t my education has been so much
neglected that it is actually indispensable I should study now."

"Education neglected! what nonsense! Do they want to make you a
Professor of the Sorbonne? Why, child, without any wish to make you
vain, you know ten times as much as half the collegiate fellows one
meets, what with languages, and music, and drawing, and all that school
learning of mamma's own teaching. And then that memory of yours, Clara;
why, you seem to me to forget nothing."

"I remember but too well," muttered she to herself.

"What was it you said, child? I did not catch it," said he. And then,
not waiting for her reply, he went on: "And all your high spirits, my
little Clara, where are they gone? And your odd rhymes, that used to
amuse me so? You never make them now."

"They do not cross my mind as they used to do," said she, pensively.

"You vote them childish, perhaps, like your dolls?" said he, smiling.

"No, not that. I wish with all my heart I could go back to the dolls and
the nursery songs. I wish I could live all in the hour before me, making
little dramas of life, with some delightful part for myself in each,
and only to be aroused from the illusion to join a real world Just as
enjoyable."

"But surely, child, you have not reached the land of regrets already?"
said he, fondly drawing her towards him with his arm.

She turned her head away, and drew her hand across her eyes.

"It is very early to begin with sorrow, my dear child," said he,
affectionately. "Let me hope that it's only an April cloud, with the
silver lining already peeping through."

A faint sob broke from her, but she did not speak.

"I 'd ask to be your confidant only in thinking I could serve you,
dearest Clara. Old men like myself get to know a good deal of life
without any study of it."

She made a slight effort to disengage herself from his arm, but he held
her fast; and, after a moment, she leaned her head upon his shoulder and
burst out crying.

At this critical instant the door opened, and Mrs. Morris entered.
Scarcely inside the room, she stood like one spell-bound, unable to move
or speak; her features, flushed by exercise, became pale as death, her
lips actually livid. "Am I indiscreet?" asked she, in a voice scarcely
other than a hiss of passion. "Do I interrupt a confidence, Sir
William?"

"I am not sure that you do," said he, good-humoredly. "Though I was
pressing Clara to accept me as a counsellor, I 'm not qui