t Mabel does not care for compliments,'
continued his mother. 'Do you, my pretty Queen Mab?'

"'I think they are a very poor substitute for real kindness between
friends,' I said.

"I could hear that my voice sounded somewhat irritable, but I could not
resist speaking, though the instant after, I could have bitten my tongue
off for showing so plainly any annoyance at his manner and words. Mrs.
Harrington did not notice my little ebullition--was it wounded
selfishness and pride, I wonder? She took my remark quite as a matter of
course.

"'You are perfectly right,' she said. 'Please to remember that, master
James.'

"I saw that he was looking earnestly at me--perhaps he thought that he
had hurt me, but I was determined to make no more silly self betrayals.
I forced my face to look indifferent, and sat playing carelessly with
the bronze paper cutter in my hand.

"'I am sure Miss Crawford knows that I should be only too proud to be
acknowledged as her friend, and that I value her intellect too highly
for an attempt at empty compliments,' James observed, gravely.

"'Ah, _viola l'amende honorable_!" laughed Mrs. Harrington. 'Mabel is
appeased, and I am content with your explanation.'

"There was a brief silence; I could feel that James was still looking at
me, and did not raise my eyes. Mrs. Harrington was playing with her
flowers, and when she spoke again had forgotten the whole matter--the
merest trifle to her, indeed to anybody possessed of a grain of common
sense, but of so much importance to ridiculous, fanciful me.

"'This is so perfect a day,' she said, 'that I think we must go out to
drive. Will you go with us, James?'

"'I fear that I shall be unable,' he replied, 'I have several letters to
write, and the American mail goes out to-day.'

"'Then we will ask Miss Eaton, Mabel,' said Mrs. Harrington, 'she always
likes to go with us.'

"I could have dispensed with this young lady's society, but of course I
did not say so, and I had the decency to be ashamed of my unaccountable
feeling toward her. She was so very beautiful that to anybody less
captious than I had grown, even nonsense from such lips as hers would
have been more graceful and acceptable than the wisest remark from
almost any other woman.

"'I am sorry you can't go, James,' Mrs. Harrington was saying, when I
had finished my little mental self-flagellation for all my misdemeanors
and evil thoughts, and could listen to what they were saying.

"