el
almost sprang to her feet in the force of her sudden passion.

"What! I--I, Lady Hope of Oakhust, invite that girl to be your
companion, my guest! Clara, are you mad? or am I?"

The girl was struck dumb with amazement. Never in her existence had she
been so addressed before--for, with her, Rachael had been always kind
and delicately tender. Why had she broken forth now, when she asked the
first serious favor of her life?

"Mamma! mamma Rachael!" she cried. "What is the matter? What have I done
that you are so cross with me?"

"Nothing," said Rachael, sighing heavily, "only you ask an unreasonable
thing, and one your father would never forgive me for granting."

"But she is so lovely! papa would like her, I know. She is so unhappy,
too! I could feel her shudder when the stage was mentioned. Oh, mamma
Rachael, we might save her from that!"

"I cannot! Do not ask me; I cannot!"

"But I promised that you would be her friend."

"Make no promises for me, Clara, for I will redeem none. Drive this girl
from your thoughts. To-morrow morning we go back to Oakhurst."

"To-morrow morning! And I promised to see her again."

"It is impossible. Let this subject drop. In my wish to give you
pleasure, I have risked the anger of Lord Hope. He would never forgive
me if I permitted this entanglement."

Lady Clara turned to Hepworth Closs.

"Plead for me--plead for that poor girl!" she cried, with the
unreasoning persistence of a child; but, to her astonishment, Hepworth
answered even more resolutely than his sister.

"I cannot, Clara. There should be nothing in common between the daughter
of Olympia and Lord Hope's only child."

"Oh, how cruel! What is the use of having rank and power if one is not
to use it for the good of others?"

"We will not argue the matter, dear child."

"But I will argue it, and if I cannot convince, I will hate you,
Hepworth Closs, just as long as I live."

"Not quite so bad as that, I trust," answered Hepworth, sadly. "To own
the truth, Clara, I fear your mother will have enough to do in
reconciling Lord Hope to the position another person has assumed in his
household. Do not let us add new difficulties to her position."

Clara began to cry.

"I'm sure I never thought of troubling her or offending my father. It is
so natural for them to be good and kind, why should I doubt them now,
when the grandest, sweetest, most beautiful girl in the whole world
wants help--just the help they can gi