s interfere with your
pleasure, or else I do not know Cousin Peter. And also I think Antony
Van Hoosen would be better here than haunting operas and theatres,
and every spot by night and day, where Rose Filmer beckons him. Oh! I
know that Filmer girl; and the more I think of her the less I think of
her. She has Antony's heart under her foot, and she turns and turns
her French heel on it, as if it were a worm. But if Antony must be in
New York, he shall have a home from which he may command the Filmers.
At least, I shall offer him this advantage."

"Command!"

"I think so. If there is one thing Emma Filmer aspires to, longs for,
covets, and hankers after, it is to step within the charmed chalk
circle, which encloses the central reserve of what she calls
'society.' Selina Zabriski is one of this potent reserve, and your
poor cousin has a kind of, a sort of, a power in it. Oh! I know Emma
Filmer! And Henry Filmer, also--poor fellow! In New York we don't
think much of husbands, but we don't often drive them to writing books
about--_civilization!_"

She was silent for a moment or two, then she resumed: "When I was a
slip of a girl, Adriana, I had a 'thoughtful' feeling about Henry
Filmer. The old Dominie used to say to me, 'Henry is a good lad,
Alida, and there is a kind of providence in the way your lands lie.
Land and love is fair matrimony, you may depend upon that, Alida.'"

"Then, cousin, did you once intend to marry Mr. Filmer?"

"As I say, I had got as far as 'thinking.' But Henry Filmer wrote
poetry, and I am not poetical. Emma Colbert set his poems to music,
and sang them! What man could resist such tactics? With her 'Ohs!' and
her 'Ahs!' and her tinkling piano, she took him captive. Poor Henry
Filmer! I do not suppose she has sung him a single poem since they
were married. So, you see, I might have been your mother-in-law."

"Cousin Alida!"

"Yes, it is better 'cousin'. But there is no need to 'keep from' me. I
used to see young Filmer and you driving and walking together, and as
I have my eyes, and my senses, I may say, as Corporal Nym said in a
delicate matter, 'There must be conclusions!' Well, I cannot tell!"

Then Adriana opened her heart. This kindly brusque woman had evidently
in the past suffered something from Harry's mother. That made an
instant sympathy between them; perhaps, indeed, Alida had divined the
trouble, and had told her own experience to induce Adriana's
confidence. At any rate, she