el, with a look of surprise.

"We are apparently drifting into confessions," responded he. "I may say
that I never could construe your visits to Paul, the ingenious artist,
merely as dictated by admiration of his wonderful genius."

"You do not know that Paul is the son of my mother's sister," replied
she. "Your uncle knows; but there may be reasons why you don't."

"Then I am relieved," was the lover's ejaculation, in a tone as if he
had got quit of a great burden.

"Yes, that is the truth," continued she; "but I also confess that I have
been attracted to his small dark workshop by the exquisite curiosities
of art on which he is so often engaged, and which, by occupying so much
of his time, keep him poor. It was only yesterday I saw on his bench a
locket which seems to transcend all his prior efforts."

The young man smiled and nodded. What could he mean? Why was he not
dumbfoundered?

"It is in the shape of a heart," she continued; "and upon touching a
spring there fly up two tiny figures, which, with fluttering wings, seem
to devour each other with kisses."

Words which forced themselves out of her in spite of her shyness, but
which she could not follow up by more than a side-look at her admirer.

"And upon which," said he, still smiling, "there is engraven the
inscription, 'From Walter Grierson to Agnes Ainslie.'"

"Yes," sighed Rachel, "the very words. I read them again and again, and
could scarcely believe my eyes."

"And well you might not," said he; "but your simple heart has never yet
informed you that love finds out strange inventions. I have been guilty
of a _ruse d'amour_, for which I beg your pardon. Knowing that you were
in the habit of visiting Paul's workroom, and seeing all the work of his
cunning fingers, I got him to make the locket out of a piece of gold I
got from my uncle, and the inscription was,"--and here he paused as if
to watch her expression,--"yes, designed, to quicken your affection for
me by awakening jealousy. I confess it. Agnes Ainslie was and is nothing
to me; and I used her name merely because I thought that you would view
her as a likely rival."

"Can all this be true?" muttered Rachel to herself, as the wish to
believe was pursued by the doubt which revolted against a departure from
all natural and rational actions.

Perhaps she was not versed in the ways of the world; but whether so or
not, the difference in effect would have been small; for what man,
beloved by a wom