drink the waters.

CHAPTER VII.

THE VASE OF PARNASSUS.

"I am glad to be allowed the chance of speaking to you, Miss
Mainwaring," Leslie Travers began. "I wanted to tell you that I have
found a clue to your poor little protegee of last evening. I am going to
visit her, guided by the boy, to whom she referred me."

"That is good news!" Griselda said. "Will you be sure to let me know if
I can do aught for her? Oh, I would that I was not dependent on others!
I do long to help the poor and sad! I must try once more to get Lady
Betty to make me ever so small an allowance. But," she added, with
sudden animation, "I have many jewels and trinkets which were my
grandmother's, and came to me at her death. Will you sell some for me? I
had thought of selling a necklace to pay Mr. Herschel for his lessons;
but it will be better to feed the starving than learn music."

"You must let me make all due inquiries first, madam," Leslie Travers
said. "I do not desire that your charity should be ill-placed, and many
beggars' tales are false."

"That child was telling the truth!" Griselda said. "I knew it! I felt
it!"

"You can then judge of truth or falseness by the unerring instinct
which is one of the gifts of true womanhood? I would hope--I would
venture to hope--that, tried by that instinct, you would trust me, and
believe that all I say is true. May I dare to hope it is so?"

"Yes," Griselda said, looking straight into the pure, clear eyes which
sought hers. "Yes; I could trust _you_."

"Could? Change that word to _do_. Say you _do_ trust me."

His voice trembled with emotion, and Griselda's eyes fell beneath his
ardent admiring gaze. The story of his love was written on his face, and
Griselda Mainwaring could not choose but read it. The compact between
them might have been sealed then, had not a quiet, gentle voice near
pronounced Mr. Travers' name.

"Leslie, my dear son!"

Griselda turned her face, flushed with crimson, towards Leslie's mother.
He hastened to relieve Griselda's evident embarrassment by saying:

"May I have the honour of presenting you to my mother, Miss Mainwaring?
I have promised to meet my guide to the house we were speaking of. I
will return hither, mother; meantime, may I hope you and Miss Mainwaring
will have some conversation which will be agreeable to both?"

"I will await your return, Leslie. But do not exceed half an hour, for
the dark streets are not pleasant, especially for old fol