it those papers without
an order from Robert or Michael Penfold. Pray consider this as a delay,
not a refusal."

"Yes, sir," said Helen; "but I meet with nothing but delays, and my heart
is breaking under them."

The solicitor looked sorry, but would not act irregularly. She went home
sighing, and condemned to wait the return of Michael Penfold.

The cab door was opened for her by a seedy man she fancied she had seen
before.

Baffled thus, and crippled in every movement she made, however slight, in
favor of Robert Penfold, she was seduced on the other hand into all the
innocent pleasures of the town. Her adventure had transpired somehow or
other, and all General Rolleston's acquaintances hunted him up; and both
father and daughter were courted by people of ton as lions. A shipwrecked
beauty is not offered to society every day. Even her own sex raved about
her, and about the chain of beautiful pearls she had picked up somehow on
her desolate island. She always wore them; they linked her to that sacred
purpose she seemed to be forgetting. Her father drew her with him into
the vortex, hiding from her that he embarked in it principally for her
sake, and she went down the current with him out of filial duty. Thus
unfathomable difficulties thrust her back from her up-hill task. And the
world, with soft but powerful hand, drew her away to it. Arthur brought
her a choice bouquet, or sent her a choice bouquet, every evening, but
otherwise did not intrude much upon her; and though she was sure he would
assist her, if she asked him, gratitude and delicacy forbade her to call
him again to her assistance. She preferred to await the return of Michael
Penfold. She had written to him at the office to tell him she had news of
his son, and begged him to give her instant notice of his return from
Scotland.

Day after day passed, and he did not write to her. She began to chafe,
and then to pine. Her father saw, and came to a conclusion that her
marriage with Arthur ought to be hastened. He resolved to act quietly but
firmly toward that end.

CHAPTER LVI.

UP to this time Helen's sex, and its attributes, had been a great
disadvantage to her. She had been stopped on the very threshold of her
inquiry by petty difficulties which a man would have soon surmounted. But
one fine day the scale gave a little turn, and she made a little
discovery, thanks to her sex. Women, whether it is that they are born to
be followed, or are accustome