auty of the house, the handsome face and kindly
manners of Farnham, and the wonderful beauty and sweetness of Alice
Belding.

"Did that bold thing go to call on him alone?" cried Miss Maud,
thoroughly aroused by this supposed offence against the proprieties of
life.

"Why, no, Mattie," said Sam, a little disconcerted. "Her ma was along."

"Why didn't you say so, then?" asked the unappeased beauty.

"I forgot all about the old lady, though she was more chinny than the
young one. She just seemed like she was a-practisin' the mother-in-law,
so as to do it without stumblin' when the time come."

"Hullo! Do you think they are strikin' a match?" cried Saul, in high
glee. "That would be first-rate. Keep the money and the property all
together. There's too many of our rich girls marryin' out of the State
lately--keeps buildin' dull."

"I don't believe a word of it," Maud interposed. "He ain't a man to be
caught by a simperin' schoolgirl. And as to money, He's got a plenty
for two. He can please himself when he marries."

"Yes, but may be he won't please you, Mattie, and that would be a
pity," said the ironical Saul.

The old man laughed loudly at his own sarcasm, and pushed his chair
back from the table, and Maud betook herself to her own room, where she
sat down, as her custom was, by the window, looking over the glowing
lake, and striving to read her destiny as she gazed into the crimson
and golden skies. She did not feel at all so sure as she pretended that
there was no danger of the result that Sleeny had predicted; and now
that she was brought face to face with it, she was confounded at
discovering how much it meant to her. She was carrying a dream in her
heart which would make or ruin her, according as it should prove true
or false. She had not thought of herself as the future wife of Farnham
with any clearness of hope, but she found she could not endure the
thought of his marrying any one else and passing forever out of her
reach. She sat there, bitterly ruminating, until the evening glow had
died away from the lake and the night breeze spread its viewless wings
and flapped heavily in over the dark ridge and the silent shore. Her
thoughts had given her no light of consolation; her chin rested on her
hands, her elbows on her knees; her large eyes, growing more luminous
in the darkness, stared out at the gathering night, scarcely noting
that the sky she gazed at had changed from a pompous scene of red and
yellow