gave him genuine pleasure to come
to a plain-featured, neglected damsel, and set all her blood tingling
by a brief whirl in a dance or a breezy chat that did her good, body
and soul, so devoid of satire or patronage was the attention. His
superb health and tireless strength, his perfect familiarity with the
usages of society, and his graceful decision of action made everything
he did appear as easy and natural as the beat of a bird's wing upon
the air, and in his large circle it was felt that no entertainment was
complete without his presence.

Graydon was still attending college when Madge Alden first became
associated with him in her home-life. She was then but thirteen, and
was small and slight for her age. The first evening when she came down
to dinner, shrinking in the shadow of her sister, lingered ever in her
memory. Even now it gave her pain to recall her embarrassment when she
was compelled to take her seat in the full blaze of the light and
meet the eyes of the one to whom she felt that she must appear so
very plain and unattractive. Clad in the deepest mourning, pallid
from grief and watching at her mother's bedside, coming from a life of
seclusion and sorrow, sensitive in the extreme, she had barely reached
that age when awkwardness is in the ascendant, and the quiet city
home seemed the centre of a new and strange world. One other thing she
remembered in that initial chapter of her life,--the kindly glances
that Graydon Muir bent on the pale crescent of a girl who sat opposite
to him. Even as a child she knew that the handsome young fellow was
not secretly laughing at or criticising her, and before dinner was
over she had ventured upon a shy, grateful glance, in reward for his
good-humored efforts to break the ice.

There had, in truth, been no ice to break. The child was merely like
a plant that had grown in the shade, and to her the strong, healthful
youth was sunshine. His smile warmed and vivified her chilled nature,
his hearty words and manner were bracing to her over-sensitive and
timid soul, and his unaffected, unforced kindness was so constant that
she gradually came to regard it as one of the best certainties of her
life. She soon learned, however, that behind his sunny good-nature
was a fiery and impatient spirit, ready to manifest itself if he was
chafed beyond a certain point, and so a slight element of fear was
mingled with her childlike affection.

He had sufficient tact to understand Madg