head, the calm, intellectual brows, and the large, tender, dark
eyes, as soft and pathetic as those of a doe--only this woman's face was
worn and sad, and her hair was silver-gray.

She was greatly agitated, and for a second or two incapable of speech.
But when he began in French to apologize for his intrusion, she eagerly
interrupted him.

"Ah, no, no!" she said, in the same tongue. "Do not waste words in
apology. You have come to tell me about my child, my Natalie: Heaven
bless you for it; it is a great kindness. To-day I saw you walking with
her--listening to her voice--ah, how I envied you!--and once or twice I
thought of going to her and taking her hand, and saying only one
word--'Natalushka!'"

"That would have been a great imprudence," said he gravely. "If you wish
to speak to your daughter--"

"If I wish to speak to her!--if I wish to speak to her!" she exclaimed;
and there were tears in her voice, if there were none in the sad eyes.

"You forget, madame, that your daughter has been brought up in the
belief that you died when she was a mere infant. Consider the effect of
any sudden disclosure."

"But has she never suspected? I have passed her; she has seen me. I gave
her a locket: what did she think?"

"She was puzzled, yes; but how would it occur to the girl that any one
could be so cruel as to conceal from her all those years the fact that
her mother was alive?"

"Then you yourself, monsieur--"

"I knew it from Calabressa."

"Ah, my old friend Calabressa! And he was here, in London, and he saw my
Natalie. Perhaps--"

She paused for a second.

"Perhaps it was he who sent the message. I heard--it was only a word or
two--that my daughter had found a lover."

She regarded him. She had the same calm fearlessness of look that dwelt
in Natalie's eyes.

"You will pardon me, monsieur. Do I guess right? It is to you that my
child has given her love?"

"That is my happiness," said he. "I wish I were better worthy of it."

She still regarded him very earnestly, and in silence.

"When I heard," she said, at length, in a low voice, "that my Natalie
had given her love to a stranger, my heart sunk. I said, 'More than ever
is she away from me now;' and I wondered what the stranger might be
like, and whether he would be kind to her. Now that I see you, I am not
so sad. There is something in your voice, in your look, that tells me to
have confidence in you: you will be kind to Natalie."

She seemed to be