ghtfulness. Then she looked up, smiling faintly.

"Elsie is so thoughtless--she does not mean the wrong she does poor
Tom--still we must not be unmerciful, so once more let us forgive her
wholly--without reservation."

A knock at the door disturbed them. It was Victoria, who came to
announce Mr. Fuller, who was close behind her.

"Elizabeth, I've come back. It was no use trying to stay in that
confounded city. To save my life I couldn't do it," he said, pushing by
the pretty mulatto and closing the door upon her. "Can I see her
now--only for once, you know?"

Elizabeth blushed crimson.

"Oh, Tom, you don't know your----"

"Yes, I do know."

"And still wish to see her?"

"Why not? of course I do; because one--infernal villain--excuse me, I
won't talk. Where is she?"

Elizabeth, a little shocked and quite taken by surprise, glanced towards
the blue boudoir. In Tom strode and shut the door resolutely after him.

CHAPTER LXXX.

TOM ACCEPTS THE SITUATION.

Lying upon a couch, over which that pale marble statue was bending with
its cold lilies in mocking purity, lay a pale little creature, covered
with a pink eider-down quilt, which but half concealed a morning dress
of faint azure; quantities of delicate Valenciennes lace fluttered, like
snowflakes, around her wrists and bosom, and formed the principal
material of a dainty little cap, under which her golden tresses were
gathered. She looked like a girl of twelve pretending womanhood.

When Tom came in she uttered a sudden cry, flung up her hands and
dropped them in a loose clasp over her face, which flushed under them
like a rose.

Tom walked straight to the couch, drew one of the fragile gilded chairs
close to it, and sat down.

"Don't--don't--go away. It's cruel. I shall faint with shame," she
cried, trembling all over.

"Not till you have answered me a few questions," said Tom, firmly.
"Questions that I have a right to ask and you must answer."

Elsie drew the little hands slowly from her face and looked at him. The
blue eyes--grown larger from illness--opened wide, her lips parted. That
was not the lover she had trifled with and domineered over. She was
afraid of him and shrunk away close to the wall.

"Elsie, one word," said Tom, pressing a hand firmly on each knee and
bending towards her.

Her lips parted wider, and she watched him with the glance of a
frightened bird when a cat looks in at the door of its cage.

"You have come to tor