaguest politeness), since he was alone, could he not offer a seat to any one?

Miss Joscelyn and her brother exchanged glances, and then the young lady sweetly spoke: “Since you are so kind, Mr. Kyrle—it really is too bad for you to have to return alone—and as there are only two comfortable seats in a gondola, I will give mine to papa and come with you.”

She held out her hand to be assisted into the boat, and Kyrle, mentally anathematizing his own politeness, muttered that he was “delighted,” Fanny Meredith laughed rather irrelevantly, and they all pushed off.

What a picture it was when they were floating on the wide lagoon, with Venice rising before them out of the shining waters, its domes and towers enveloped in the golden haze of sunset, like some dream of fancy, too magically fair for reality! In such an hour and scene, who does not long for sympathetic companionship? Poor Kyrle at least did, as instinctively he glanced toward the gondola that held AimÉe, and thought how different all this glory of earth and sky, all the enchanted loveliness of the most poetical spot on earth, would have appeared to him had he been able to see it reflected in her eyes.

---

“Upon my word, Lydia, you astonished me this afternoon!” Mr. Percy Joscelyn condescended to say to his sister that evening. “I really had no idea of your ability before. You managed the situation perfectly. I never saw anything better done than the way you took possession of Kyrle.” He laughed softly. “The fellow’s face, when he stepped into his gondola, was a study!”

Lydia flushed at the laugh. She was pleased to be commended—to have proved conclusively that she had power to do what she had undertaken; but her vanity suffered under the imputation that she had forced herself upon an unwilling man. No woman likes to feel this. Even if it be a fact, she conceals it as far as possible from herself, and never forgives the person who thrusts it brutally before her.

“I did not find it at all difficult to monopolize Mr. Kyrle, as you call it,” she said, with a tone of offense in her voice. “He did not seem to object to being monopolized. And about AimÉe—I have found out just what I expected—he never was her lover at all.”

“How do you know?” asked her brother, eagerly.

“Because he told me so. Oh, you need not laugh! I was not foolish enough to ask the question as a question; I made him tell me what I wanted to know without his hardly being aware that he was telling it. I think I remember all the conversation. It was like this—”

She proceeded to give a fairly accurate report of it, to which Percy listened with the keenest attention, and, when she finished, admitted that her conclusions were probably right.

“I agree with you that it was most likely some tricky game of Fanny Berrien’s, in which she used AimÉe as a blind,” he said. “And, late in the day as it is, there is nothing I should like so much as to get on the track of it and expose her. But we have no proof—none whatever—for you say this fellow will not speak, and we know that AimÉe will not.”

“He may speak—that is, he may give me information without intending to do so, as he did this afternoon,” Lydia calmly replied. “I don’t despair of finding out the whole thing; but, after all, it has no great bearing on the present state of affairs.”

“More than you imagine,” her brother said. “A hold on Mrs. Meredith would be the most useful thing possible to me just now. If, as I don’t doubt, this man was an old lover of hers, she has not only deceived her husband with regard to him, but she is now bringing him forward as a suitor for AimÉe. Give me one iota of proof of the story we both believe, and I will go to her and say: ‘You have probably still sufficient influence over Mr. Kyrle to send him away.’ If not, I shall have the pleasure of telling Mr. Meredith the story of your love affair with him in the past. Get me the proof, Lydia—give me the power to say this—and there is nothing you can ask me that I will not do for you.”

“I will do my best,” said Lydia, “but absolute proof is difficult to get, you know. One may be perfectly certain, and yet not have that.”

“I know,” Percy answered. “But anything that would give me a hold over that woman—” He broke off in his speech, but the intensity of his tone boded little good to Fanny Meredith should that hold over her be obtained. “One thing, at least, is certain,” he resumed after a moment—“the man explicitly denied to you that he had ever been AimÉe’s lover.”

“Explicitly and emphatically.”

“Then that point is number one secured. This is a good beginning. Continue the work, Lydia, and let us see how long Mr. Kyrle will allow himself to be monopolized.”

Mr. Kyrle allowed himself to be monopolized almost unresistingly for several days. Not indeed as completely as at the Lido, but to a degree sufficient to prevent any satisfactory intercourse with AimÉe. A sudden passion for excursions seemed to have seized the Joscelyns, who had hitherto seen as little as possible of the different places in which they had unwillingly sojourned, and who had seemed quite insensible to any claims of art or history upon their attention. Now, however, they discovered that the neighborhood of Venice abounded in places of interest; and Lydia arranged one excursion after another to the adjacent islands, excursions which Kyrle was invited to join, and during which he was carefully kept as much as possible apart from AimÉe.

The tactics by which this was managed were beautifully simple. He found himself sitting by Miss Joscelyn’s side in a gondola, carrying her shawl, offering her his arm whenever the need for an arm arose, without in the least understanding how it all came about. But one of the lookers-on understood perfectly, and laughed to herself with an amusement not untinctured by malice. “He declined my aid,” Mrs. Meredith thought, “so I shall leave him to Lydia’s mercy. A man, poor creature, is so helpless in such a case!”

This man was certainly very helpless. There was not in him any of the tincture of brutality which exists in men who can release themselves from such a position by the simplest and most direct methods. He could not be deaf when a woman asked for assistance; he could not refuse to hold a parasol over her when she requested him to do so, nor leave her alone when, falling behind the others, she pleaded fatigue and begged to “rest a little.” They were all threadbare artifices, but still strong enough to hold one who to the instincts of a gentleman in such matters added a certain hopelessness with regard to his own affairs. For, after all, he said to himself, he had made up his mind not to compromise AimÉe by attentions of a loverlike character, and it was well that Lydia Joscelyn should help him to keep this somewhat difficult resolution.

But it was a resolution which every day became more difficult, as every day the charm that breathed from her presence laid deeper hold upon him. Despite the vigilance of the Joscelyns, they had occasional opportunities for conversation, and every such opportunity seemed to him to strengthen that impression of a rare individuality which she had from their first acquaintance made upon him. Now and then there were glimpses of thoughts and feelings that lay usually hidden under the gentle composure with which she met the world; and these glimpses, he had a fancy, were given only to him. One of these rare occasions occurred on an excursion to one of the islands, where they encountered another group of tourists, who, proving to be acquaintances, distracted for a time the attention of the rest of the party and so made it possible for him to find AimÉe alone. She was sitting, when he discovered her, under the shadow of the cloisters belonging to the ancient and partially deserted monastic building they were supposed to be examining, gazing seaward; and as he approached unobserved, he was struck by the wistful, almost sad expression of her face. The expression vanished as she became conscious of his presence; only a slight shadow still lingered in her eyes as she turned them on him. But she spoke, with a smile:

“Does a scene like this,” she said, indicating the wide, beautiful marine picture spread before them, “ever rouse in you the expectation of seeing a sail rise up from ‘the underworld’ bringing some wonderful good fortune to you? I am always expecting it. I never look at an ocean horizon without saying to myself, ‘When will my sail come?’”

“I thought,” he said, as he sat down beside her, “that your sail had come, bearing what most people consider the best of good fortune.”

“You mean money?” she asked. “Yes, that came to me, and I am not so ungrateful as to underrate its value, though I can not say it has done much for me; but I am not thinking of anything so prosaic, in looking for my fairy sail. That will bring—ah, I know not what, but something that will give a different meaning to life. All things seem possible there”—she waved her hand toward the distant meeting-place of sea and sky; “one feels as if everything for which one longs might come out of that mysterious distance.”

“But if the magic fortune delays, why not go in search of it?” Kyrle asked, smiling at the fancifulness of the talk. “Shall we embark? Behind that dim line we may find all that we have lacked in life awaiting us.”

She shook her head. “No,” she answered; “I have no heart to search the unknown. I am one of those who can only sit on the shore and wait the coming of the sail, however much it may delay.”

Something in her tone, an unconscious echo of the sadness still lurking in her eyes, made Kyrle realize more fully than he had ever done before that her life was certainly not happy. How, indeed, could happiness in any positive degree exist in such an environment as hers? Physical well-being, the comfort and luxury of wealth were hers; but what besides, what love for the tender heart, what sympathy for the aspiring mind? No wonder that the dark, wistful eyes sought the horizon for the magic sail that should bring some meaning into her colorless days. A rush of pity made speech impossible to him for several minutes, and with pity came a longing like a passion to seize and bear her away from the odious people who surrounded and preyed upon her, into the sunshine of such a full and generous existence as her nature craved. It was the force of repression which he had to exert upon himself which made his voice sound almost stern, as he said:

“The most of us can do little more than sit on the shore and wait for sails that long delay in their coming. But I fear that what we chiefly look for them to bring is that prosaic fortune which you despise.”

“Oh, no,” she answered, quickly, “I am not so foolish nor, as I have said, so ungrateful as to despise wealth. But if I do not rate its power as high as most people seem to do, that is natural. My fortune has really brought me very little personal good. I have often thought that I should have been happier without it. Yet that seems ungrateful; and my family would think it sheer profanity,” she added, with a smile.

“I wish,” said Kyrle, with an energy that was fairly startling, “I wish to Heaven that I were a rich man! Shall I tell you what I would do? It is understood that we are in fairyland, you know. I would have a yacht—a very sea-gull for swiftness and beauty—at my bidding, and I would take you—”

“Oh, here she is!” said a voice at a little distance—the far from welcome voice of Percy Joscelyn. “AimÉe, we are waiting for you.”

---

It chanced that Kyrle was thinking of this conversation and all that it had suggested the next day as, having left the party in a church engaged in inspecting, with blank amazement, some frescoes of Carpaccio which Mr. Ruskin has held up to the admiration of the world, he went out on the little piazza before the church and sat down on the steps which led down to the canal, to wait for them. As he sat there in the soft Venetian sunlight he was of two moods—one to go quickly, at once, out of a temptation which had become overmastering; the other, to cast all scruples to the winds, and show these people—who fancied, forsooth, that their stratagems and devices had any power to restrain him—how little such barriers of straw would stand in his way did he once resolve to take that way. Some one, who came quietly out of the church and sat down beside him, thought that at this moment he looked more like the old, masterful Lennox Kyrle than he had looked since she had seen him under these new conditions.

“I wonder,” said Fanny Meredith, “if you are by this time aware that you are a very foolish man?”

He turned and looked at her. “I have been aware of it for a long time,” he answered, quietly.

“And is not the knowledge of folly the beginning of wisdom? Are you not sorry now that you refused my good offices?”

“Did I refuse them? I am not sure of it. But, if so, the reason holds good now as then, which made it impossible for me to accept them. You urged me to come forward as a suitor to your cousin, and I told you that I was too poor a man to think of doing so. My position has not changed since then.”

“But if you don’t see the folly of that, you are not at the beginning of wisdom,” said she, impatiently. “Why, according to your fancy, only rich people should ever marry rich people; when, on the contrary, it should really be the other way! The proper equalizing of wealth demands that rich persons should marry poor ones.”

He was not in a mirthful mood, but to refrain from laughing at this was impossible. “It is a new thing for you to appear in the character of a political economist,” he said. “Your theory is well enough, and I find no fault with those who practice it. But I must decline to be one of the poor persons who aid in the equalization of wealth by such means.”

“Well, I am one of them,” said Fanny, quite unabashed, turning a diamond ring round on her finger so that its flashing splendor lent emphasis to the assertion, “and I can assure you that it is a very good means. Pride is the matter with you,” she went on, remorselessly, “and I call it a very selfish thing—much worse than the mercenary spirit, which I presume you feel very virtuous in despising! You don’t deny that you are in love with AimÉe; you dare not say that she is not worth a thousand times more than her fortune; and yet you are prepared to let her go, for the sake of the money you profess to hold in such scorn, and because the Joscelyns might call you a fortune-hunter.”

This was certainly very plain speech, and contained a kernel of truth which struck Kyrle sharply. “If I have held money in scorn,” he said, “it has only been with regard to myself. I know well what its value is in the eyes of others. And it is true that I think too much of my own pride, perhaps; but this is a point on which I have always been peculiarly sensitive—”

“As if I did not know that!” she interposed, with a note of that curious old resentment against his culpable indifference to mercenary considerations in her voice. “You were so afraid of being suspected of paying court to your uncle, that you behaved outrageously to him. Oh, it was a very fine thing to show your spirit, your independence, your scorn of groveling souls that cared for money! So you lost a fortune which a little compliance with an old man’s whims would have secured to you; and now you are enjoying the fine results thereof, and preparing to be guilty of the same folly, only in an aggravated form, over again!”

Some people, leaning in the windows of one of the tall, old houses across the canal, and watching the little scene curiously, remarked among themselves that the pretty foreign lady seemed to be a terrible scold, and that the poor man—her husband, probably—had little to say under her rating. “He has deserved it, no doubt,” remarked one woman, enlightened by her own experience. “It is a case of jealousy, most likely.”

“What a vindictive creature you are!” Kyrle was meanwhile saying, with a smile. “Why can not my old follies—for which, as you justly observe, I am now suffering—be allowed to rest? I grant you that I was foolish, impracticable, full of pride—”

“As you are yet,” she interpolated.

“Granted again. But a fortune-hunter—to be suspected of seeking a woman for her wealth—that is something I should feel very deeply. Yet Miss Vincent is indeed worth so much more than her fortune, that to speak of it in connection with her seems an insult. If she were only rid of it—”

“But she is not,” said practical Fanny; “and you can hardly expect her to give it or throw it away in order to oblige you.”

“I expect nothing,” he answered impatiently. “And I do not understand why you should talk as if I had only to put out my hand and grasp a prize which I am sure would, under any circumstances, be far beyond my reach.”

“Your humility does you credit,” she said. “But in my opinion there is no reason why you should not grasp the prize if you would only resolve to make the effort. It is not on your own account that I urge you in this manner,” she added, quickly, “but because I want to rescue AimÉe. You do not understand, and she hardly understands, in what a bondage she is held. If those people can prevent it, she will never marry anybody, unless it be Percy Joscelyn. By every possible means they keep suitors away from her; and if I had not been here, you would never have been allowed to approach her near enough to bow to her. Through me you have a chance that no other man has had before. But if you are so blind, if you throw it away for a mere scruple, if you think more of your own pride than of saving her—then you may go! I have nothing more to say to you.”

She rose as she uttered the last words, and Kyrle, who had listened to the latter part of her speech with amazement, could scarcely believe that it was Fanny Meredith who was leaving him with such an air of dignity. He rose too, and made a step after her. There was a sensible quickening of interest among the heads at the windows opposite, as the scene promised to become more dramatic. “It must be a lover’s quarrel,” some one suggested. “If he were her husband he would not follow her.”

“Stop a minute,” Kyrle said. “If you have nothing more to say to me, at least let me say something to you. I have never looked at the matter in exactly the light in which you have put it. But if you will have patience, if you will give me a little time to consider, I will tell you my final decision before to-day is ended.”

“In your place, I would tell mine in five minutes,” said Fanny, scornfully.

“Very likely,” said he, humbly, “but you must make allowances for the slowness of the masculine mind. Can I see you—will you be at home this afternoon?”

“No,” she replied, after a moment’s consideration, “for Mr. Meredith would likely be at home also, and we could not speak freely. But you may meet me at the top of the Campanile about sunset.”

She had hardly said this, and Kyrle had no more than time to assent, when Miss Joscelyn emerged from the church and came toward them with an air of surprise.

“I have been wondering what had become of Mr. Kyrle,” she said. “You really should not have kept him from studying those extraordinary frescoes of Carpaccio.”

“They are certainly extraordinary,” said Fanny, dryly, “but I have not kept Mr. Kyrle from them. I found him here when I came out for a little relief of sunshine. I hope that we are done with Carpaccio now, and that we are going home. It is time for lunch, and I am hungry.”

This seemed to be the general sentiment of the party, which, with a somewhat stupefied appearance—as of having taken art in rather too large a dose—now emerged from the church. The major was shaking his head. “Mr. Ruskin is, no doubt, a fine judge of painting,” he was saying, “but, really—ah—hum—to send one to see such pictures as these!”

AimÉe, who was walking behind with Percy, looked tired and pale, and when Kyrle met her eyes he was about to step to her side, but a hand was suddenly laid on his arm.

“Do be kind enough to raise this parasol for me,” said Miss Joscelyn. “The sun is positively blinding.”

Kyrle raised the parasol, and, accepting his fate, assisted her into the waiting gondola. But then, instead of following, he stepped back, and, lifting his hat quietly, bade the party adieu “until to-morrow.”

“You will not join us this afternoon?” inquired Lydia, with some surprise and evident concern.

“I am sorry that I can not have that pleasure,” he answered. “I have a budget of correspondence to read, and another budget to dispatch.”

“Then we will defer the excursion to Murano till to-morrow,” said she, positively.

Kyrle did not answer, but watched the gondola, as it moved away, with a very grave face. The moment of temptation had come now in earnest. Ought he to think of himself and his own pride, when it was a question of rescuing the fair and gentle creature who had won his heart from such a bondage as that which Fanny described? If it were true that by a singular chance he had been enabled to approach her more nearly than any other man had ever approached her, or was likely in the future to do, did it not seem as if Fate pointed him out as her rescuer? Yet, for him, by comparison a poor man, to woo so rich a woman, to meet the insults of her friends, and bear the brand of a fortune-hunter in the eyes of the world—that was a bitter necessity to face; and, revolving it in his mind, he went slowly home.

He had been strictly within the limit of the truth when he told Miss Joscelyn that he had a budget of correspondence to read, for the accumulation of several weeks had reached him only that morning, and he had not taken time to wade through it before going out. After a light dÉjeuner, he set himself to the task, partly because it was a necessity, and partly to distract his mind from the question which he was constantly asking and altogether unable to answer.

So, after going through several letters with a very distracted attention, he took up and opened one which was addressed in a strange handwriting and bore the stamp of a legal firm. “How can I—I, who have nothing!” was the refrain echoing through his brain as he broke the seal. But a minute later he uttered a great exclamation, and sat staring incredulously at the paper before him.

Instead of having nothing, this letter informed him that he possessed a fortune of not less than a million and a half dollars.

The sun had set, but there was a radiant sunset sky, as well as a view of great extent to be seen from the Campanile as two ladies stood there, and, leaning over the parapet of the great tower, looked down on Venice, with the Grand Canal winding through its midst like a silver serpent; at the coast of Istria and the blue summits of the Alps afar; and at the Adriatic spreading to meet the sky. One fastened her dark eyes on that distant line of blending sea and sky, but the other bestowed her regard chiefly on the Piazza at her feet, where people seemed to be crawling about like ants. Presently one of these ants crossed the square more quickly than the rest and entered the loggia at the foot of the Campanile. Mrs. Meredith looked round at her companion.

“I think I see Mr. Kyrle coming up,” she remarked.

AimÉe turned with a slight start from the contemplation of the Adriatic. “How do you know that it is Mr. Kyrle?” she asked. “It may be any one.”

“I know because I told him that we were to be here,” returned the other, carelessly. “I thought the poor fellow needed a little relief from the society of Lydia. He really begins to look worn and pale under the ordeal.”

“I can not see why you should draw such a conclusion,” said AimÉe. “If he did not like Lydia’s society, he need not endure it. A man can do what he likes in such matters.”

“Simpleton! is that all you know about it?” said Fanny. “Why, unless he absolutely runs away, a man is helpless in the hands of a woman who knows how to play such a game as Lydia is playing. And this man does not want to run away, because he adores you.”

“Fanny!”

“It is quite true. He adores you, and yet he is so afraid of your fortune that he dare not approach you. He does not believe that a poor man has any right to try to marry a rich woman.”

A flush that seemed borrowed from the sunset was now on AimÉe’s face. She cast a glance of reproach at her cousin.

“If it is true,” she said, hurriedly, “why have you chosen such a time to speak of it?”

“Because I thought it only a matter of justice to let you know that he does not endure Lydia’s attentions because he likes them,” replied Fanny, coolly.

They were silent then, for steps were now heard inside the tower, ascending that inclined plane up which tradition tells that Napoleon rode his horse; and a little later Kyrle stepped on the platform.

The moment he appeared, Fanny Meredith saw that there was a change in him—a glow in his sunburned cheek, a light in his eye, and the air of a man who had burst some bond. She looked at him with surprise, and as he walked up to her—not seeing AimÉe, who had retreated to the other side of the tower—she said, involuntarily:

“What is the matter? You look—unlike yourself.”

“Do I?” he said, with a thrill of excitement in his voice. “Well, that is not strange. I am not myself—that is, I am not the man you parted with this morning, but quite another. Allow me to introduce myself to you as a millionaire.”

She gave a cry, and clasped her hands. “Your uncle is dead, and has left you his money, after all!” she exclaimed. “O Lennox, I am so glad!” Then she turned swiftly and ran across the platform. “O AimÉe!” she cried, “you must congratulate Mr. Kyrle. He has just come into a large fortune.”

When AimÉe turned, she and Lennox were both pale—he, because he had not entertained the least expectation of finding her there; and she, on account of this unexpected sequel to those last words of Fanny’s, which were still ringing in her ears.

“I hope Mr. Kyrle will accept my congratulations,” she said, “although”—and she smiled a faint, tremulous smile—“I am not sure that to inherit a great deal of money is always such good fortune as the world believes.”

“Ah,” said Fanny, “such skepticism may do for people who have inherited it. But I do not think Mr. Kyrle will quarrel with his good fortune.”

“No,” said Lennox, quietly, “I would be very far from quarreling with it—if it were really mine.”

“If it were really yours!” repeated Mrs. Meredith, recoiling a step in her amazement and disappointment. “What do you mean?”

Lennox looked at AimÉe. “I will tell you,” he replied, “what I mean. When I said, a moment ago, that I am a millionaire, I said what is exactly true; and ever since I read the letter announcing the news to me I have been playing with the sensation, with the idea, of being rich and free, and altogether living in a fool’s paradise. For”—his voice changed—“it is true that the fortune is mine, but it is also true that I can not retain it.”

“Good Heaven! why not?” cried Mrs. Meredith; while AimÉe said nothing, but looked at him with all her soul in her eyes; and he, gazing into those eyes, answered:

“Because it is by an accident, not by the intention of my uncle, that I inherit this fortune. It has long been his intention, of which I was well aware, to found with his wealth some great charity to perpetuate his name, and his will to that effect was drawn up many years ago. Lately he wished to alter it in some particulars, and directed his lawyer to draw up a new will according to his directions. Before this will could be signed he died suddenly of apoplexy, and the older will having been destroyed, I inherit the property as nearest of kin.”

“Now, I call that providential!” said Fanny, in a tone of devout thanksgiving. “I do not know when I have heard anything that gives me so much pleasure! To think of that old—ahem—gentleman being so outwitted at last, and so thwarted in his desire to cheat you! For I call it absolute cheating, when a man leaves his property away from his nearest relative and natural heir.”

“Opinions differ on that point,” said Lennox. “I hold that a man’s property is his own, to do with what he will; provided, of course, that he does not neglect his duty to his children. But that duty does not extend to a nephew, especially one who declined all that he offered, and chose another path in life. No, it seems to me that my plain duty is to regard that unsigned will as a valid instrument, and to execute it.”

There was a minute’s silence after he finished, for both of his hearers were completely taken by surprise. Fanny Meredith fairly gasped with amazement before she cried:

“Why, it is worse than quixotism—it is absolute madness! I have never heard of such a thing in my life! What you threw away before, when you went against your uncle’s wishes, was bad enough; but this—!” Words failed her: tears absolutely came into her eyes. “O Lennox,” she said, imploringly, “you surely will not do it!—AimÉe, for Heaven’s sake, speak to him! He will listen to you!”

AimÉe flushed, but Lennox turned to her quickly. His face was set in resolute lines, but there was something in his eyes—a wistful, pathetic expression, as of one asking help—which touched her deeply.

“Tell me,” he said, simply, “am I not right?”

It was a subject on which few people would have cared to offer advice, unless, like Fanny Meredith, they offered it on the side of worldly common-sense; but AimÉe did not hesitate. She answered as simply and directly as he had asked:

“Yes—as far as I can judge, I think that you are right.”

Fanny Meredith threw up her hands, as if appealing to earth and heaven against such folly.

“I think you are both mad,” she said, “and I really feel constrained to seek some saner society.”

With this, before either could utter a word or make the least effort to detain her, she had turned and fled. For an instant they stood confounded, listening to the sound of her flying feet down that incline which is a veritable “facilis descensus.” Then murmuring something quickly, AimÉe made a motion to follow; but the consciousness of being a millionaire, were it only for an hour, gave Lennox courage and resolution.

“Pray do not go,” he said, earnestly; “she will be back presently, or—we can follow her. But first I must speak to you; I wish to ask your advice.”

“I scarcely think that I am fitted to advise you,” she said, pausing at his request, but looking away from him.

“You are eminently fitted,” he replied, “because your opinion is of infinite value to me, and your approval worth more to me than that of any one else in the world. Indeed, if you approve, I care not who else disapproves.” He stopped for an instant, then quickly went on: “I thank God that the temptation to keep this money has not overpowered me, for it has been great. Do you know why? Because it seemed to put within my reach a prize which before had seemed as far from me as heaven; at least, it made effort possible, it gave me leave to try. Before, how could I, how dared I, think of saying to one dowered like a princess, ‘I love you’? But if, with this fortune in my hand, I said it, no one could doubt my sincerity, no one could think that I sought her for anything save herself—herself, so far above all that a man could offer or give, that if he brought the wealth of the world he would still be unworthy of her!”

He paused, overpowered by his own emotion, and hardly expecting an answer from AimÉe. He could not see her face, for she had turned away from him, but he saw that she was trembling, and he was amazed by the clear steadiness of the voice in which she spoke after a moment.

“What a man could say with a fortune in his hand, he might surely—unless he thought more of money than of his own manhood—say without it.”

“May I?” he cried, almost incredulously. “You will let me say it—I, who had nothing yesterday, and will have nothing to-morrow!—you will let me tell you that I love you with all my heart?”

Another pause, and then—“If that be true,” said the sweet voice, “why should it matter that you had nothing yesterday or that you will have nothing to-morrow?”

“It matters,” he answered, “in the opinion of the world, which is quick to say of such a man—”

“But, a moment ago, I thought that it was my opinion alone which mattered,” she interposed.

“It is yours—yours alone,” he replied. “And if you tell me that I may hope, the scorn of the whole world can not hold me back from striving to win you.”

She turned a beautiful, smiling face toward him. “It seems to me,” she said, “that a man who possesses or who has refused a fortune of a million or two can hardly fear that his disinterestedness could be questioned. But I”—her voice sank a little—“I do not think I should have needed the test.”

---

Mrs. Meredith, sitting quietly below in the loggia of Sansovino, grew rather tired of waiting before the two from above came down to seek her. She rose, and looked at them with a smile.

“Well,” she said, innocently, “have you settled the matter? Is the fortune to be given up, or retained?”

“The fortune!” said Kyrle. “I had forgotten it; but, of course, it is to be given up.”

“Ah!” said Mrs. Meredith. She looked at him curiously, this man who was capable of such wild quixotism, and said to herself that certainly things were better as they were. There was no danger that Mr. Meredith would ever be troubled by any scruples which would cause him to resign his fortune. Then she shrugged her shoulders gently. “I suppose it is quite useless to argue with you,” she said, “but, at least, the fortune has done you a good turn, and I advise you to say nothing to any one else of your intention of resigning it. Do the thing, if you like, when you return to America, but don’t talk of it now. It is yours until you choose to give it away, so pray take the great advantage it will give you.”

She did not say in what way, but Kyrle knew to what she alluded; he knew that this wealth would render it difficult for the Joscelyns to object to him. He looked doubtfully at AimÉe.

“That,” he said, “would seem like sailing under false colors; or, at least, like winning what I most desire by a false representation.”

“Now, Heaven grant me patience!” said Mrs. Meredith, impatiently. “But is not the fortune yours?”

“For the present, yes,” he answered.

“Then, why on earth should you take people who are not your friends into your confidence with regard to what you mean to do with it?”

“Simply,” he replied, “because those people have a right to know what is my true position in life, and an accident like my uncle’s unsigned will does not affect that position. Am I not right?” said he, turning to AimÉe.

“I think that you are,” she answered, quietly.

“Very well,” said Mrs. Meredith, “go your own way. I wash my hands of you both; but I am very sure that before you are done with this affair you will wish that you had followed my advice.”

The event more than justified this prediction. The storm which burst when Kyrle proposed himself to Major and Mrs. Joscelyn as a suitor for AimÉe was such as the latter, with all her experience, had never known before. They would not have received the proposal of a prince had it been possible to refuse it, for they were resolutely determined to retain control of the heiress and her fortune. But a man who by his own acknowledgment had nothing, yet was capable of throwing away a million or more dollars—words were too weak to express their opinion of him! They rejected his suit with scorn, and the major grew fairly inarticulate when trying to express himself with regard to such unparalleled audacity.

A penny-a-liner, a scribbler for newspapers, possessing not a dollar in property, yet so insane as to refuse a fortune for an absurd scruple! By Jove, a raving maniac would be as suitable a match! Never should AimÉe throw herself away in such a manner—never! If it were necessary, they would constrain her for her own good. She should not wreck her life and her fortune by marrying a madman.

But the time had come when they were to learn what was in AimÉe. She had so submissively yielded to their demands hitherto that they expected her to yield now; but it was characteristic of her that the strength which her nature possessed only manifested itself on rare and supreme occasions, so that she now and then took even those who knew her best by surprise. She certainly took her tyrants by surprise on this occasion. Quietly, but steadily, she faced them like a rock.

“I shall marry Mr. Kyrle,” she said. “I am sorry if my choice does not meet with my mother’s approval; but it is a matter which concerns myself alone, and I can not suffer dictation with regard to it.”

The major stormed, Mrs. Joscelyn tried tears and entreaties, culminating in hysterics, but AimÉe remained unmoved. She calmly repeated her ultimatum, and left them.

Then, in view of the gravity of the situation, another family council was held. Percy came, pale and venomous with the shock of hearing that his worst fears had been realized, and Lydia with a suspicious redness around her eyes. She not only shrank in anticipation from the bitterness of her brother’s taunts and reproaches upon the failure of her effort to attract Kyrle, but there was a sting in the failure itself, for her fancy was of the order that went out to any man who approached her, and her eagerness to detain the young correspondent at her side had not been dictated only by regard for the family interest.

Percy condescended to throw her but one stinging word. “I was a fool to trust to such poor arts as yours,” he said. “Of course, the man was only amusing himself with your vanity and laughing in his sleeve at all of us. You have failed totally in keeping him from AimÉe; have you succeeded better in discovering anything about his past relations with Mrs. Meredith?”

She shook her head. “No,” she answered, in a crestfallen tone. “I have never been able to draw anything from him, though I have tried. But I am sure that I am right—that there was something between them in the past!”

“So am I,” he retorted, “but what good is there in being sure when one has no proof? You might have got that out of him if you had done no more! But, even without proof, I have made up my mind to see what can be accomplished by threatening Mrs. Meredith with exposure. Toujours l’audace! She may believe that I know everything. Heavens! if I only did—”

He glared at poor Lydia as if it were her fault that he did not, then turned abruptly to his father. “If I fail in what I am going to try,” he said, “we must adopt a policy of stratagem. Drop all appearance of opposition, but insist upon returning at once to Paris. The first and essential thing is to separate AimÉe from the Merediths. Separating her afterward from Kyrle will be comparatively easy.”

“She is—ah—um—very determined,” said the major.

“So is every girl who fancies herself in love; what does that matter? She will learn that her determination must bend before ours. For myself, I will hesitate at no means to accomplish this. Are you not ready to say the same?”

Under the challenge of that domineering and unscrupulous glance the major fidgeted, cleared his throat nervously, but finally spoke. “Yes,” he said, “I think that any means would be—ah—justifiable, to prevent a thing so mad as what she declares her intention of doing.”

“Then everything is settled,” said Percy, with sharp decision. “Make preparations for leaving Venice immediately. Whether I succeed or fail with Mrs. Meredith, that must be done. Give AimÉe no excuse for refusing to go. Promise anything now. Once away, she will be in our hands, and the rest is easy.”

Even Lydia shuddered a little at the last words. To be in Percy’s hands, at Percy’s mercy, was surely a fate not to be desired, and that, she knew, was what it meant; for he ruled them all, and his father and stepmother would consent to whatever he proposed. With the last words he rose.

“Now,” he said, “I am going to try intimidation with Mrs. Meredith. If I succeed, our work will be easier; if I fail, nothing will be lost. In any event, we go.”

---

Fanny Meredith was walking restlessly about her sitting-room, waiting for the news from AimÉe, which AimÉe had not yet come to give. Lennox had looked in after his interview with Major and Mrs. Joscelyn, made his report, received the sarcastic congratulations of his ally on having brought about exactly the result she had predicted, and which she supposed he had desired, and then taken his departure—for he felt as if solitude was at that moment the only thing he craved—solitude to dwell upon the look and the tone of AimÉe when she put her hand in his as he was going, and said: “Do not let any of this trouble you. I shall not change.” Change! He could have laughed at their folly in fancying they could change her. How well he knew that light in the brave, dark eyes, and the unflinching resolution which it indicated!

After his departure, Fanny looked for AimÉe to appear shortly; but as time went on and she did not come, Mrs. Meredith grew restless and impatient. What was the matter? Even her courage shrank from bearding the lion in his den—that is, the enraged family in their own apartments; but she decided that if AimÉe did not come soon, she would go and learn what detained her. It was just after this resolution had been formed that a knock at the door was followed by the appearance of Percy Joscelyn.

He was perfectly calm in outward bearing, but his quietness of manner did not deceive Fanny for a moment. She knew in the first glance of his eye that he had come for war, and she felt at once scornfully ready to meet it. What could Percy Joscelyn say that would matter to her? She threw back her head and met him with the weapon that always came to her most readily, that of mockery.

“Why, Percy,” she said, “this is a very unexpected pleasure. It is not often you are good enough to come to see me alone. But I suppose you want to talk over such an interesting event as AimÉe’s engagement.”

“Not exactly,” replied Percy, blandly, though his glance became more venomous than ever. “I do not consider that AimÉe’s engagement can take place without the consent of her parents and guardians; but I wish to congratulate you on your success in getting rid of an old lover who might tell awkward stories, by the simple expedient of stopping his mouth with an heiress.”

There was a moment’s pause. The gauntlet had been flung down, and he stood with his hand on the back of a chair, waiting to see how she would take it up. As for Fanny, astonishment rather than lack of courage held her silent for the short space of time in which they regarded each other. Then she said, with more dignity than any one could have imagined her capable of displaying:

“So you have come simply to insult me. That, at least, makes matters clear. I understand and can allow much for your disappointment with regard to AimÉe; but I do not intend to listen to such insinuations as you have just uttered. Be good enough to leave my room.”

She lifted her hand and pointed to the door, but Joscelyn did not stir. On the contrary, he held his position with an air of determination, as he held her glance by the steadiness of his own.

“It will not be well,” he said, “for you to insist upon my leaving before I have finished what I have come to say. I know that Kyrle was your lover before you were married, and that you jilted him for a richer man. In order to deceive that man, you have represented him as having been the lover of AimÉe. This is a pretense which might blind Mr. Meredith, but nobody else; and I hardly think it would blind him very long if one took the trouble to tell him the truth. Now, I do not propose that AimÉe shall be bargained away to save your secrets, so I plainly give you your choice: send this fellow away, as I have no doubt you have the power to do, or Mr. Meredith shall know the whole truth about him and you!”

“My dear,” said Fanny Meredith afterward, in describing the scene to AimÉe, “I was astonished at myself. You know I always was a coward, and I had no doubt that the horrid wretch did know everything, as he said, and would tell it to Tom. But, for the life of me, I could not quail before him! I felt such contempt for him, and such a sense of outrage that he should dare to threaten me in that manner, that I suppose it was anger that made me as brave as a lion.”

Whatever was the force supplying courage, whether anger or disdain, she did not exaggerate in saying that she showed no sign of quailing before Percy Joscelyn’s threats. She drew her brows together, and her eyes blazed as they looked at him. In that instant he felt that he had made a mistake—that to intimidate this woman was not possible.

“What a contemptible creature you are,” she said, in a clear, vibrating tone, “and what a fool besides, to think that you could accomplish anything with me by such a method as this! I will not condescend to answer your insolent assertions and insinuations. If you can induce my husband to listen to you, you can tell him what you please. But understand once for all that every effort in my power shall be devoted to helping Lennox Kyrle to rescue AimÉe from any further association with such a person as yourself. Now will you go—or shall I be forced to ring for the servants to put you out of my apartment?”

Brave as a lion she surely was, or she would have shrunk from the impotent and vindictive rage that almost convulsed Percy’s countenance as he looked at her. There was little in his power to give which he would not have given at this moment to be able to crush her by some revelation such as he had hinted at, but which he now began to think had no existence in reality; for it seemed to him impossible that any one whose conscience convicted her of the falsity charged, could have been so daring and defiant. No, he had made a mistake, and yet—

What was this? Why did Fanny’s expression change so suddenly and greatly? Why did something like fear—yes, he could not be mistaken, it was fear—come into her eyes, as she looked past him at the door to which she had again haughtily directed him? He turned quickly and faced Mr. Meredith, who paused astonished at the angry scene before him.

“Fanny!” he said, involuntarily addressing his wife.

Fanny felt as if her last hour had come, but to betray this to Percy Joscelyn was impossible! The spirit that was in her still kept her head erect and her manner dauntless, although it had not been able to keep from her eyes that sudden expression of fear which had leaped into them. She now addressed her husband with admirable composure, notwithstanding that there was a perceptible quiver of excitement in her voice.

“I have just requested Mr. Joscelyn to leave the room,” she said. “He has so forgotten himself, under the disappointment of AimÉe’s engagement, that he has ventured to come here and threaten me—”

“Threaten you!” repeated Mr. Meredith, as she paused. He made a stride forward that brought him close to Percy Joscelyn, and then he stopped, controlling himself by an effort, but with all its usual genial expression gone from his face, and, instead, fierce indignation in every line. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked, sternly. “Explain yourself!”

A bitter sneer curled the other’s lip. He could not, indeed, explain himself as he should have liked to do; he could not explicitly charge Fanny with duplicity which he only suspected, but he could at least throw a firebrand, and make, he fondly hoped, trouble between herself and her husband. So it was that the sneer came as he looked at that gentleman.

“Mrs. Meredith seems to have regarded it as a threat,” he said, “that I requested her to use her influence over her old lover to induce him to relinquish his fortune-hunting scheme with regard to AimÉe, or else I should have the pleasure of enlightening you with regard to some episodes of her past connected with that gentleman.”

It was a desperate venture, this speech, for if he had been asked for the episodes——But he fancied that he knew Tom Meredith too well to fear that, and the event proved him right. Mr. Meredith did not glance at his wife at all, but looked at Joscelyn himself with lowering brows and gleaming eyes.

“You are a cowardly cur!” he said, distinctly. “My wife told you to leave the room. I now repeat the advice; and if you do not follow it instantly, I shall be obliged to kick you out!”

---

“O Tom, Tom,” cried Fanny, hysterically, “how good you were not even to gratify the wretch by listening to him!”

“Is it possible that you could have imagined that I would?” her husband asked. “Then I can only say that you don’t know me very well yet. Even if I had believed what he implied, do you think I would have let him know it? But how did such an idea enter his mind?” he inquired after a moment, as he sat down. “Is he not aware that Mr. Kyrle was AimÉe’s lover long ago?”

Fanny stood silent, motionless, incapable, it seemed to her, of movement or speech. Never had that old falsehood, told so lightly and heedlessly in the past, appeared to her so odious, so black, so dishonorable as now! Oh, what a vile return for her husband’s trust and goodness to let him still be deceived, still believe a thing which was not so, still be less wise (so she fancied) than Percy Joscelyn, still think her better than she was! No, if it lost her his love forever, if he never, never forgave her the long deceit, she would tell him the truth now, while she had the saving grace and courage to speak. Perhaps Mr. Meredith had never in his life been more surprised than when she suddenly rushed forward, sank on her knees by his chair, and burst into tears.

“O Tom,” she said, “I don’t know that you will ever forgive me for having deceived you so long, but I must tell the truth! Lennox Kyrle was never AimÉe’s lover at all. He was mine.”

“And he took it like an angel, my dear,” Mrs. Meredith said to AimÉe a few hours later. “I never have credited Tom with any angelic qualities before, but I see now that it was because I did not do him justice. No one could have been kinder. He seemed really touched that I confided in him at last, only, he said, it was a mistake not to have told the truth at the time; and he was very severe about the false position in which you were placed. But I cried—Heavens, how I cried!—so he could not scold very much; and then he said he appreciated my telling the truth because it was entirely a voluntary act, since he was sure I did him the justice to believe he would never have listened to Percy Joscelyn. I did believe it, and that was the reason I was forced to speak. When he trusted me so, I was ashamed to feel how I had deceived him!”

“I have often wondered,” said AimÉe, “that you did not feel it before.”

“No doubt I ought to have done so,” replied Fanny, penitently, “and perhaps I suffered more than you would believe; for I feel now as light—oh, as light as a feather, to think that there is no more need for concealment. Lennox will be glad. He was always so desperately indignant about you. I really believe that he fell in love with you at that time.”

AimÉe smiled a little. Probably Lennox had already told her so.

“And what a pleasant thing it is,” Mrs. Meredith went on, “to reflect that this is the only result of Percy’s attempt to make mischief—the viper! AimÉe, do you know that there are dreadful possibilities of malice in that man? I shudder when I remember the expression of his face as he stood there”—she pointed to the spot—“looking at me. And what makes me shudder, is the thought of his having any power over you.”

“He has none at all,” said AimÉe, a little haughtily. “What is Percy Joscelyn to me?”

“To you?—nothing. But he directs every act of your mother and stepfather, and therefore he has a dangerous power over your life. I tell you frankly that I shall never feel that you are safe until you are married and out of their clutches.”

“Safe from what?” asked AimÉe, quietly.

“Well,” answered Fanny, reluctantly, “I don’t want to be melodramatic, or I should say safe from danger. I believe Percy to be capable of any wickedness. I did not think so until to-day. Hitherto I have thought him more mean than wicked, but it was as if I looked down into his soul when he stood there gazing at me with hatred in his eyes, and what I saw there was as black as—as the bottomless pit!”

“Fanny!” said AimÉe, astonished and startled, for this flight of imagination was singularly unlike Fanny, who generally took things on the surface, and was not at all addicted to descending in fancy to the region of which she spoke.

“I mean exactly what I say, my dear,” replied her cousin, with energy. “I assure you that I wish I could see you married to-morrow.”

“It would have to be an elopement, then,” said AimÉe, with something between a smile and a sob, “for I have just been informed that we are to return to Paris to-morrow.”

“AimÉe!” It was fairly a scream that Mrs. Meredith gave. “You will not dream of consenting to go?”

“What reason have I for refusing?” the girl asked, wistfully. “I can not, without some reason, positively decline to accompany my mother. I have told them that I shall certainly marry Mr. Kyrle; but that has nothing to do with returning to Paris.”

“It has everything to do with it!” said Fanny, in great excitement. “Why else should they think of taking you away in this manner? I tell you that they will hesitate at nothing when they have you alone with them. AimÉe, you must not go.”

“What would you have me do, then?” asked AimÉe.

“I would have you come with us.” (It had long been settled that the Merediths were to go from Venice to Vienna, while the question whether or not the Joscelyns should accompany them had been left open.)

“They would never consent,” said AimÉe, “and I can not endure the thought of a struggle. When the time comes to part from them I should like it to be in outward peace at least.”

“That can never be,” said Fanny, resolutely. “Do not hope for it. They will never let you and your fortune go without a struggle. The only thing to do is to get this struggle over at once. Come with us and marry Lennox Kyrle in Vienna. Don’t tell me that you are not brave enough for it! I am sure that you are brave enough for anything.”

“Brave enough to face danger—yes,” said AimÉe, simply, “but not brave enough to face struggle, pain, bitterness—”

“But you must face all those things if you remain with them, unless you buy peace by giving up Lennox Kyrle. For—do not deceive yourself—they will never consent to your marrying him; and if you are resolved to do it, you must at last leave them in a more unpleasant manner than this which I propose. Now, there is not the slightest difficulty about it, but if you were alone with them would it be easy? I fear that it might be impossible, and I should not be there to help you.”

“It is true,” said AimÉe, who was pale and greatly shaken. “It might be necessary hereafter—under worse circumstances.”

“It would be necessary, and might be impossible,” said Fanny. “Do you not see? This is the golden opportunity. Ah!”—she rose quickly and ran to the window—“I see some one who will help me.”

She waved her hand to Kyrle, whose gondola was just drawing to the steps of the hotel. A moment later he was in the apartment and ready to second her proposal with all the eloquence that love could inspire. But even his eloquence might not have moved AimÉe if she had not felt that he was right; that she was merely on the threshold of a struggle in which she might be worsted, since her opponents would be absolutely unscrupulous in the use of means. But Fanny and Lennox appreciated this, and both were earnest in urging her to take now a step which must be taken sooner or later.

But she was still undecided, when an unexpected ally to the attacking force appeared on the scene. Mr. Meredith came in, and when he heard of the plan of the Joscelyns his honest wrath was stirred. “What! they propose to leave to-morrow, and carry you away with them?” he said. “Then there is one simple thing to be done: I shall go at once and engage your passage with us on the Trieste boat which leaves to-night.”

AimÉe rose and went up to him. The opinions of the others had not moved her as much as might have been expected. Fanny, she knew, was always inimical to the Joscelyns, and for Fanny’s judgment she had not great respect, while Lennox labored under the disadvantage of being a lover who appealed to her heart. In yielding to him she felt that she would be yielding to those dangerous guides, the feelings. But if this practical, unsentimental man thought she ought to go, that was a different matter. She laid her hand on his arm, and looked at him with her dark, appealing eyes.

“Tell me,” she said, “do you think I ought to go?”

The appeal of her tone was as great as the appeal of her glance; and the simplicity of her words touched the man whom she addressed more than anything impassioned could have done.

“My dear,” he said, kindly, “I think that, if you are determined to marry this gentleman, the wisest thing you can do is to leave your family at once, for it will come to that at last; and there is not only no good in deferring an evil day, but at another time you might not be able to command the protection which I am happy to offer you now.”

“Just what I have told her,” cried Fanny.—“Now, AimÉe, will you consent to go?”

AimÉe’s glance passed wistfully from one to the other, and rested on Lennox. “Yes,” she said at length, “I will go.”

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Out into the night and the sea the steamer was moving, leaving the wonderful lights of Venice—a vision of an enchanted city—behind, while among the passengers on her decks one group of four persons watched rather silently the lessening radiance. They were all somewhat subdued in feeling by the fierce storm of opposition through which they had passed—a storm that had shaken AimÉe to the very center, yet had showed her the absolute necessity of this step. She stood now leaning on Kyrle’s arm, her gentle soul filled with sadness at the thought of the bitterness and anger she had left behind, although beneath the sadness was a consciousness of freedom of release from bondage such as she had never felt before. Presently her spirit would spread its wings like a bird in the sunshine, exulting in this new atmosphere; but now she was silent, and Kyrle, divining what she was thinking, as well as her physical exhaustion after such stress of emotion, uttered himself no word, only pressed close against his heart the little hand resting on his arm. It was Fanny Meredith who said at last, with a sigh of relief:

“Well, thank Heaven, it is over, and we are safe; but I feel as if we had all eloped.—Don’t you, Tom?”

“I can’t say that I do,” her husband answered, with a laugh. “But, by Jove, they were desperate! The major swore he would lock her up, and I swore that if he did I would break down the door. I should have done it, too, without a moment’s hesitation,” the speaker ended.

“Wouldn’t it have been simpler and less sensational to call in the police?” Fanny asked.

“The police!” Mr. Meredith scornfully blew out a cloud of cigar-smoke. “What the deuce could Italian police do in such a case? They would probably have arrested everybody, and kept us in Venice until proof could have been given of AimÉe’s age, and a lot of other nonsense. Do you suppose the Joscelyns would have hesitated to declare that she was still an infant? No; the simple and direct thing to do was what we did—carry her off by armed force.”

“What was it you said to Percy Joscelyn when he followed us to the gondola?” Fanny inquired of Kyrle.

“I told him that if he came a step farther I should pitch him into the canal,” that gentleman answered. “Probably he was aware that it would give me sincere pleasure to do it, for he drew back.”

“And yet people think that a fortune is a blessing!” said AimÉe, with a long, quivering breath. “How gladly they would have let me go—as they did once—if it were not for my money! I felt like casting it to them, and bidding them take the only thing they cared for!”

“I am very glad you did not,” said Fanny, practically. “They would have certainly taken it, and you have already cast them far too much. Don’t abuse your fortune, my dear, because the Joscelyns are despicable. Money is a good, a very good thing to have. I only wish you could make Lennox believe it!”

Kyrle laughed. The strain of emotion was sufficiently relaxed now for laughter to become easy. “I promise,” he said, “to do exactly what she wishes with regard to my fortune.”

“Ah,” replied Fanny, pettishly, “you only say that because you know she is as absurdly quixotic as yourself. It may be a very fine thing to be able to throw fortunes away,” the speaker pursued, “but I am glad Tom has no temptations of the kind.—Come,” she said, taking that gentleman’s arm, “I begin to feel the swell a little. Let us walk.”

They passed down the deck, and the two left alone together stood silent for a moment, still watching the lessening lights of the fairy-like city. Then Kyrle turned his face seaward, to meet the fresh breeze that came from the wide sweep of the Adriatic, and his heart leaped within him, as if in answer to that boundless freedom of the sea.

“This is not exactly the sea-gull yacht in which I longed to carry you away,” he said to his companion, “but, although less poetical, it is still bearing us toward the region of our dreams—that mysterious distance out of which it seemed possible that all things might come.”

“You came out of it,” said AimÉe, with a sound as of a smile in her voice. “How well I remember the night on the sea wall of St. Augustine, when I waited for the sound of your oars, and presently you came from the sea, as now—”

“Now I am going back to it—with you,” he said, as she paused. “There has been a long interval between the beginning and the end of the romance; but it is fitting that the sea, which had a part in its beginning, should also have a part in the end. And I may be presumptuous,” he added after a moment, “but I have no fear that we shall not find all our dreams awaiting us beyond that dim horizon of the future at which we gazed the other day.”

THE END.

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Transcriber’s Notes:

1. The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
2. Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been maintained, i.e.: lover-like/loverlike, downstairs/down-stairs, etc.
3. Page 40 “I dont want any wine,” changed to “I don’t want any wine,”.
4. Page 141 “The Jocelyns” changed to “The Joscelyns”.
5. Page 159 Removed extra double quote.
6. Page 200 “lovelness of the most poetical” changed to “loveliness of the most poetical”.
7. Page 202 Added single quote after “Kyrle to send him away”.
8. Page 227 Period added after “children”.
9. Page 250 Double quote added after “And what a pleasant thing it is,”.