to bear poverty. She was good and amiable,
but he wearied of her, and scarcely pretended to feel her death as a
loss."

"Oh! mamma, how could that be possible? if he married her for love?"

"For what he called love, at least. There are men, my child, and perhaps
women also, whose only kind of love is a fancy, like a child's for a
toy. They see something which attracts them; they try their utmost to
obtain it. If they fail, they soon forget their disappointment; if they
succeed, they are delighted for the moment, until, the novelty having
worn off, they discover that they have paid too dearly for their
gratification, and throw aside their new possession in disgust."

Mrs. Costello spoke earnestly, and with a kind of suppressed passion. It
seemed as if her words had an application beyond Lucia's knowledge; yet
they awed her strangely. Could they be true? Who then could be trusted?
for according to her mother's story, Lord Lastingham had not merely
deceived his wife, he had deceived himself also, with this counterfeit
love. She fell into a reverie, which lasted till the noise of cups and
saucers, as Margery brought in tea, put it to flight.

CHAPTER IV.

Two or three weeks passed. The inhabitants of Cacouna had grown
accustomed to the sight of Mr. Percy's tall figure, as he lounged from
his cousin's house to his office, or rode and drove with Mrs. Bellairs.
From different causes, the project of spending the day at the farm, as
well as some other schemes of amusement, had been deferred, and, with
one or two exceptions, all was going on as usual. The most notable of
these exceptions was in the life at the cottage, formerly so calm, so
regular, so smooth in its current. Now a change had crept over both
mother and daughter, and the very atmosphere of the house seemed to have
changed with them.

In Lucia, even a casual visitor would have remarked the difference. Her
beauty seemed suddenly to have burst from bud into blossom; her
childishness of manner had almost left her; her voice, especially in
singing, had grown more full and musical.

In Mrs. Costello, the change was the reverse of all this. Mrs. Bellairs
and Maurice Leigh, the two people, who, except her daughter, loved her
best, grieved over her unrested, pallid face, and noticed that her soft
brown hair had more and more visible streaks of grey. They thought her
ill, and each had said so, but she answered so positively that nothing
was the matter, that t