your marriage!'

'They have,' said Percy, smiling. 'They will come back some way or
other. I shall work with a will now! I am twice the man I was yesterday.
It was heartless work before. Now, "some achieve greatness," you know.'

Arthur would have said more, but Percy stopped him. 'If you gave it me
to-morrow, we could not marry on it. Let things alone till you are about
again, and John comes home. Meantime, trust her and me for being happy.
A fico for the world and worldlings base.'

He attained his object in making Arthur smile; and Violet presently
returning, they sat on opposite sides of the fire, and held one of the
happiest conversations of their lives. Violet told the whole story of
the fire, which seemed as new to Arthur as to Percy.

'Why did I never hear this before?' he asked.

'You heard it at the time,' said Violet.

Recollections came across Arthur, and he turned away his head,
self-convicted of having thought the women made a tedious history,
and that he could not be bored by attending. Percy's way of listening,
meanwhile, was with his foot on the fender, his elbow on his knee, his
chin resting on his hand, his bright gray eyes fixed full on Violet,
with a beaming look of gladness, and now and then a nod of assent, as
if no heroism on Theodora's part could surpass his expectations, for he
could have told it all beforehand. However, his turn came, when Violet
described her last expedition after the chess-board, and the injury it
had entailed.

'Now, now, you don't say so!' said he, stammering with eagerness, and
starting up.

'Poor dear, she hardly knew what she did,' said Violet.

'I remember,' said Arthur. 'That was the time of the delusion that Percy
had taken up with his present cousin-in-law.'

Violet blushed. She was too much ashamed of ever having had the idea
to bear to recall it; and when Arthur explained, Percy shuddered, and
exclaimed, 'No, I thank you, Violet! you knew enough against me; but you
need not have thought me quite come to that!'

On the morrow, Percy came in as the children's lessons were concluded.
He studied Theodora's face tenderly, and hoped that she had rested. She
laughed, and called herself perfectly well; and, indeed, her eyes were
as large and as bright as they ought to me, and she had discovered, that
morning, that her black locks would make a much more respectable show
if properly managed. He would not have mistaken her if she had looked as
she did now three