obe which a
bronze Atalanta held in a niche half way up the stairs, his nobly
formed head and gleaming forehead impressed itself for ever on her
memory.

Slowly he went down, and leaning over the balustrade to watch the
vanishing figure, the withered azaleas slipped from her hair, and
floated like a snowflake down, down to the lower hall.

Fearful of discovery she shrank back, but not before he had seen the
drifting flowers, and one swift upward glance showed him the blanched
suffering face pale as a summer cloud, retreating from observation.
Stooping, he snatched the bruised wilted petals that seemed a fit
symbol of the drooping flower he was leaving behind him, kissed them
tenderly, and thrust them into his bosom.

The blessed assurance so long desired seemed nestling in their
perfumed corollas making all his future fragrant; and how little she
dreamed of the precious message they breathed from her heart to his!

"What could he do indeed? A weak white girl
Held all his heartstrings in her small white hand;
His hopes, and power, and majesty were hers,
And not his own."

CHAPTER XXXI.

"No, mother; no. Not less, but more beautiful; not so pale as when
you hang over me at the convent, baptizing me with hot, fast dripping
tears. Now a delicate flush like the pink of an apple bloom
overspreads your cheeks; and your eyes, once so sad, eyes which I
remember as shimmering stars, burning always on the brink of clouds,
and magnified and misty through a soft veil of April rain, are
brighter, happier eyes than those I have so fondly dreamed of. Oh,
mother! mother! Draw me close, hold me tight. Earth has no peace so
holy as the blessed rest in a mother's clasping arms. After the long
winter of separation, it is so sweet to bask in your presence,
thawing like a numb dormouse in the sunshine of May. I knew I should
find joy in the reunion, but how deep, how full, anticipation failed
to paint; and only the blessed reality has taught me."

On the carpet at her mother's feet, with her head in her mother's lap
and her arms folded around her waist, Regina had thrown herself,
feasting her eyes with the beauty of the face smiling down upon her.
It was the second day after her arrival in Paris, and hour after hour
she had poured into eagerly listening ears the recital of her life at
the quiet parsonage, at the stately mansion on Fifth Avenue; and yet
the endless stream of talk flowed on,