ut, and was
assuredly acquiring from the multitude of volumes she devoured all
the knowledge a woman needed, she was safer in the evenly heated city
house. The sisters had independent fortunes of their own, and the
great point in Mrs. Muir's mind was that they should live and enjoy
them. If Madge was only sufficiently coddled now while she was
growing, she would get strong eventually; and so the good lady, who
had as much knowledge of hygiene as of Sanscrit, tempted the invalid
with delicacies, permitted her to eat the confectionery that Graydon
brought so often, and generally indulged a nature that needed wise and
firm development.

Thus Madge lived on, growing more pale and languid with each
succeeding year. The absence in the mountains and at the seashore
which Mr. Muir permitted to his family every summer brought changes
for the better, even though the young girl spent most of the time in a
hammock or reclining in the stern of a sail-boat. She could not escape
the invigoration caused by the mere breathing of pure air, but during
the winters in town she lost all and more than she had gained, and
sunk back into her old apathetic life.

This life, however, contained two elements which gave some color and
zest to her existence. All through the day she would look forward to
Graydon's return from business, and when she heard his latch-key the
faintest possible color would steal into her cheeks. Up-stairs, two
steps at a time, he would come, kiss her, waltz her about the room
with a strength which scarcely permitted her feet to touch the floor,
then toss her back on the lounge, where she would lie, laughing,
breathless, and happy. With a man's ignorant tolerance he accepted her
character as an invalid, and felt that the least he could do was
to brighten a life which seemed so dismal to him. When he came down
dressed for dinner or some evening engagement, she looked at him with
a frank, admiring pride that amused him immensely. When he returned
earlier than usual he often found her still upon the lounge with her
inevitable book, usually a novel, and then he would take her upon
his lap and call her his "dear little spook, the household ghost that
would soon cease to cast a shadow;" and she, with a languid curiosity,
would easily beguile from him a portrayal of the scenes through which
he had just passed. She cared little for them, but from his stores
of vitality and strength he imparted life to her, and without
understand