f discord, into the narrow
circle of their happiness.

They reached Clarence at four o'clock. Warwick got down from the buggy
at his office. Tryon drove on to his hotel, to make a hasty toilet
before visiting his sweetheart.

Warwick glanced at his mail, tore open the envelope addressed in his
sister's handwriting, and read the contents with something like dismay.
She had gone away on the eve of her wedding, her lover knew not where,
to be gone no one knew how long, on a mission which could not be
frankly disclosed. A dim foreboding of disaster flashed across his
mind. He thrust the letter into his pocket, with others yet unopened,
and started toward his home. Reaching the gate, he paused a moment and
then walked on past the house. Tryon would probably be there in a few
minutes, and he did not care to meet him without first having had the
opportunity for some moments of reflection. He must fix upon some line
of action in this emergency.

Meanwhile Tryon had reached his hotel and opened his mail. The letter
from Rena was read first, with profound disappointment. He had really
made concessions in the settlement of that lawsuit--had yielded several
hundred dollars of his just dues, in order that he might get back to
Rena three days earlier. Now he must cool his heels in idleness for at
least three days before she would return. It was annoying, to say the
least. He wished to know where she had gone, that he might follow her
and stay near her until she should be ready to come back. He might ask
Warwick--no, she might have had some good reason for not having
mentioned her destination. She had probably gone to visit some of the
poor relations of whom her brother had spoken so frankly, and she would
doubtless prefer that he should not see her amid any surroundings but
the best. Indeed, he did not know that he would himself care to
endanger, by suggestive comparisons, the fine aureole of superiority
that surrounded her. She represented in her adorable person and her
pure heart the finest flower of the finest race that God had ever
made--the supreme effort of creative power, than which there could be
no finer. The flower would soon be his; why should he care to dig up
the soil in which it grew?

Tryon went on opening his letters. There were several bills and
circulars, and then a letter from his mother, of which he broke the
seal:--

MY DEAREST GEORGE,--This leaves us well. Blanche is still with me, and
w