ok which she gave me. "It is true,"
she assented. Then, with a grand turn of her body, and a quick air of
determination: "I am desirous of being worthy of your good opinion. I
will go back to my cousin, Mr. Raymond."

I felt my spirits rise a little; I took her by the hand. "May that
cousin have no need of the comfort which I am now sure you will be ready
to give her."

Her hand dropped from mine. "I mean to do my duty," was her cold
response.

As I descended the stoop, I met a certain thin and fashionably dressed
young man, who gave me a very sharp look as he passed. As he wore his
clothes a little too conspicuously for the perfect gentleman, and as I
had some remembrance of having seen him at the inquest, I set him down
for a man in Mr. Gryce's employ, and hasted on towards the avenue; when
what was my surprise to find on the corner another person, who,
while pretending to be on the look out for a car, cast upon me, as I
approached, a furtive glance of intense inquiry. As this latter was,
without question, a gentleman, I felt some annoyance, and, walking
quietly up to him, asked if he found my countenance familiar, that he
scrutinized it so closely.

"I find it a very agreeable one," was his unexpected reply, as he turned
from me and walked down the avenue.

Nettled, and in no small degree mortified, at the disadvantage in which
his courtesy had placed me, I stood watching him as he disappeared,
asking myself who and what he was. For he was not only a gentleman, but
a marked one; possessing features of unusual symmetry as well as a form
of peculiar elegance. Not so very young--he might well be forty--there
were yet evident on his face the impress of youth's strongest emotions,
not a curve of his chin nor a glance of his eye betraying in any way the
slightest leaning towards _ennui,_ though face and figure were of that
type which seems most to invite and cherish it.

"He can have no connection with the police force," thought I; "nor is it
by any means certain that he knows me, or is interested in my affairs;
but I shall not soon forget him, for all that."

The summons from Eleanore Leavenworth came about eight o'clock in the
evening. It was brought by Thomas, and read as follows:

"Come, Oh, come! I--" there breaking off in a tremble, as if the pen had
fallen from a nerveless hand.

It did not take me long to find my way to her home.

XII. ELEANORES

"Constant you are--
... And for secrecy