be able to enjoy myself to-night just so much as I see that you are
doing so. Life has its dark portals and its bright ones. This is one
that you must enter with your most brilliant smiles."
"And they shall not be lacking," said she. "When a treasure-box of
thought is given us, we do not open it and scatter its contents abroad,
but lay it away where the heart keeps its secrets, to be opened in the
hush of night when we are alone with our own souls and God."
He smiled and she moved towards the door. "None the less do we carry
with us wherever we go, the remembrance of our hidden treasure," she
smilingly added, looking back upon him from the stair.
And again as upon the first night of her entrance into the house, did he
stand below and watch her as she softly went up, her lovely face
flashing one moment against the dark background of the luxurious bronze,
towering from the platform behind, then glowing with faint and fainter
lustre, as the distance widened between them and she vanished in the
regions above.
She did not see the toss of his arm with which he threw off the burden
that rested upon his soul.
XVII.
GRAVE AND GAY.
"No scandal about Queen Elizabeth I hope."
--SHERIDAN.
"Stands Scotland where it did?"
--MACBETH.
"Who is that talking with Miss Stuyvesant?" asked Mr. Sylvester,
approaching his wife during one of the lulls that will fall at times
upon vast assemblies.
Mrs. Sylvester followed the direction of his glance and immediately
responded, "O that is Mr. Ensign, one of the best _partis_ of the
season. He evidently knows where to pay his court."
"I inquired because he has just requested me to honor him with a formal
introduction to Paula."
"Indeed! then oblige him by all means; it would be a great match for
her. To say nothing of his wealth, he is _haut ton_, and his red
whiskers will not look badly beside Paula's dark hair."
Mr. Sylvester frowned, then sighed, but in a few minutes Paula observed
him approaching with Mr. Ensign. At once her hitherto pale cheek
flushed, but the young gentleman did not seem to object to that, and
after the formal introduction which he had sought was over, he exclaimed
in his own bright ringing tones,
"The fates have surely forgotten their usual role of unpropitiousness. I
did not dare hope to meet you here to-night, Miss Fairchild. Was the
ride all that your fancy painted?"
"O," said she, speaking very low and g
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