sented allegories of Faith and Prayer to
people without. A white marble group of several figures, expressing an
Italian conception of Lincoln Freeing the Slaves,--a Latin negro and
his wife,--with our Eagle flapping his wings in approval, at Lincoln's
feet, occupied one corner, and balanced the what-not of an earlier
period in another. These phantasms added their chill to that imparted
by the tone of the walls, the landscapes, and the carpets, and
contributed to the violence of the contrast when the chandelier was
lighted up full glare, and the heat of the whole furnace welled up from
the registers into the quivering atmosphere on one of the rare
occasions when the Laphams invited company.

Corey had not been in this room before; the family had always received
him in what they called the sitting-room. Penelope looked into this
first, and then she looked into the parlour, with a smile that broke
into a laugh as she discovered him standing under the single burner
which the second-girl had lighted for him in the chandelier.

"I don't understand how you came to be put in there," she said, as she
led the way to the cozier place, "unless it was because Alice thought
you were only here on probation, anyway. Father hasn't got home yet,
but I'm expecting him every moment; I don't know what's keeping him.
Did the girl tell you that mother and Irene were out?"

"No, she didn't say. It's very good of you to see me." She had not
seen the exaltation which he had been feeling, he perceived with half a
sigh; it must all be upon this lower level; perhaps it was best so.
"There was something I wished to say to your father----I hope," he
broke off, "you're better to-night."

"Oh yes, thank you," said Penelope, remembering that she had not been
well enough to go to dinner the night before.

"We all missed you very much."

"Oh, thank you! I'm afraid you wouldn't have missed me if I had been
there."

"Oh yes, we should," said Corey, "I assure you."

They looked at each other.

"I really think I believed I was saying something," said the girl.

"And so did I," replied the young man. They laughed rather wildly, and
then they both became rather grave.

He took the chair she gave him, and looked across at her, where she sat
on the other side of the hearth, in a chair lower than his, with her
hands dropped in her lap, and the back of her head on her shoulders as
she looked up at him. The soft-coal fire in the grate purred and