No, Ishmael! I cannot make up my mind to part with you yet. It is true,
as you say, that there is little to do now; but recollect that for
months past there has been a great deal to do, and you have done about
four times as much work for me as I was entitled to expect of you. So
that now you have earned the right to stay on with me to the end of the
year, without doing any work at all."

"But, sir--"

"But I won't hear a word about your leaving us just yet, Ishmael. I will
hold you to your engagement, at least until the first of June, when we
all return to Tanglewood; then, if you wish it, of course I will release
you, as your professional duties will require your presence in the city.
But while we remain in town, I will not consent to your leaving us, nor
release you from your engagement," said the judge.

And Ishmael was made happy by this decision. It had been a point of
honor with him, as there was so little to do, to offer to leave the
judge's employment; but now that the offer had been refused, and he was
held to his engagement, he was very much pleased to find himself obliged
to remain under the same roof with Claudia.

Ah! sweet and fatal intoxication of her presence! he would not willingly
tear himself away from it.

Meanwhile this pleasure was but occasional and fleeting. He seldom saw
Claudia except at the dinner hour.

Miss Merlin never now got up to breakfast with the family. Her life of
fashionable dissipation was beginning to tell even on her youthful and
vigorous constitution. Every evening she was out until a late hour, at
some public ball, private party, concert, theater, lecture room, or some
other place of amusement. The consequence was that she was always too
tired to rise and breakfast with the family, whom she seldom joined
until the two o'clock lunch. And at that hour Ishmael was sure to be at
court, where the case of Cobham versus Hanley, in which Mr. Worth was
counsel for the plaintiff, was going on. At the six o'clock dinner he
daily met her, as I said, but that was always in public. And immediately
after coffee she would go out, attended by Mrs. Middleton as chaperone
and the Viscount Vincent as escort. And she would return long after
Ishmael had retired to his room, so that he would not see her again
until the next day at dinner. And so the days wore on.

Mr. Brudenell remained the guest of Judge Merlin. A strange affection
was growing up between him and Ishmael Worth. Brudenell under