nom into even his selfish
nature.

General Harrington sat with the book open before him. One hand, on
which was a costly seal-ring, had, in unconscious warmth, grasped a
dozen of the leaves, and half-torn them from the cover, while his eye
read on, fascinated, and yet repulsed by the secret thoughts thus torn
with unmanly violence from poor Mabel's life. All the craft and coolness
of his nature had disappeared for the moment. His whole being was fired
with disgust and bitter rage. Still, in his soul, he felt that these two
persons had in reality suffered a deadly wrong from himself; that, after
encouraging the attachment which he had hoped might spring up between
them before his wife's death had swept her great wealth out of his
hands, he had ruthlessly, and without questioning the state of these two
souls, severed them for the accomplishment of his own interests. It had
not once occurred to him that any lasting attachment for another could
exist, while he condescended to solicit a woman's preference; and that
which had for a time made itself manifest between the two young people,
only gave a fresher zest to his conquest. To win a woman from one so
much younger than himself, was even then, a triumph almost as agreeable
as the possession of Mabel's fortune.

But now, when he was beginning to feel the approach of age, and to
wither under the preference given to younger men--a preference rendered
each day more decided in a country where statesmen are jostled aside by
beardless boys, and the senseless giggle of pert school girls might
drive Sappho into a second watery grave, sickened with disgust. His
personal vanity became almost a monomania, and he sat there, clutching
Mabel's book, pale as death, and with flecks of foam gathering upon his
lips, longing to appease his mortified vanity by tearing fiercely at
something, as a baffled hound digs his claws into the earth when his
prey is beyond reach.

As he sat there shaking with silent rage, a door, not used for years,
opened in his bed-chamber, and a woman came through, leaving the dark
and dusty room which had for a short time been occupied by the first
Mrs. Harrington, before her fatal voyage to Europe, in total darkness
again. She stood for a moment, concealed by the crimson curtains, and
keenly watched the old man, as he sat trembling before her in the first
rage of his humiliation. Then, having satisfied herself that her hour
was propitious, she stole softly into th