herless girl who had once had every
promise of a life of ease and joy, and was by the hap of ill fortune
thrown out on the cold world and into a relation of dependence. He had
about given up any idea of falling in love. Love, such as he had once
known it, was not for him. Love for love's sake--love that created a new
world and peopled it with one woman--was over for him. At least, so
he said.

And when he had reasoned thus, he would find himself hurrying along the
avenue or in the Park, straining his eyes to see if he could distinguish
her among the crowd of walkers and loungers that thronged the sidewalk
or the foot-path a quarter of a mile away. And if he could not, he was
conscious of disappointment; and if he did distinguish her, his heart
would give a bound, and he would go racing along till he was at
her side.

Oftenest, though, he visited her at Mrs. Wentworth's, where he could
talk to her without the continual interruption of the children's busy
tongues, and could get her to sing those old-fashioned songs that,
somehow, sounded to him sweeter than all the music in the world.

In fact, he went there so often to visit her that he began to neglect
his other friends. Even Norman he did not see as much of as formerly.

Once, when he was praising her voice to Mrs. Wentworth, she said to him:
"Yes, I think she would do well in concert. I am urging her to prepare
herself for that; not at present, of course, for I need her just now
with the children; but in a year or two the boys will go to school and
the two girls will require a good French governess, or I may take them
to France. Then I shall advise her to try concert. Of course, Miss
Brooke cannot take care of her always. Besides, she is too independent
to allow her to do it."

Keith was angry in a moment. He had never liked Mrs. Wentworth so
little. "I shall advise her to do nothing of the kind," he said firmly.
"Miss Huntington is a lady, and to have her patronized and treated as an
inferior by a lot of _nouveaux riches_ is more than I could stand."

"I see no chance of her marrying," said Mrs. Wentworth. "She has not a
cent, and you know men don't marry penniless girls these days."

"Oh, they do if they fall in love. There are a great many men in the
world and even in New York, besides the small tuft-hunting, money-loving
parasites that one meets at the so-called swell houses. If those you and
I know were all, New York would be a very insignificant place. Th