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DORIS’S FORTUNE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 
 Bear your blushing honors meekly, old fellow. You 
 are the hero of the hour. ” 
 
 “ Let us get away somewhere out of the crowd, away 
 from everybody,” said the other man quietly, but with 
 some impatience in his particularly sweet and gentle voice. 
 
 “ Not so easy in town on a May afternoon! Let us go to 
 the park; and there, if the sight of your baking fellow- 
 creatures does not tempt you to join the solemn throng, 
 well go and hide ourselves among the trees and moralize.^ 
 “ The park! That is just the place to meet everybody. 
 
 “ Then why not meet them all at once and get the or¬ 
 deal over? Face the congratulations of your defeated rivals 
 like a man. One would think you were ashamed of your 
 victor}'. ” 
 
 “ So I am rather.” , ., , 
 
 “ Ashamed of carrying off the prettiest, wittiest, richest 
 
 girl in London, the only good-looking heiress that ever was 
 born, whom all the penniless bachelors I know worshiped 
 from afar, and all those who were running through their 
 own money looked upon as the hoped-for support ot their 
 
 ^‘“Thaft^is just where it is; it is rather awkward to be 
 marrying a girl so much better olf than one s self, i i & no 
 as if I had expectations, or any hope of making money my¬ 
 self some day. I ought to have been content to worship 
 
 her from afar like the rest.” 
 
 “But, my dear fellow, she wouldn t let you. You are 
 unreasonable; you let strained sentiment carry you too iar. 
 Let us get into this hansom and argue the point. 
 
 They both got into the hansom, and, as they were slowly 
 
6 
 
 doris’s fortuhe. 
 
 driven in the block of vehicles of all kinds along crowded 
 Piccadilly, the younger man continued his argument: 
 
 “ I look upon you as the one solitary case of merit re¬ 
 warded, which restores my faith in a discriminating Provi¬ 
 dence. The very first time Miss Edgcombe saw you, two 
 months ago, on your return from India, she seemed pleased 
 when some one told her you admired her, and she asked 
 me several questions about you which showed that she was 
 interested in you. Well, you can guess that the girl has 
 been used to attention and admiration from every man she 
 has met since she left the school-room, and is a pretty 
 shrewd judge of the merits of her admirers. And I never 
 thought so highly of her judgment as I do now. ” 
 
 “ But then you are the most generous-hearted fellow in 
 the world. Why you haven’t married her yourself long 
 before this is the most perplexing conundrum I ever ask 
 myself.” 
 
 “ I? Oh, I never asked her! We’ve been chums— 
 Doris and I; and I am her adviser and counselor in all 
 matters of difficulty. Of course I give up my office now to 
 you; but it has been a great thing for her to have at hand 
 a man on whose experience and discretion she could rely, 
 surrounded as she is by a giddy crowd of idle flutterers. ” 
 
 The young fellow said this with all solemnity; but his 
 friend interrupted him with a laugh. 
 
 “ That’s rough on the other flutterers, Charlie.” 
 
 “ Other flutterers! I assure you I never flutter where 
 Miss Edgcombe is concerned. I am her Mentor, I tell you, 
 her pilot among the quicksands of a corrupt and venal so¬ 
 ciety; and, if it had not been for my influence exerted in 
 your favor, who knows but she might have bestowed her 
 hand; not to speak of her fortune, in quite a different 
 quarter?” 
 
 Charlie Papillon twirled his golden mustache with feroc¬ 
 ity as he finished this menacing speech; but the other man 
 laughed again. 
 
 64 It is lucky for me I did not know before that my fate 
 hung in your uncompromising hands. I should never 
 have had the courage to propose.” 
 
 “ But then it is so easy to propose to an heiress. It 
 seems the natural thing to do, if one gets a tete-a-tete 
 with her. She expects it, and is so well used to refusing 
 offers that she knows how to dismiss one kindly with the 
 
Doris's fortune. 
 
 7 
 
 least possible pain to one's feelings. I think Doris must 
 have refused all the single men she knows except me." 
 
 “ Why didn't you try? You would have had a better 
 chance than anybody, I should think." 
 
 ‘‘How could I? I haven't any money. What could I 
 have said to her? How could I neatly disguise my willing¬ 
 ness to share nine thousand a year and expectations with a 
 pretty girl? My heart and two hundred a year could have 
 no possible attraction for her." 
 
 “ Take care—consider my feelings. You are putting my 
 
 own case. 
 66 
 
 Oh, no, that is quite a different thing! If Miss Edg- 
 combe had accepted me or any of those other fellows—flut¬ 
 tered, as you call them—all the rest of us would have 
 called out in chorus, ‘ What on earth cun she see in him?' 
 while now we all metaphorically step back and bow our¬ 
 selves out, and make way quite cheerfully for ‘ old Glyn.' 
 It is just the right man and the right woman for once, and 
 everybody acknowledges it and says, ‘ Bless you, my chil¬ 
 dren!' I always felt myself that a beneficent Providence 
 had something nice in store for both of you, and Provi¬ 
 dence has fulfilled my highest hopes in giving you each 
 other." 
 
 Charlie Papillon spoke enthusiastically; but he was 
 hardly overstating the case either as regarded his own de¬ 
 votion to his two friends, or the estimation in which they 
 were generally held. Miss Edgcombe was an exceptional 
 woman, not only in the fact that she was young, wealthy, 
 and handsome, but, in having such a well-balanced mind 
 that, in spite of the flattery and homage she had now for 
 six or seven years been accustomed to receive, she had lived 
 to the age of twenty-four with head unturned and, so it was 
 said, heart untouched. Even her best friends could not suc¬ 
 cessfully defend her from the charge of coldness; but, just 
 in time to save herself from the confirmation of this re¬ 
 proach, she had encouraged the attentions and accepted the 
 hand of David Glyn; and friends and acquaintances agreed 
 that she had chosen well. 
 
 David Glyn had passed the age of thirty without realiz¬ 
 ing any of the brilliant prophecies his friends had freely 
 made concerning him in his early youth. Perhaps there 
 had never been any particular ground for believing that 
 these prophecies would be realized. The exact foundation 
 
8 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 on which the esteem in which he was held was built it 
 would have been difficult to discover. A handsome high- 
 spirited lad, with a generous disposition and sweet temper, 
 he had occupied, even in his Eton days, a high position 
 among his companions, independently of his attainments 
 either in study or in sport, which were respectable, but 
 not extraordinary. A certain natural reserve, with which 
 neither haughtiness nor sulkiness had anything to do, gave 
 dignity to the sweetness of his disposition, and perhaps did 
 more to secure the respect in which he was held than his 
 more undeniable merits. The reputation of the boy be¬ 
 came that of the man; he passed through life making few 
 enemies and many friends, drifting from the army to the 
 bar, from the bar to a clerkship in a Calcutta bank, from 
 the bank to a Government office in London, always steady, 
 always reserved, always looked up to as a good man as well 
 as a good fellow. His handsome figure and beautiful grave 
 face had always attracted a great deal of attention from 
 women of all ranks and ages, and, together with the fact 
 that he rather avoided their society, had caused him to be 
 much sought after by them. The climax to this wide¬ 
 spread admiration, of which he had never been in the least 
 vain, was the interest he excited in beautiful Miss Edg- 
 combe, who frankly encouraged his attentions, without any 
 coquetry, from the first evening of his introduction to her 
 —when she had been prepared to receive him graciously— 
 by Charlie Papillon, who mingled with enthusiastic praises 
 of his friend a glowing account of the impression her beauty 
 had made upon him. After that, it had been plain sailing 
 for Glyn, and in a few weeks, whether at his initiative or 
 hers neither quite knew, he had proposed and been at once 
 accepted. 
 
 The person who rejoiced the most demonstratively over 
 this happy consummation was Charlie Papillon, who con¬ 
 sidered that he was the prime mover in the matter, and 
 took a more than paternal interest in both the young people. 
 He felt quite as much excitement over their love-affair as 
 he did over any of his own, which were many and varied, 
 ranging from the purely Platonic through all the de- 
 g'rees of light-comedy flirtation, sentimental interest, 
 serious attachment, and hopeless passion. He was very 
 good at all but the last, from which, in the course of a few r 
 days, either the hopelessness or the passion would invariably 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 9 
 
 drop out. Mothers and chaperons feared him; but unat¬ 
 tached old ladies and matrons without daughters to marry 
 petted and tried to convert him. For Charlie was an infidel 
 and a heretic on many points of social and moral ortho¬ 
 doxy, a blue-eyed cynic, a golden-haired philosopher, “a 
 most dangerous man, my dear, quite an improper compan¬ 
 ion for young people!” 
 
 But there was not much harm in Charlie, except that his 
 desperately ineligible caressing white hand and affectionate 
 blue eyes would come in the way of most excellent matches 
 between pretty girls and men with big red hands and unin¬ 
 teresting faces, and fortunes which made poor Charlie's 
 two hundred a year seem a poor pittance indeed. But 
 when marriage made a grip in the circle of his loves, Papil- 
 lon replaced the defaulting fair one by another, or he en¬ 
 tered the bride afresh on the register of his heart under 
 the heading “ Platonic," and all went on as happily as 
 ever. No husband seriously feared him, nor had any hus¬ 
 band serious reason to do so; though perhaps, had the mas¬ 
 ter of the house always known what a much more sponta¬ 
 neous smile his wife had for the sunny-faced guest than for 
 his less unvaryingly sweet self, he would have wished that 
 young gentleman back at the office where he placed his 
 valuable services, for six placid hours each day, at the dis¬ 
 posal of an unexacting government. 
 
 Papillon was not a drone, though he rather encouraged 
 the thought that he was; he liked to think that he was 
 quietly husbanding his strength to do great things in that 
 “ some day 99 which was to bring him his opportunity. In 
 the meantime mere waiting had its consolations, and at 
 five-and-twenty he could still afford to let things slide for 
 awhile. To be able to debate each afternoon or evening 
 with himself on which of half a dozen pleasant places he 
 should shed the light of his presence, with the certainty 
 that at any one of them he would be warmly welcomed, 
 was in itself a thing to make life worth living. What he 
 would be at forty he did not ask himself, nor did any one 
 else consider; at twenty-five he was a social sunbeam, 
 which of itself was not a bad destiny. 
 
 He had been a small boy at Eton when David Glyn was 
 in the sixth form; but they had scarcely met since until the 
 return of the latter from India, since when the old boyhood 
 acquaintance had become friendship, and Papillon had 
 
10 
 
 doris’s fortune. 
 
 hoisted his friend on to a pinnacle and worshiped him and 
 sung his praises with great enthusiasm. 
 
 The two men got out of the hansom at Hyde Park Cor¬ 
 ner, and strolled through the gates together. Papillon 
 liked the people, Glyn liked the trees. But the philoso¬ 
 pher, the cynic, had an idea that the influence of trees was 
 bad, unless you were with a girl—girls having the power to 
 charm away all noxious influences that ever threatened his 
 serenity. So he linked his arm in his friend’s, and, keeping 
 the thoughts of the latter diverted by a flow of bright chat¬ 
 ter, led him into the stream of well-dressed men and 
 variously dressed women that throng the park in the sea¬ 
 son. They had got to the end of the path where the crowd 
 was thinnest, when a gentleman whose dress proclaimed 
 that he was not a Londoner came up to Glyn and greeted 
 him very warmly. 
 
 “ I found out your address, and was coming to call upon 
 you this afternoon,” said he. “I met Barrett last night, 
 and he told me you had come back from India and were 
 going to be married. So, as I am going back to Yorkshire 
 in a day or two, I thought I must find you out and give 
 you my good wishes first. I vyish you joy, Glyn!” 
 
 “ You know who the lady is?” 
 
 “ Oh, I can guess, of course! It can be only the one.” 
 
 “ Which one?” asked Glyn, in surprise. 
 
 “ Why, Mrs. Hodson, of course! I didn’t even know her 
 husband was dead; but I know you are not the sort to 
 change, and, as soon as I heard you were going to be mar¬ 
 ried, I guessed who the lady was,” said he, mysteriously. 
 
 “ You are wrong, though,” said David, laughing. 
 “ Mr. Hodson is alive and in very good health; and, even 
 if Mrs. Hodson were a widow and willing to have me, which 
 is supposing a good deal, I don’t think I could quite recon¬ 
 cile myself to becoming the property of a lady so much 
 older than myself. Why, in a year or two I might have 
 proposed myself as a son-in-law!” 
 
 “ Oh, well, I beg your pardon!” said the country gentle¬ 
 man, rather disconcerted. “ Of course I didn’t know. 
 When I knew you there at Richmond two years ago, you 
 seemed to be always at the house, and people talked, and, 
 until young Taunton turned up there, you seemed to be 
 generally about, and— But, oh, I beg your pardon! Er— 
 who is the lady, then?” 
 
DORIS'S FORTUNE, 
 
 11 
 
 u Miss Edgcome, of Amblesicle. I wish you were going 
 to stay in town; I should like to introduce you to her. She 
 is a great deal younger and handsomer than the impossible 
 bride you wanted to give me. '' 
 
 r Tm very glad to hear it,” said the other man ener¬ 
 getically. “ Then I can congratulate you with a free con¬ 
 science. 99 
 
 And, after a few more remarks, showing more kindliness 
 than tact, he went on his way and left the young men to¬ 
 gether. 
 
 Charlie Papillon did not as usual break out at once into 
 cheerful prattle, but waited for his friend to speak first. 
 
 “ Good fellow that — 99 
 
 “ In spite of the cut of his coat. Where did you pick 
 him up?” 
 
 “ I used to meet him very often at Richmond before I 
 went to India, at the Hodsons'. You know Hodson, the 
 stock-broker, don't you?” 
 
 “ Yes. Gives very good dinners and rides very good 
 horses, and— Do you like him?” 
 
 “ Not particularly; but he has a very nice wife. I think 
 people go more to the Lawns for the sake of his wines and 
 his wife than because they find any great attraction in Hod- 
 son himself. '' 
 
 Charlie glanced at his friend's calm face, but there was 
 no change in its somewhat languid expression; it was clear 
 that the indifference in his voice was not assumed. 
 
 “ Yes. Hodson's stolid enjoyment of his own dinners is 
 amusing at first; but it is a diversion which palls in course 
 of time. I'm rather fond of Mrs. Hodson; she is the pleas¬ 
 antest specimen of the mature coquette I know.'' 
 
 “ That is rather severe, Charlie. She is an awfully kind- 
 hearted woman, and I never saw any coquetry about her. 
 She speaks of herself in the frankest manner as an old 
 married woman still young enough to enjoy the world . 99 
 
 “ Oh, I don't say anything against her manner; and she 
 is a charming woman, I admit at once!” 
 
 “ I think so, too. A little unrefined, perhaps, but so 
 genial, so—so jolly! Then she is so ready to show kindness 
 to any one who feels rather stranded, as it were, and badly 
 off for relaxation or pleasure. For some time before I 
 went to India, I got most of the enjoyment I had in life at 
 the Lawns. Instead of giving me a stiff invitation now 
 
Boris's fortune. 
 
 and then, and showing me that I was de irop if I made my 
 appearance unexpectedly, she absolutely encouraged me to 
 come when I liked, and stay as long as I liked, and do just 
 as I liked. There is a sort of easy-goingness about the 
 whole household, without any stiffness or any want of 
 order, that makes it quite the pleasantest I ever was in 
 in England." 
 
 “ I wonder whether it is quite as easy-going for those 
 two little girls. " 
 
 “ Nellie and Ethel? One sees so little of them; they are 
 always in the school-room. Yet even they add to the charm 
 of the place. They have such prim, demure, pretty little 
 manners, when one does see them, and have such a quaint, 
 old-fashioned look, one wonders what they will grow up 
 into. By the bye, they were looking rather tall for their 
 short frocks when I went away; I suppose they must be al¬ 
 most grown up by this timer" 
 
 “ Oh, no, they won't grow up for a long time yet!" said 
 Charlie, dryly. “ Pretty women's daughters develop very 
 slowly." 
 
 “ They ought not to have to delay much on that ac¬ 
 count,*' said Glyn, laughingly. “I don't consider their 
 mother such a very pretty woman. If you catch her un¬ 
 prepared—and she doesn't seem to mind being caught—she 
 really isn't pretty at all." 
 
 “ Now, I don't agree with you. I think her very pretty, 
 especially in evening-dress." 
 
 “But her taste in dress is atrocious; she likes barbaric 
 
 colors." 
 
 “ Yes; but they don't look so ill on her as they would on 
 another woman. And there are gleams of a better nature 
 in her fondness for old lace and Indian muslin. A woman 
 who can alford to tone herself down with old point and dia¬ 
 monds may pass muster as well dressed, however^far astray 
 her individual freaks of taste may sometimes carry her." 
 
 “A very good defense, Charlie," said Glyn, laughing 
 again. “ However, one forgave her bad taste for the sake 
 of her good nature." 
 
 “ I believe she is awfully good-natured to young people at 
 a loss to what to do with their time—or their money. I 
 know two or three fellows she has been a mother to." 
 
 “ You let your cynical tongue carry you too far, Charlie. 
 
BORISES EORtUKE. 
 
 13 
 
 But I don't suppose you can understand such a thing as 
 friendship with any woman without flirtation-” 
 
 “ Well, we won't discuss it, because, to begin with, we 
 should not define flirtation in the same way. Did you ever 
 meet young Taunton at the Lawns?' 
 
 “The young fellow whose losses on the Derby made 
 such a sensation last year? Yes; he was a client of Hod- 
 son's. I didn't care much about him, and when he began 
 to come I left off going there so much." 
 
 “ Ah, he was very well off then! He was a great favor¬ 
 ite of Mrs. Ilodsons, wasn't he? He's just been through 
 the Bankruptcy Court.” 
 
 “ Don't be unfair, Charlie. You can't say she was kind 
 to me because I was well off.'' 
 
 “ Well, you had your beaux yeux . And you admit you 
 were not so often at the Lawns after Taunton's appearance 
 there." 
 
 “ But that had nothing to do with Mrs. Hodson. It was 
 only a few weeks before I left England, and I had a great 
 deal to do and had not so much time on my hands as be¬ 
 fore. The hospitality at the Lawns was as open as ever." 
 
 “ Have you seen anything of the Hodsons since your re¬ 
 turn?” 
 
 “ Yes; I met Hodson in the Strand the other day, and he 
 asked me down to dance, and I went. It was the seven¬ 
 teenth of last month, I think. ” 
 
 “ Oh, he asked me to do that; but I had another engage¬ 
 ment! Wliat sort of affair was it:" 
 
 “ The old style there—not too many people, rooms cool, 
 capital supper. Madame was as charming as ever; but I 
 scarcely spoke to her. Missed my two prim little friends, 
 Nellie and Ethel—gone to school. ” 
 
 “ Was Miss Edgcombe there?" 
 
 “No; it was before I even dared to hope I had an out¬ 
 side chance with her. ” 
 
 “ Why, I knew how things were going even then! Doris 
 is above encouraging a man for her own amusement." 
 
 “You have known her longer than I, you see. Besides, 
 her striking beauty, and her brilliant manner fairly dazzled 
 me; I can't express the effect she had on me in any other 
 way. So that I had neither judgment nor power of criti¬ 
 cism where she was concerned." 
 
 “ I can understand that. If she were not generally a 
 
14 
 
 DOUIS S FOETUNF. 
 
 iittle cold, we should all be off our heads about her; when 
 she wishes to please she is irresistible. '' 
 
 “ Cold! I should not have called her cold.” 
 
 “ No, you would not, of course! She isn't cold to me 
 either. But I've seen people she doesn't like shrivel up at 
 a look from Doris; and I think if I had done anything very 
 mean, I should run the other way if I saw her coming. She 
 is a little too good for most people; I had just begun to 
 think I should have to send up for an archangel to marry 
 her, when luckily you stepped in and made it all right.” 
 
 “ Draw it mild, Charlie. I'm a little in awe of her al¬ 
 ready; she seems to stand out so far above all the other 
 women I have met. Her generosity almost appalls me. Do 
 you know, she absolutely refuses to have any of her money 
 settled on herself, and insists that everything she possesses 
 shall be entirely under my control?” 
 
 “ Ah, yes! I have often heard her say she would never 
 marry a man she could not trust completely, and that she 
 would not have any mean money quarrels. It has been a 
 great dread of hers that she would be married for what she 
 has, and not for herself.” 
 
 “ What singular modesty in such a beautiful girl!” 
 
 “ Yes; I like her for it, though. ” 
 
 “ One can't help it. But 1 wish she would have been 
 persuaded to keep her fortune in her own hands.. To tell you 
 the truth, the responsibility alarms my indolence.” 
 
 “It wouldn't alarm mine. Hallo, I think 1 recognize 
 that showy little victoria!” 
 
 They were walking slowly along with the crowd beside 
 the line of carriages, which were stationary for the mo¬ 
 ment. A few steps brought them close to the carriage 
 which had arrested Papillon's attention; and both men 
 raised their hats in answer to the bow and smile of a lady 
 whose appearance was attracting a good deal of comment 
 of various kinds. 
 
 The lady who was the center of so much observation 
 could not be more than five- or six-and-thirty, and looked 
 younger, a fact which was due as much to a certain sunny 
 youthfulness of expression as to the aid of pearl-powder. 
 Her dress partook sufficiently of the attributes of that of 
 the grand monde and of the demi-monde to enable an acute 
 observer to decide that she belonged to neither. As she sat 
 tick, silent and almost motionless, by the side of ajudi- 
 
BORISES FORTH HE, 
 
 15 
 
 ciously chosen friend in brown, she looked rather like a 
 well-dressed and expensive wax doll; but, when she bowed, 
 smiled, spoke, and held out a dainty and perfectly gloved 
 little hand to Papillon, it was impossible to deny that she 
 was charmings 
 
 “ I haven't seen you for an age, Mr= Papillon. I sup¬ 
 pose you won't condescend to come to the suburbs in the 
 season. All we poor creatures just outside London can ex¬ 
 pect is to catch a glimpse of you sometimes when town is 
 empty." 
 
 44 Scold Glyn too, Mrs. Hodson, please.” 
 
 “ No, no! Pm the good boy, Mrs. Hodson, am I not? 
 I called at the Lawns ten days ago, but you were out.” 
 
 “Well, come down this evening, and Pll forgive you 
 both. There are two charming girls coming, besides sev¬ 
 eral nice people you know. Oh, I mustn't forget to con¬ 
 gratulate you, Mr. Glyn! I only heard the secret to-day. 
 I must call upon Miss Edgcombe, and implore her not to 
 keep you all to herself and never let your poor old-fogy 
 friends get a sight of you.” 
 
 The line of carriages had begun to move again, and with 
 more gracious smiles Mrs, Hodson drove on; and the young 
 men continued their walk. 
 
 “ You are in favor again now, Glyn. I'll bet you what 
 you like madame will not be out next time you call." 
 
 “Do you think not?” said the other indifferently. “I 
 think I shall find the Lawns just a little too far out of my 
 way just now. South Kensington will be about my limit 
 for the next six weeks.'' 
 
 “ Six weeks! Is it to come off in six weeks? In the mid¬ 
 dle of the season, too?” 
 
 “ Yes. Doris is going to give up the end of the season, 
 which is very generous of her when she is so fond of excite¬ 
 ment. '' 
 
 t give it up except for 
 are not going away, are 
 
 “ No; we shall go straight down to Fairleigh, her place 
 on the Thames. It will be just the right time to enjoy 
 it, you see; we are both fond of the river, and the thought 
 of posting about through the heat and dust from one place 
 to another, or hunting about for some uncomfortable hotel 
 in some place which is sure to be either overcrowded or de- 
 
 “ Well, I suppose she wouldn' 
 something she likes better. You 
 you?" 
 
DORISES FORTUHE. 
 
 16 
 
 serted, wteri there is a charming home a few miles off only, 
 waiting to be lived in, is absurd, we both think / 9 
 
 “ What a sensible pair you will be! A model husband 
 and wife! I shall have to show you off, and give lectures 
 upon you. How soon may I venture to come down to be 
 eaten up with envy?” 
 
 “ As soon as you like. You know very well you are al¬ 
 ways welcome everywhere. ” 
 
 “ Because I don’t come when I’m not wanted. I’ll hire 
 a boat and row up and down the creek till you signal to me 
 that I may land without fear of being considered an in¬ 
 truder. By the bye, where is Doris to-day, that you are off 
 duty?” 
 
 “ She has gone down to Reading with her grandmother, N 
 to pay a farewell visit before her marriage to some aunts 
 who are going abroad. She won’t be back till to-morrow, 
 so I feel rather stranded. ” 
 
 “ Shall we go to the theater?” 
 
 “ Too hot! I want to get out of London; it is too late 
 to get down somewhere for a pull on the river now, though. 
 Ah, there is Mrs. Hodson’s victoria again! Surely she is 
 a good deal more made up than she used to be two years 
 ago! It is the first time I’ve seen her by daylight since 
 I’ve been back. Her face looks quite blue in the shades.” 
 
 “ Yes: that is the worst of that liquid stuff she uses; it 
 is extremely inartistic.” 
 
 “ Why, you know all about it, or you pretend very well. ” 
 
 “ I flatter myself I can analyze any beauty, and tell you 
 exactly in what it consists, whether in veloutine, pearl- 
 powder, or natural bloom, features, expression, or tricks. 
 Well, where shall we go?” 
 
 “ Suppose we go down to the Lawns? We are sure of 
 cool rooms and good champagne there, at any* rate. ” 
 
 And Mrs. Hodson promised some charming girls. But 
 I know the sort of girls she calls charming, and I don’t 
 feel tempted. Besides, I wouldn’t go to the Lawns to¬ 
 night if I were you, Glyn.” 
 
 “ All right! We’ll go and hear Patti then,” said Glyn, 
 indifferently. 
 
17 
 
 Boris's fortune. 
 
 CHAPTER IL 
 
 In a house in a well-known square of South Kensington 
 Miss Edgcombe sat at luncheon with her grandmother and 
 a girl friend, the day alter that on which David Glyn and 
 Papillon had met Mrs- Hodson during their stroll through 
 the park. 
 
 Old Mrs. Edgcombe was a handsome erect lady for her 
 age, which was about sixty-three. She had been the con¬ 
 stant guardian and companion of her granddaughter, to 
 whom she was devoted, since the death of her own son and 
 his wife, Doris's parents. Her advancing age had begun 
 of late to make her feel that the time was drawing near 
 when she must resign her post of chaperon to her hand¬ 
 some, much-sought-after granddaughter to younger hands; 
 she had been eager to see her charge happily married, and 
 had been the first to rejoice over her engagement to David 
 Glyn. The high-minded if somewhat extravagant princi¬ 
 ples which Doris held in money-matters had been inculcated 
 by the elder lady, who had determined to leave her own 
 property, which was considerable, to her granddaughter, 
 under the entire control of the latter's husband. She had 
 had reason, in her youth, to be disgusted with sordid money- 
 quarrels, and she held that no man was fit to be trusted 
 with a girl's happiness who could not be trusted with her 
 money. 
 
 She had returned with Doris from Reading that morn¬ 
 ing, and—an old school-fellow, who had called to inquire if 
 it was really true that the flinty-hearted Miss Edgcombe 
 had at last succumbed to a common human emotion, having 
 stayed to luncheon—the three ladies sat around the table 
 talking about wedding-presents and the trousseau . 
 
 “ Shall you be married in white or in traveling-dress?" 
 asked Hilda Warren, a pretty, clever-looking little woman, 
 rather eccentrically dressed. 
 
 “ In ivory-colored brocade. I don't care for the thought 
 of sneaking into the church in every-day dress, as if I felt 
 ashamed of what I was doing, and didn't want to be no¬ 
 ticed. I want to look my very, very best, to make David 
 feel proud of me, and to make the very idlers who crowd 
 
18 
 
 doris's fortune. 
 
 round the door to see what the bride is like—as they always 
 do, you know—nudge each other and say, ‘ My! Don't she 
 look nice!' and think my husband a lucky fellow." 
 
 Both her companions looked at Doris with an expression 
 which plainly showed that her last words echoed their own 
 opinion. As she sat back in her chair, and spoke saucily, 
 but with real pride and pleasure in her face, no one could 
 have denied that, as far as beauty went, her future husband 
 would have found it hard to make a better choice. 
 
 Miss Edgcombe was a brunette, rather above the middle 
 height, of slight but well-shaped figure, with delicately 
 slender hands and feet, and almost faultlessly regular face. 
 As is usually the case with beauties of this type, the first 
 impression of admiration in looking at the face was fre¬ 
 quently followed by a sense that there was something want¬ 
 ing, that the beautiful eyes sparkled, but did not speak, 
 the well-cut mouth smiled, but never grew soft. It was 
 only at rare moments that some passing emotion would 
 bring the rich color to her cheek and light up her face with 
 a brilliancy w T hich was bewitching. 
 
 She was looking her best as she raised her dark eyes to 
 her old school-fellow's face and laughed. 
 
 “ I don't think I've ever seen Mr. Glyn, Doris." 
 
 “ Haven't you? I have a portrait of him upstairs; come 
 and tell me what you think of him." 
 
 The girls rose and left the room, followed more slowly 
 by the elder lady; and they all three went up to the draw¬ 
 ing-room, which was furnished rather somberly, by a freak 
 of its young mistress. 
 
 The floor was stained and polished, and there was only a 
 small square carpet in front of the fire-place. The windows 
 and doors were draped with curtains of dark-crimson 
 plush, lined with silk of Oriental pattern and blended col¬ 
 ors. The wainscoting and wood-work were stained the 
 same color as the floor, and the walls were not papered, 
 but tinted in pale buff. The furniture was covered with 
 crimson plush, with cushions embroidered in many colors. 
 There were marble statuettes in the corners of the room, 
 in high relief against the dark curtains; the windows were 
 blocked by stands full of leafy plants; the only flower ad¬ 
 mitted among them being the pale, heavy, washed-out-look- 
 ing hydrangea. There was a striking absence of ornament 
 on the stands, the brackets, the easily upset tables covered 
 
doris's fortune. 
 
 19 
 
 with trifles, which make progress difficult in most modem 
 drawing-rooms. There was a large carved cabinet full of 
 not very curious curiosities, chiefly relics of the campaigns 
 of Mrs. Edgcombe's late husband, who had been a soldier; 
 there was a grand piano, and there was a large pile of 
 music. 
 
 “ Do you know, I like this room better than any I know," 
 said Hilda Warren, as they came in. 
 
 “ Do you? Most people call it bare. And I am begin¬ 
 ning to think myself that it is rather a mistake. It is a 
 sort of temple to old memories. The floor and the hydrangeas 
 are for the sake of a French country-house I used to stay at 
 when I was a child; the cabinet and its contents are a 
 shrine to grandpapa; the plants are the same as those we 
 used to have in the conservatory at Ambleside, where I was 
 born. And in the piano is the spell which carries me back 
 to any one of those places and the people who lived in 
 them. This is Mr. Glyn." 
 
 She took from the mantel-piece a framed photograph and 
 handed it to her friend, who looked at it long and critically. 
 
 “ He is very handsome," said she at last; “ and he looks 
 very good and very nice, and altogether quite the right sort 
 of man to be the hero of your romantic dreams. I never 
 knew you were so romantic until to-day; you have given 
 the key of your heart to the right person, Doris, for you 
 are much nicer now he has opened it. And who is this?" 
 
 Hilda, peering about among the things on the mantel¬ 
 piece, had unearthed another portrait, half hidden behind a 
 candelabrum. 
 
 “ Why, this one is handsome too! Who is it, Doris? 
 Isn't Mr. Glyn jealous of your having another ‘ juvenile 9 
 as a pendant to him?" 
 
 Hilda Warren was an actress: she thought it was the in¬ 
 troduction of a theatrical term into her speech which made 
 old Mrs. Edgcombe grow suddenly very upright. Doris 
 took the portrait laughingly from her hand. 
 
 “ Oh, no; Mr. Glyn has no need to be jealous; that is 
 not a hated rival!" said she. 
 
 “ Rival! I should think not!" broke in Mrs. Edg¬ 
 combe, severely. “ They ought not to be mentioned in the 
 same breath. I am surprised at you, Doris, for allowing a 
 portrait of David Glyn to remain on the same shelf with 
 that of Augustus Melton." 
 
20 
 
 dokis’s fortune. 
 
 “ Well, grandmamma, don’t be angry; I didn’t even 
 know he was there. He had had the sense to creep into a 
 corner where nobody could see him and frown at him. 
 We’ll take him away altogether, and leave David to undis¬ 
 puted sovereignty of the mantel-piece.” 
 
 “ Doris, I think that joking way of talking about them 
 is very unbecoming. I should think Mr. Glyn would dis¬ 
 approve of your keeping a portrait of Augustus at all. ” 
 
 “ If Mr. Glyn objects, Gussie shall go. Only don’t call 
 the poor boy 6 Augustus,’ grandmamma, please,” said the 
 girl, good-humoredly. 
 
 But Mrs. Edgcombe was offended; and in a few min¬ 
 utes, after turning a deaf ear to all her granddaughter’s 
 conciliatory speeches, she made some excuse about fetohing 
 some work she wanted, and left the room. 
 
 “ Now grandmamma is offended for the rest of the day,” 
 said Doris, when the door closed upon the old lady. “ I 
 am so sorry; and yet I don’t think it was my fault. I did 
 not mean to vex her; but I don’t like to hear the absent 
 consigned to stern silence without a little pity. ” 
 
 “ Who is this wicked Augustus, or this unfortunate Gus¬ 
 sie? Is he a ne’er-do-weel admirer for whom you have just 
 a glimmer of lingering tenderness? I shouldn’t have sus¬ 
 pected you of such a thing before to-day; but, now that 
 you have proved yourself to be human by falling in love 
 with Mr. Glyn, why, you may be even guilty of the femi¬ 
 nine weakness of being sorry for a scapegrace! Do tell me 
 the story, Doris; I’ve told you all my love-affairs, and given 
 you the benefit of a long experience in these matters. Now 
 tell me yours, and I will take your one confession as a bal¬ 
 ance to my half dozen. You know I can keep a secret.” 
 
 “ But there is no secret to keep,” said Doris, laughing. 
 “ And what do you mean by asking me to tell you my 
 * one ’ love-story? I have had only one, and that you 
 know—my engagement to Mr. Glyn.” 
 
 “ But that is not what I can a love-story—it is not 
 romantic enough,” said Hilda impulsively. ‘ c You are not 
 what I call in love with Mr. Glyn at all.” 
 
 4 4 Then I am afraid I shall never be what you call 4 in 
 love.’ But what do you want me to do? You don’t ex¬ 
 pect me to talk about him in blank verse, or spend any 
 me on my knees before his photograph, do you?” 
 
BORISES FOkTUXE. 21 
 
 il Oh, yes, that is what I always do when Pm in love!'' 
 said Hilda, dryly. 
 
 “ Now, Hilda, tell me seriously what you mean. You 
 have brought a grave charge against me, and you must 
 prove it or withdraw it. You have accused me of want of 
 warmth—" 
 
 “ Oh, dear, no! I was quite touched by the enthusiasm 
 you showed when I asked you at what time Mr. Glyn was 
 coming to-day. 6 Oh, he may come at three, or he may 
 come at four, or perhaps he won't be here till we go out, 
 soon after five!' That is what you said, with just as much 
 excitement as if he had been a tradesman coming for an 
 order! Why, if I were in love, and expecting the man I 
 was fond of, I shouldn't be able to sit still; I should be 
 mad with the hands of the clock for not going round faster; 
 I should get a book and set myself a task of reading so 
 many chapters before T would let myself see what the time 
 was again; I should upset all those nicely arranged flowers 
 by rushing to the window twenty times! Long before 
 three o'clock came, 1 should be in a fever; while you— 
 Doris, I believe, if he were not to come until—until six 
 o'clock, you would not say, c How tiresome of him to put 
 out all my arrangements!' Of course I know your emotion 
 of impatience because he upsets your plans is much better- 
 bred than my impatience to see the man because I love 
 him; but then you know I am only a Bohemian." 
 
 And the girl, whose restless excitable nature betrayed 
 itself as she spoke by quick nervous movements of the 
 hands as much as by the volubility with which she poured 
 forth her words, dropped from her chair on to a cushion at 
 the feet of her calmer companion, with a little curl of the 
 lip to belie the humility of the end of her speech. 
 
 “ Yes; but you don't make allowance for the difference 
 between my temperament and yours. You can't imagine 
 me hopping about between the clock and the door with my 
 hands through my hair every two minutes, any more than 
 I can picture you sitting quietly and stiffly on a chair wait¬ 
 ing with beautiful submission until your hero, as you call 
 him, chose to shed on you the sunshine of his presence." 
 
 “ Oh, you want me to think that the difference between 
 
 us is only that your affections are under better control than 
 
 mine! Well, then, I don't believe it. You could no more 
 
 sit there and chatter to me calmlv about a dozen different 
 
 «/ 
 
22 
 
 r>01lIS*S FORTUXE. 
 
 things while you were expecting Mr. Glyn, if you were 
 really fond of him, than I could.” 
 
 “ You mean that I am a cold-blooded creature—a sort of 
 fish by nature, quite incapable of feeling any emotion above 
 tepid-point. ” 
 
 “ No, I don’t; I mean that you don’t feel any emotion 
 above tepid-point for Mr. Glvn. ” 
 
 “ But, Hilda, you mustn’t say that. Indeed it is not 
 true!” said Doris, rather disturbed. “ I am not nearly so 
 excitable as you, I am not even sure that I can feel quite 
 so much—certainly I could not show as much; but I admire 
 Mr. Glyn more than any man I have ever met; I respect 
 his opinion in everything; I am never so happy as when I 
 am with him; I try to please him far harder than I ever 
 tried to please any man before; and I feel jealous of every 
 other woman he looks at. Surely that is love worth hav¬ 
 ing! At any rate, it is the best I have to give.” 
 
 Hilda shook her head. 
 
 “ Too calm!” said she briefly. 
 
 “ And don’t you think a steady feeling like that, which 
 never rises and never sinks, is a better foundation for a love 
 which is to last a life-time than a spasmodic emotion which 
 can not last, which brings, on the whole, as much pain and 
 discomfort as pleasure even to the object of it, and which 
 you yourself admit you can feel for a succession of people?” 
 finished Doris triumphantly. 
 
 “ And how can you be sure your admiration and respect 
 will last a life-time either?” asked the young actress per¬ 
 sistently. “ You have no more reason to be sure that this 
 Mr. Glyn, whom you have known only a few weeks, will 
 always be worthy of the respect and all that which he has 
 inspired you with than I had for supposing the poor painter 
 who followed me like my shadow would become the great¬ 
 est artist of the day, just because the very sound of his 
 voice set me trembling with happiness. ” *> 
 
 ‘ c Do you mean to say that reason ought to have nothing 
 to do with love?” 
 
 “ I don’t say anything about ‘ ought,’but I think reason 
 has very little to do with it.” 
 
 “ Then the less one has to do with love the better.” 
 
 “ Yejs, perhaps, if one could choose; but one can’t, you 
 Vww.” 
 
 . “ Some can.” 
 
Doris's fortuhe. 
 
 as 
 
 “ You think you can. Of course you may be right; I 
 don't know. But I don't think such a nice woman as you 
 are, and romantic too, will be able to get through life with¬ 
 out—loving. Have you read Alfred de Musset's lines on a 
 woman who died without having loved?— 
 
 “ ‘ Elle est morte sans avoir vecu, 
 
 De sa main est tombe le livre 
 Dans lequel elle n’ rien lu.’ ” 
 
 “ Yes, that is very pretty— 
 
 “ ‘ Without having lived she is dead, 
 
 From her hand the book has fallen 
 From which she has nothing read.’ 
 
 But I shouldn't go to De Musset for a standard of con¬ 
 duct." 
 
 “ No; you may not go to him to find out what one ought 
 to do; but you might do worse than go to him to find out 
 what one does." 
 
 “ Oh, you wicked play-actress! What would grandmam¬ 
 ma say if she could hear you?" 
 
 “ She would be very much shocked, of course. But she 
 had read and thought over the matter we are discussing 
 long before she met your grandfather." 
 
 “ Then you really think, Hilda, that I shall lose my head 
 some day—I, who have arrived at the age of four-and- 
 twenty, retaining the full possession of all my faculties?" 
 
 “ But are you sure you have never been in love—lost 
 your head—whatever you like to call it—already? Perhaps 
 you won't confess to me?" 
 
 “ Yes, I would, if I had anything to confess. But I am 
 ashamed to say that my attachment to Mr. Glyn, which 
 you despise, is the nearest approach to that love you say I 
 must feel that I have ever had for any man. And now, 
 you see, I am going to settle down to matrimony, so that 
 my chance of a romance is over. For I hope even you, 
 with your alarming code, will allow that I shall be safe 
 then." 
 
 “ Seriously, I am not sure about that. If I were a man, 
 I should feel safer in marrying a girl like me, who had sown 
 the wild oats of her affections, as it were, than in marrying 
 a girl like you, who has never loved anybody and whose 
 capabilities have therefore never been sounded. Of course 
 
3)0HIS*S FOMtTK®. 
 
 2i 
 
 a man, in marrying you, can pride himself on being youf 
 first love; but in marrying me he might feel a great deal 
 surer of being the last/* 
 
 “ I shall tell David what you say, and ask him if he feels 
 nervous/’ 
 
 “ I don’t think he need feel so/* 
 
 “ Not after all your complaints of my ‘ tepid affection * 
 for him and your warnings about the 6 unsound capabili¬ 
 ties * of cold women?* * 
 
 “ No. I believe this Mr. Glyn is so sweet-tempered and 
 handsome and good that you will really love him after you 
 are married to him. I believe you have a nature not easily 
 kindled; I won*t believe you have no warmth in vou at 
 all.** 
 
 “That is what they all tell me, though,** said Doris, 
 slowly—“ all but David, that is to say; he makes no com¬ 
 plaints of me in any way. And, if I am warm enough to* 
 please him, what more can I want?** 
 
 “ Nothing, indeed,** said Hilda, looking at her narrowly. 
 iC And who are the ‘ all of them * who complain of your 
 coldness?** 
 
 “ Oh, the other men who have wanted to marry me—and 
 my money!** said Doris, in rather a hard tone. 
 
 “ But why do you sneer, as if it were impossible for them 
 to care for you yourself apart from your money? And, 
 however devotedly a man might love you, he couldn*t be 
 quite indifferent to the fact that you were rich. ** 
 
 “ David is,** said Doris, turning round quickly, with a 
 gleam of pride and pleasure in her eyes. “ My money ab¬ 
 solutely stood in the way of his proposing to me, not 
 through his diffidence, but his distaste for the responsibility 
 of being rich.** 
 
 “ Oh, he is perfect, of course!** said Hilda, rather im¬ 
 patiently. 46 I expect you were rather hard on the poor 
 fellows who hadn’t arrived at such a sublime pitch of dis¬ 
 interestedness.** 
 
 “ Now you are sneering; a minute ago—** 
 
 “ No, I*m not. I want to know how you penetrated the 
 sordid motives of your other admirers, and in what way you 
 dismissed them. * * 
 
 “ Dismissed them! I didn’t dismiss many, and I didn’t 
 care enough about them to care what their motives were. 
 
 I have had very few downright proposals— not more than 
 
Doris’s fortune. 
 
 25 
 
 two distinct offers of marriage, I think. You see, a man 
 can’t ask you to be his wife unless you have given him 
 some sort of encouragement, if he is not an absolute idiot.” 
 
 “ I think it is very good of you, with your opportunities 
 and advantages, not to flirt more than you do. Why, with 
 very little trouble, you might have half the men in town at 
 your feet!” 
 
 “ And all the women in town about my ears. I haven’t 
 the courage to maintain such a position as that, even if I 
 had the inclination. You know I am called a coquette 
 now, because I feel bound to be civil to everybody—at 
 least, everybody I don’t dislike—in return for the attention 
 most people pay me. I sometimes think, if I were not so 
 well off, I might play at being a little cruel now and then, 
 for my own amusement; but, placed as I am, if I were to 
 encourage a poor man—one of those charming detrimentals, 
 for instance, who always flirt more pleasantly than anybody 
 else—and then throw him over, as other girls do, without 
 feeling that they have done any great harm, why, in me it 
 would be worse than cruel—it would be mean!” 
 
 “ You always seem to be thinking more of your money 
 than of yourself. It seems to be an absolute burden to 
 you.” 
 
 6 ‘ It is, in some respects. People will do such mean 
 things for the sake of it—people you never believed capable 
 of deceit,” said Doris, with warmth. ‘ 4 It is a very painful 
 and humiliating thing to find out that the attentions, even 
 of a person who was indifferent to you, were really directed 
 not to you, but to your fortune.” 
 
 “ Has that ever happened to you, Doris?” asked Hilda, 
 much interested. 
 
 “ Yes. I will teH you about it, and then I don’t think 
 you will be so much surprised by what I see you consider 
 the strained way in which I look at money-matters. You 
 know I spend part of every year at Ambleside with grand¬ 
 mamma, at my dear old Delhi Lodge, where I was born? 
 Well, last autumn, when we were there, some friends of 
 ours, the Bryants, had taken a house at Bowness, and of 
 course we were always riding and driving and rowing and 
 fishing together. There was a young fellow staying with 
 them who was always about with Marion Bryant, who is a 
 very nice girl, two or three years older than I am, not at 
 
26 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 all pretty, but very good-natured. Soon after mv appear¬ 
 ance there, he transferred his attentions to me, and devoted 
 himself to me with an utter disregard of everybody else, 
 which made us all laugh. Marion took his desertion very 
 good-humoredly, and everybody seemed to think it very 
 natural, and nobody thought seriously about it. He was 
 about two years younger than I; but he was so very boyish 
 and had such bad, spoiled manners, that he seemed a great 
 deal younger; and we all treated him as if he had been 
 about fifteen. He seemed so headstrong and thoughtless, 
 and made love to me in such a silly, candid, school-boy sort 
 of fashion, that I never for a moment suspected his disin¬ 
 terestedness or believed that he thought about me seriously 
 at all. He took possession of me, and laughed at my jokes, 
 and took my snubs and my scoldings just like a cross, 
 spoiled child. We got on beautifully together; and, when 
 he made love to me, I laughed, and he left off, and just 
 followed my lead in everything. Then he went away sud¬ 
 denly, and I rather missed him at first—he used to laugh 
 so heartily; but more people came, and I soon forgot all 
 about the boy. Then, when we came back to town, I met 
 him again one day at the Bryants*, and he worked his way 
 round to me and tried to pick up our acquaintance just 
 where it had dropped. Of course that was out of the ques¬ 
 tion; the boy was nothing to me—if he had been, I should 
 have been hurt and unhappy at his abrupt disappearance 
 from Bowness without saying good-bye to me. As it was, I 
 was obliged to snub him; and the lad, who has no more 
 character than a child, was so utterly crest-fallen and sub¬ 
 dued under my rebuke that, when I met him again, I was 
 obliged to be very kind to him, for he shrunk away from 
 me just like a dog that has been whipped.** 
 
 “ Then you did coquette with him?** 
 
 “ I did not mean to; but a word, either kind or unkind, 
 has so much more effect upon his weak excitable nature 
 than it would have had upon any other man. It seemed 
 absurd to think of him as a man; he was a great overgrown 
 spoiled boy.** 
 
 “ What was he like?** 
 
 “ He was a great big broad-shouldered fellow—uncouth, 
 the men called him—with pretty vacant gray eyes and such 
 lovely teeth; his face I should have called handsome if it 
 had only expressed anything. But he had a low forehead, 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 27 
 
 to show he hadn^t any brains, and a mouth like a wom¬ 
 an ^s.^ 
 
 Hilda gave a glance at the photograph which had been 
 displaced from its hiding-place on the mantel-piece and lay 
 now on a chair. Doris did not notice the look, and con¬ 
 tinued: 
 
 “ Then he began to try to talk seriously to me whenever 
 we met. I always stopped him and laughed at him; but 
 sometimes that made him cross for about a minute and a 
 half, for he hadn’t character enough to sulk consistently. 
 Then he talked to me about his expectations in a way which 
 led me to believe he was very well off. I was never unkind 
 to him, I never took him seriously, and I never for a mo¬ 
 ment gave him cause to think, if he had been not so very 
 silly, that I cared about him. About that time David 
 Glyn was introduced to me, and this silly boy had to be 
 snubbed again for showing annoyance because I spoke ad¬ 
 miringly of him. Then one night, at a dance,” Doris went 
 on hesitatingly, in a lower voice, “ Gussie lost his head; 
 and, when he had taken me into the conservatory after a 
 waltz, and I had sat down and leaned my head back amongst 
 the flowers in that delicious half-weariness you feel when you 
 have been dancing and you still hear the music, and the 
 light is soft and the flowers are sweet, he suddenly threw 
 himself beside me and flung his arm round me, and, if it 
 had not been for the sound of the voices of two other people 
 who were just coming in, he would have kissed me.” 
 
 “ And what then?” asked Hilda, breathlessly. 
 
 “ Of course he started up; and we went out, and I was 
 very angry, very much offended, and would not speak to 
 him again that night. And next day they told me that he 
 was deeply in debt and had no expectations at all worth 
 speaking of, and that he had been told that nothing but a 
 good marriage could put him straight. It would have 
 made no difference to me if the headstrong boy had been a 
 millionaire; but I was very much disgusted to think I had 
 been deceived, for I had not for one moment thought his 
 childish attentions interested.” 
 
 “ Do you know I think you treated him very badly.” 
 
 “ I can’t agree with you. A few days afterward I ac¬ 
 cepted David Glyn, and Gussie had the shockingly bad taste 
 to insult him. Of course David treated his petulant in¬ 
 solence beautifully, and w T as quite sorry for him, even when 
 
28 
 
 DORISES FOBTUKE. 
 
 I told him the boy had only wanted my money. Now do 
 you understand my feeling about it?” 
 
 “ Now I understand two things. May I say them? 
 One is that you were a great deal too hard upon the boy, 
 as you call him; the other is that you were a great deal 
 nearer being in love with that unlucky Gussie than you 
 have ever been with Mr. Glyn.** 
 
 The front door bell rang as Doris rose from her seat, 
 laughing. 
 
 “ Hilda, you will read everything by the light of your 
 imagination, and not by that of common sense. That is 
 David*s voice.** 
 
 The bright color had come into her face at the sound. 
 
 “ And what are you going to do with 6 poor Gussie *?** 
 said Hilda, taking up the photograph hurriedly. 
 
 (i Oh, 6 poor Gussie * can stay where he is! David has 
 no reason to be jealous of him,** answered Doris, contempt¬ 
 uously. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Nike weeks had passed since Doris Edgcombe listened 
 to the reproaches and warnings of the young actress, Hilda 
 Warren, and she had now settled down to matrimony in 
 her own river-side house, Fairleigh, on the banks of the 
 Thames. 
 
 The honey-moon was nearly over, and her husband was 
 away from her for the first time since their marriage. Old 
 Mrs. Edgcombe, to whom she had written two days before, 
 announcing that she would be alone on this day, had taken 
 the opportunity to come down and find out how the young 
 couple were getting on, ready with sage advice to her 
 granddaughter as to the proper management of a husband, 
 with keenly critical eyes for shortcomings in the newly 
 established household. Doris had driven her pretty ponies 
 in her own little carriage to meet her grandmother, and the 
 latter noted at once that the young wife looked well, hand¬ 
 some, and happy. A drive of only a few minutes brought 
 them to Fairleigh. 
 
 It was a two-storied white house, jutting out here and 
 Shore with looms added wherever they were wanted, until 
 original scheme of architecture had been entirely lost 
 
Doris’s fortune. 
 
 29 
 
 sight of, and presenting plenty of variety in the way of 
 roof, slates, and tiles of different shapes covering the out¬ 
 buildings, which were of various heights, and overgrown, 
 some with ivy, some with fruitless fruit-trees; while the 
 front and left side of the house, which had been left as 
 originally built, were sweet with thickly growing small red 
 roses and with heavy clusters of clematis and graceful trails 
 Df jasmine. 
 
 The two ladies passed under the portico, where Doris’s 
 pug received them with the languidly condescending recog - 
 nition of well-fed, petted old age, through the low, wide, 
 carpeted hall, and between heavy curtains to the drawing¬ 
 room, a square cool room where the July afternoon’ sun 
 never penetrated. 
 
 Doris had indulged in no freaks of originality here; it 
 was a pleasant room, furnished in the modern manner, 
 without bright colors or gilding, with plenty cf books and 
 papers lying about, and a faint smell of tobacco telling a 
 tale of easy-going good nature on the part of the mistress 
 of the house, which was to the elder lady as the distant 
 sound of battle is supposed to be to the charger. 
 
 “ Why, my dear Doris ”—with a gentle incredulous little 
 sniff—“ surely you do not allow your husband to smoke in 
 the drawing-room?” 
 
 “ Oh, yes, David smokes everywhere, grandmamma! 
 Men do now, you know. And, even if they did not, I 
 should have to relax all rules in favor of his cigars; he is 
 never happy unless he is smoking.” 
 
 Nothing less than the discovery that her grandson-in-law 
 had another wife or two in the background could have 
 lowered him in her eyes as this admission did; she pursed 
 up her lips, but said no more, like a wise lady, and without 
 more comment, allowed Doris to lead her to a seat by the 
 door which opened on to the lawn. She had come with 
 words of warning, with a little comfort and counsel too, 
 should they be needed by this wife whose husband had left 
 her for three whole days before the end of the honey-moon. 
 But Doris was as smiling as the morn, was passing her tem¬ 
 porary widowhood in perfect peace, and was looking lovely 
 and radiant as she had never looked in her girlhood. 
 
 The elder lady’s doubts and fears were for the moment 
 set at rest; and, when tea was brought in, and the young 
 wife had brought her fruit gathered by her own hands, and 
 
30 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 was sitting on a footstool at her feet in a caressing attitude 
 not usual with Doris, Mrs. Edgcombe said kindly— 
 
 “ You seem very happy, my dear.” 
 
 “ I am as happy as the clay is long, just as they say in 
 children’s story-books, grandmamma, I have nothing to 
 wish for. ” 
 
 “ What takes David away from you?” 
 
 “ Oh, an old friend of his, whom he hasn’t seen for years, 
 is in Paris for a few days just before starting for America! 
 David said he wished he could see him, and I asked him 
 why he didn’t go. So he went. He will be back to-mor¬ 
 row.” 
 
 “ It seems a very trifling cause to take a husband away 
 from his newly married wife. ” 
 
 “ Do you think so—to see a friend he may not have an¬ 
 other chance of meeting for years? It was I who suggested 
 his going.” 
 
 “ Then why didn’t he take you with him?” 
 
 “ I never offered to go. It is too hot for traveling, and 
 I hate Paris in July.” 
 
 “ But surely your husband’s society is an attraction great 
 enough to compensate even for a little heat?” 
 
 “ Yes, of course it would be if I couldn’t see him at any 
 other time. But, as it was, I thought I should like better 
 the piquancy of a parting and the delight of welcoming him 
 back. And, for a short stay and a rapid journey like that, 
 I think it must be pleasanter for a man to be alone; a 
 woman is only in the way.” 
 
 “ Your husband told you you would be in his way?” 
 cried Mrs. Edgcombe, in horror. 
 
 “ No, no, grandmamma, of course he didn’t!” laughed 
 Doris. “ And he never will have to tell me anything of 
 that sort, even when we are old married people and have 
 got tired of each other, because I think I shall always have 
 the sense to find it out for myself. We have begun our 
 married life on common-sense principles, you see, and it 
 answers very well so far. I love him better every day, and 
 I think he would tell you something of the same sort about 
 me. ” 
 
 But Mrs. Edgcombe gave the slender white fingers that 
 crept round her own no responsive pressure — she was 
 shocked, scandalized. This calm unenthusiastic way of 
 looking at marriage in the very glow of the honey-moon 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 31 
 
 seemed to her atheistic, French, diabolical. Doris’s calm 
 demeanor throughout her engagement she had praised and 
 upheld as well bred; but this cold-blooded acceptance of the 
 possibility of her getting tired of her husband and of his 
 getting tired of her was carrying good-breeding a little too 
 far. 
 
 “ I suppose this is the modern fashionable way of look¬ 
 ing at marriage, Doris?” said she gravely. “ At any rate, 
 I never heard anything like it before! It sounds very clever 
 and very shrewd to be talking already about the time when 
 you won’t be quite so young and so handsome and lovely as 
 you are now; and of course I know quite well that married 
 people can’t be so enthusiastic about each other when they 
 have grown old and selfish as they are when they are in 
 their bloom. But I do think I like the old simple fashion 
 of talk better, when a young wife used to think her love 
 was strong enough to keep them always young, and the 
 young husband, even if he knew better, at least said noth¬ 
 ing about it and tried to think so too. ” 
 
 Doris felt remorseful for her frankness when she saw how 
 deeply her words had pained her grandmother; and she 
 said quickly— 
 
 “ It is only a new way of talking, granny, dear; we feel 
 just the same as you and grandpapa did when you were first 
 married; only just now it is the fashion to be cynical and 
 to hide one’s feelings away as if one were ashamed of 
 them. ” 
 
 “ But you need not surely try to hide them away from 
 me. And I don’t think you could, my dear, if they were 
 as strong as you say. However, I suppose I must be con¬ 
 tent with what you choose to show me. When is this new- 
 fashioned husband of yours coming back; or does it depend 
 on what attractions he can find in Paris whether he leaves 
 you to spend the rest of your honey-moon alone or not?” 
 
 “ It is not quite so bad as that yet,” said Doris, laugh¬ 
 ing. “ He will be back to-morrow in time for dinner, and 
 he will bring Charlie Papillon down with him, I hope. ” 
 
 But Mrs. Edgcombe’s patience was exhausted. 
 
 “ Charlie Papillon!” she exclaimed, sharply. “ To stay 
 with you for a week or so and prevent your feeling dull, I 
 suppose? A very proper* person to choose! I should 
 think, if he does not succeed in persuading you both that 
 the duty of married people is each to go his own way and 
 
32 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 C no attention whatever to the tie which binds them, no* 
 y could. ” 
 
 Poor Doris saw her mistake, but hardly knew what to say 
 in defense of her bright little favorite Charlie which would 
 not draw down a fresh storm of indignation upon that easy¬ 
 going philosophers head. Her fondness for him had long 
 been a sore point with old Mrs. Edgcombe, whose prin¬ 
 ciples, though not more rigid than those of an elderly lady 
 ought to be, were buckram indeed to Charlie's. She had 
 been in constant dread of his persuading Doris to marry 
 him, and she was now quite ready to consider him the evil 
 genius hovering about the young household, eager to 
 wreck their domestic happiness by his Mephistophelian sug¬ 
 gestions and influence. She had not thought, however, 
 though she had come down with a word of warning against 
 him, that he would begin the work of ruin so soon. 
 
 “ It was my suggestion that David should bring Charlie 
 with him, not for a week, but just for a day or two,” said 
 Doris, diffidently. “ You see, grandmamma, when you 
 and I came down here every summer, and had the house 
 full of people, the boy used to come down here as a matter 
 of course whenever he liked; and I think he must miss his 
 rowing and lawn-tennis and the nice people we used to 
 have here. It seems rather selfish of David and me to 
 keep the dear old place all to ourselves, when there are 
 half a dozen unused rooms that people would be glad to 
 come and fill, and the fruit is getting ripe for nobody to 
 eat, and the boats are falling to pieces in the boat-house 
 with nobody to pull them. I hate to go into the billiard- 
 room; it looks so desolate now there are no cues lying about 
 and no boys quarreling round the table. I don’t even en¬ 
 joy the flowers or the river so much as I should if there 
 were a lot more people here to enjoy them, too. I think, 
 and David thinks too, that, when one finds one's self in 
 possession of nice things that lots of other people would like 
 to have, it is wrong not to spread the enjoyment of them as 
 far as one can. " 
 
 “Well, I should admire your unselfishness more if I 
 could only persuade myself that it was genuine, my dear. 
 But I do think that, if your love for each other were a little 
 stronger, you would not have quite so much to spare in 
 general philanthropy/' 
 
 “ But I am phiianthropieal only to the person* I like. 
 
DGftls's FOMUKl. 
 
 33 
 
 ?ou know. I am longing to get poor Hilda Warren away 
 or a little change from the nasty, hot theater, just from 
 Sunday morning to Monday afternoon. That is not unself¬ 
 ish, because I liKe her and she amuses me. ” 
 
 This was another unlucky speech, for Mrs. Edgcombe 
 tolerated the girl only for the sake of her old acquaintance 
 with Hilda’s mother, who was still alive, but who was liv¬ 
 ing uncomfortably in furnished apartments since the 
 death of her husband. That event, which happened just 
 after Hilda’s final return from school in Paris, when she 
 was seventeen, had changed the whole course of the girl’s 
 life. From large houses, pleasant lawns, handsome dresses, 
 many friends, she descended at once to two rooms, as many 
 gowns, about as many friends, and one pot of flowers in the 
 window of the dingy sitting-room. Instead of an introduc¬ 
 tion into society, balls, concerts, amusements of all kinds, 
 and the admirers which her pretty face would surely have 
 attracted, she plunged at once into an existence of hard 
 work for the necessaries of life, teaching children in the 
 morning, studying design at night, with tea at the pastry 
 cook’s in the company of two or three more girl students, 
 as her only recreation, and the awkward attentions of their 
 ill-bred brothers as the only homage her fair face could now 
 hope to attract. An ordinary girl would have sunk 
 gradually into the faded and industrious hack-artist, or the 
 well-mannered but affected governess who will never allow 
 her employers to forget that their position is nothing com¬ 
 pared to that her father filled. 
 
 Hilda Warren was not an ordinary girl; and, after three 
 or four years of dreary, ill-paid work, she gave up teaching 
 and went on the stage, not making herself the laughing¬ 
 stock of the critics at a morning performance in some im¬ 
 portant and difficult part, as she would have done in her 
 ignorance had she been able to afford that incompetent dis¬ 
 play, but speaking two lines as a servant in a modern 
 comedy—speaking them well too, so that a good many 
 among the audience could hear them. For more than two 
 years she had now been at the same theater, earning a 
 salary that she could almost have lived on had she been by 
 herself, but which was not enough to support her mother 
 upon without the necessity of her spending most of her day¬ 
 light hours poring over her old work of designing. 
 
 When Doris by accident found out this girl, whom she 
 
34 
 
 DORISES FORTUHE. 
 
 had often met at children’s parties when they both lived in 
 the same circle, she was struck by what seemed to her the 
 heroism of the young actress and by a deep sense of her own 
 inferiority to her. Mrs. Edgcombe, on the other hand, 
 was struck with astonishment and some disgust with 
 Hilda’s choice of a profession, and looked upon the girl, 
 with her somewhat masculine freedom of speech and open 
 preference for men’s society, as a most undesirable compan¬ 
 ion for her own granddaughter, whom she already consid¬ 
 ered rather too independent in manners and in mind. 
 Doris would not give up her friend, however, especially as 
 Hilda’s sensitive pride made her society a pleasure not too 
 easily got; and the young actress had been among the 
 guests at her wedding. 
 
 Mrs. Edgcombe was just wise enough and just simple 
 enough to look upon actresses as the sworn foes of newly 
 wedded wives, and the introduction of one of them into the 
 scarcely launched household at Fairleigh was just the one 
 thing wanted to make Doris’s willful sacrifice of her own 
 happiness complete. 
 
 “ Ah!” said she, when Doris had remarked that Hilda 
 would amuse her. “ And she will amuse your husband 
 too, I dare say!” 
 
 “ Hilda amuses everybody,” answered Mrs. Glyn, with¬ 
 out taking any notice of the suggestion implied by her 
 grandmother’s tone. “ When she and Charlie are together, 
 one can do nothing but laugh.” 
 
 ‘ l Is Charlie growing fond of her?” asked Mrs. Edg¬ 
 combe, less stiffly, scenting a romance. 
 
 “ Oh, you know Charlie is fond of every pretty girl he 
 meets! I think Hilda shares his very best affection with 
 about two others, though. He is really very much at¬ 
 tached to her. Last time she came to see me in town they 
 were inseparable. ” 
 
 “ Then why doesn’t he marry her?” 
 
 “ Why, he couldn’t afford to, even if she could! You 
 see, if they were to marry, she would be spoiled for an act¬ 
 ress, and he would be spoiled for a—butterfly. Each has 
 a mission, which each fulfills perfectly, to amuse and please 
 everybody they meet. ” 
 
 “ But isn’t their own happiness to be considered?” 
 
 “ Yes; and that is just what we. all consider best when 
 we encourage them to wander about at their own sweet 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 35 
 
 will, and get everybody’s affection and liking, in return for 
 being bright and sweet and irresponsible in the midst of us 
 dull, staid, old married people. I don’t myself think you 
 consider people’s happiness best by tying them up in twos 
 just at the age when they most enjoy their own liberty.” 
 
 Mrs. Edgcombe looked hard at her granddaughter; but 
 Doris was looking so sweet and bright that she could 
 scarcely think these words were dictated by a feeling that 
 she had given up her own liberty too soon. Both ladies 
 began to feel that it was time to turn the talk to other sub¬ 
 jects, since the chance of their agreeing upon points of 
 domestic interest had evidently grown slighter than ever 
 since the marriage of the younger one; and before long 
 they left the house to enjoy the early evening in the shade 
 of the trees on the lawn. 
 
 The elder lady returned to town before luncheon the 
 next day, unwilling to meet either the grandson-in-law 
 whose departure had so much displeased her, or his evil 
 genius, Charlie Papillon. She said no more warning words 
 to the young wife; but the last look she gave her as she 
 bade her good-bye at the station was eloquent with anxiety 
 and foreboding which made Doris smile when she was alone. 
 
 “ Poor grandmamma! She won’t believe I am happy. 
 As if a woman could help being happy with David!” 
 
 CHAPTER IY. 
 
 Doris took all pains in her room that afternoon to look 
 her very best. She put on an embroidered India-muslin 
 gown of palest yellow tint, and fastened dark-red roses on 
 her breast with a diamond brooch. She was too handsome 
 and too young to need much aid from dress, and she dis¬ 
 liked elaborate toilets which interfered with her freedom of 
 movement. But the simple style she preferred showed off 
 her graceful figure, and, as the flush of expectancy rose to 
 her cheeks while she wandered about the house, restlessly 
 unable to occupy herself with anything until her husband’s 
 return, she looked unspeakably lonely. 
 
 He had not told her, in the letter she had received from 
 him that day, by what train he should come, but had said 
 he should be at Eairleigh as early as possible; so that she 
 could not go to the station to meet him, but had to content 
 
u 
 
 DORISES FORTUKE. 
 
 herself with listening for the barking of the dogs, which 
 would surely announce their masters approach. But at 
 the last he came upon her all unexpectedly, as she was stand¬ 
 ing on a chair in the path outside the drawing-room win¬ 
 dow, nailing up a straggling branch of a climbing rose-tree. 
 She sprung down at the sound of his tread, with her face 
 sparkling with pleasure. 
 
 “ It has seemed such a long time to me! Has it seemed 
 long to yon, David?” 
 
 “ Very long, my darling—long enough for you to grow 
 much handsomer than you were before I went away.” 
 
 “ Ah, you see solitude agrees with me!” said she, saucily. 
 €C Where is Charlie? Haven't you brought him?” 
 
 Charlie had lagged discreetly in the hall, busy disposing 
 of his hat and his umbrella; and he now came sauntering 
 through the drawing-room and stood on the steps at the 
 door with an air of much modest diffidence. 
 
 “ I haven't seen you since you have attained the dignity 
 of wifehood, Mrs. Glyn, and you look so much more com¬ 
 manding than you used to do that I stand quite in awe of 
 you.” 
 
 “ Yes, you have. You saw me at the wedding.” 
 
 “ Ah, that didn't count! Then you were only a bride, 
 and looked awfully ashamed of yourself. You wouldn't 
 have me stand in awe of a bride! Everybody could see you 
 were sorry you had not chosen me. I heard people remark 
 upon it, and say how much they pitied Glyn. So did I.'' 
 
 “ If you have quite finished all the absurd and tedious 
 romances you have been carefully making up all the way 
 from town, you may come down those steps and take in 
 this chair for me,” said Doris, gravely. 
 
 “ I will; and then I'll make love to you w T hile David gets 
 himself ready for dinner. How glad you must be, David, 
 of an opportunity for a wash after your long journey!” said 
 he, solicitously. 
 
 “ And leave the destroyer of my domestic peace in full 
 possession of the field?” asked David, in his sweet, soft 
 voice, laughing. 
 
 “ Yes; I will fight you to-morrow morning before break¬ 
 fast, if you like to get up early; and we'll choose pistols, 
 because I know I can shoot better than you. Or we'll set- 
 tie it with boat-hooks out in the creek, if you prefer nov- 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 3? 
 
 elty!** he called out in an obliging tone, as Glyn disap¬ 
 peared in the house. 
 
 “ And now that the hated tyrant is no more/* continued 
 Papillon easily, “ we *11 go and sit under the trees and flirt.** 
 And they strolled across the lawn to a group of garden- 
 seats and chairs under a walnut-tree from which they could 
 see the smooth water of the creek and watch the boats and 
 the rapid little steam-launches on the broader stream of the 
 river outside. Then, when they had leaned for a few min¬ 
 utes on the iron railing which ran along the top of the bank 
 at the edge of the water, and Charlie had scolded her for 
 spoiling her dress, and they had contradicted each other 
 rudely as to the distance from where they stood to the op¬ 
 posite bank of the creek, he said reflectively— 
 
 “It is against my principles to raise the husbands of 
 pretty and charming women to their wives; but what a dear 
 old chap David is!** 
 
 Doris laughed, very much pleased. 
 
 “ He really is, you know; I don*t wish to prejudice you, 
 but I must repeat it. As we were coming down in the 
 train to-day, talking about one thing and another, I 
 couldn*t help thinking that, if ever a girl had a good ex¬ 
 cuse for throwing herself away, it was you, Doris.** 
 
 “ Very neatly put. I am sure David would shed tears 
 of gratitude if he could hear you.** 
 
 “ My dear, I don*t expect gratitude. What disinterested 
 good comes in my way to do in this world I do, leaving it 
 to chance to get paid in a better one. But to hear him 
 prose on in his sweet grave way about the people he knows, 
 and the best way of showing them kindness, as if he were a 
 benevolent old man at the other end of life, instead of a 
 handsome young man at this, made me feel quite sentiment¬ 
 ally toward him—it did really.** 
 
 “He is awfully kind-hearted,** said Doris, her mouth 
 softening. “ Whom does he want to be kind to now?** 
 “Oh, he talked about Mrs. Edgcombe*s loneliness now 
 she has lost you, and about young Hill*s failure on the 
 Stock Exchange, and even spoke as if he was sorry for that 
 silly young Melton, who was so rude to him after you had 
 accepted him!** 
 
 “ Oh, what has become of the boy?** 
 
 “ He is in ^ery low water, I believe. Things really have 
 gone rather hardly with the boy lately. To begin with— 
 
38 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 two months ago he thought there was only a cousin of his 
 between him and a large property; now the cousin has sud¬ 
 denly come back from America or one of those places with 
 a wife and a whole boat-load of children! Of course Melton 
 might have expected his cousin to marry, for he is quite a 
 young man; but still it was inconsiderate of the other fel¬ 
 low, when our friend Augustus was in debt too! And now 
 his mother is ill, and I believe, when she dies, his interest 
 in her money ceases; it is an annuity, I suppose, or an 
 allowance of some kind.” 
 
 “ Then why doesn’t he do something?” asked Doris in¬ 
 dignantly. 
 
 “ What is he to do? If he were a mechanic’s son, he 
 might drive a plow, or a water-cart, or do lots of things; 
 but there is very little a gentleman can do without any 
 training.” 
 
 “ I should thing Gussie could drive a water-cart.” 
 
 “ No, he couldn’t,” said Charlie impatiently. “ Now 
 how should I look driving a water-cart?” 
 
 “ Well, then, he might cut pencils and rule paper in an 
 office like you.” 
 
 “ Oh, you must have interest to get into a Government 
 office! Even your Charlie didn’t get there by the unaided 
 light of his natural genius. David spoke of introducing 
 him to old Bramwell; he might do something for him, if 
 Melton would go into the City.” 
 
 “ He ought to be glad to go anywhere, instead of wasting 
 his time,” said Doris severely. “Mrs. Bramwell is going 
 to give a garden-party; I’ll get her to send Gussie an in¬ 
 vitation. ” 
 
 “ Oh, don’t let her forget me too! I like Mrs. Bram- 
 well’s garden-parties, I know a path in her garden that 
 everybody but me thinks leads to nowhere; but there is a 
 seat at the end close to a sweet-brier b.usli and right under 
 a wall covered with apricots. I’ll take you there, and we’ll 
 stay there all the afternoon, and— Go away, David! I 
 don’t know where you have been brought up; you might 
 know it is not manners to come and interrupt. Go away, 
 I say; we’ll talk to you presently.” Then, turning his 
 back upon his host, who had sauntered up to them just as 
 the dinner-gong sounded, he continued fco Doris, more 
 affectionately than ever, “ And you shall tell me all your 
 
Doris's fortune. 
 
 39 
 
 troubles, just as you have been doing now; and then I'll 
 comfort you, and we’ll be so happy. '' 
 
 “1 shall really have to put you into the creek, Charlie," 
 said David. 
 
 “ Oh, not till after dinner!" answered Papillon, with 
 gentle remonstrance, as he gave his arm to Doris, and they 
 all went in-doors. 
 
 The three had a cozy little dinner in the great room 
 which would hold thirty; and at the close of a very happy 
 evening Papillon found himself installed for the first time 
 in one of the best bedrooms.’ In the old days, when he had 
 been one of the crowd of visitors whom Mrs. Edgcombe and 
 her granddaughter entertained all through the summer, he 
 had had, as an insignificant bachelor, to content himself 
 with all sorts of impromptu couches very near the roof. 
 He leaned out of window, rejoicing in his promotion, and 
 smoked a cigar in the moonlight. 
 
 Presently he heard footsteps, softly descending the stairs, 
 and the stealthy unfastening of the drawing-room win¬ 
 dow below him; and then he saw that the midnight dis¬ 
 turbers of his peace were his host and hostess, who had 
 stolen out for just one more stroll in the sweet summer 
 night air. They sauntered together up the path on the 
 left-hand side of the lawn, and disappeared behind the 
 shrubs and trees at the end. He waited at the window 
 until they reappeared from among the tall hedges of yew 
 and guelder-roses, and watched them as they slowly returned 
 toward the house, feeling quite poetical. They were such an 
 ideal pair. He was so tall and well built and moved so 
 easily; she was a woman of ideal beauty of face and form. 
 Half-way down the path the shawl she had thrown round 
 her slipped from her head, and her husband stopped to 
 draw it again into its place so tenderly that Papillon turned 
 away his head, excited to enthusiasm and something like 
 worship. 
 
 " Wl lere will this end?" thought the philosopher pres¬ 
 ently. “ They can't go on like that in this groveling 
 wicked old world of ours. They are too pure, too perfect. 
 They'll die and slide off to heaven just as they are, without 
 any change at all—except just the wings." 
 
40 
 
 doris’s fortune. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 It was in the very last days of July that Mrs. BramwelFs 
 garden-party came off. The weather was perfect, the 
 grounds, which were next to Fairleigh, were among the 
 most beautiful on that part of the Thames, and all the 
 arrangements made for that particularly dull form of en¬ 
 tertainment were complete. There was lawn-tennis for the 
 energetic, there were little tents and arbors with seats for 
 the lazy, there were boats, there was a band, and there 
 were two marquees for refreshments. 
 
 Papillon was there. Having instantly secured an intro¬ 
 duction to the prettiest girl on the ground, and having 
 taken her down ids favorite paths and satisfied himself that 
 her conversational merit was not equal to her appearance, 
 he had generously given way to a rival and taken himself 
 off in search of metal more attractive, carefully avoiding 
 his hostess, lest she should pounce upon him and make him 
 to do duty at the side of some elderly young lady whose ap- 
 
 { >earance was not equal to her conversational merit. Char- 
 ie was not a useful young man; he utterly declined to be¬ 
 stow his devoted but valueless attentions upon any ladies 
 but those most sought after. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson was there, attracting * more attention and 
 even more admiration than the far lovelier and younger 
 Mrs. Glyn. She wore a dress of some light silk covered 
 with lace, and a daring hat trimmed with long white feath¬ 
 ers, and exquisitely made artificial flowers. She carried a 
 sunshade, the lace on which was worth more than all the 
 lace Doris had ever possessed, mounted upon an ivory 
 handle on which her monogram was carved among delicate 
 trails of ivy and sprays of lilies. Her husband was not 
 with her; he would come by and by, she said, on his return 
 from the city. 
 
 “ He is such a slave to that horrid city/* she said, with 
 a pretty frown of petulance, to Mrs. Bramwell. 
 
 And her hostess condoled with her on the fearful fate of 
 having a husband who was a slave to the city; but the 
 matrons near, whose gowns had not come from Paris, and 
 whose monograms were not carved on anything, smiled 
 
doris's fortune. 
 
 41 
 
 lightly to each other and wondered how the poor man ever 
 found time to come home at all when he had such extrava¬ 
 gance as that to support. That a woman of thirty-five or 
 more—even these severe judges could not add to her age, 
 she looked so much younger—should dress like a duchess 
 and take the attention of the young men away from the 
 girls, their daughters, instead of submitting to be placed 
 on the shelf, was a scandalous thing. And what were Mrs. 
 Hodson's own daughters doing while their mother was en¬ 
 joying herself and flirting like a young girl? 
 
 But these indignant dowagers overshot the mark when 
 they passed this censure upon Mrs. Hodson's flirtations. 
 She certainly did flirt; but it was with the easy assurance 
 of the matured beauty, and not with the shy tentative 
 coquetries of the young girl. She attracted more admira¬ 
 tion, she got more attention than the fairest of the girls 
 whose cause the elder ladies took up so hotly; but she could 
 scarcely be said to have robbed them of homage which 
 would have fallen to their share if she had not been there. 
 For pretty and bright girls will get their meed of soft 
 words and tender looks, and plain or dull ones such share 
 of attention as must always suffice them in a throng, 
 whatever the charms of the sirens who enter the lists with 
 them may be. But much-maligned Mrs. Hodson, who bore 
 the sarcasms of her compeers with great equanimity, ful¬ 
 filled a social function to which the loveliest of debutantes 
 would have been unequal; her brilliant presence and sunny 
 manner gave life to the whole assembly, she broke up the 
 knots of listless young men who would have gathered round 
 the refreshment-tents and remained there, she paired off 
 chatty old gentlemen with tattling old ladies, she spied out 
 neglected girls and provided them with partners from the 
 ranks of her own body-guard of submissive youths, she 
 flitted about over the lawns and among the paths, pretty, 
 gracious, and charming, insuring the success of the affair by 
 taking half the burden of entertainment upon her fair 
 plump shoulders, and earning the deep gratitude of Mrs. ' 
 Bramwell, who had indeed reckoned upon her valuable aid 
 at the outset of the undertaking. Dangerous Mrs. Hodson 
 might be, as less brilliant women did not scruple to call 
 her; but her danger was not for the multitude, not in a 
 throng. 
 
 Doris, in satteen of pale tints of oink and gray, took ad' 
 
42 
 
 DOKIS'S FOKTUNE. 
 
 1 
 
 miration less by storm but more surely; face, figure, dress, 
 and movement satisfied every demand of the most critical 
 taste. She had obtained invitations for Hilda Warren, 
 whose slight figure was conspicuous by the quaint simplicity 
 of her dress, and for Gussie Melton, a tall, broad-shoul¬ 
 dered, good-looking young man with a single eyeglass and 
 a vacuous expression, who lounged with a kindred spirit 
 just outside one of the refreshment-marquees, in a listless 
 and sulky dissatisfaction with the entertainment provided 
 for him; he had failed in an endeavor to get a tete-a-tete 
 with Mrs. Glyn, but he could not keep his eyes from wan¬ 
 dering in her direction. 
 
 Mrs. Hod son who saw everybody, saw him, had him in¬ 
 troduced to her, swept him off in her train, and he pres¬ 
 ently had the satisfaction of finding himself in a group of 
 which Doris was a member. She was talking to another 
 lady about a horse-show at which they had both been pres¬ 
 ent. 
 
 44 Did you get the pair of chestnuts you took such a fancy 
 to, Mrs. Glyn?** 
 
 44 No. I haven*t got over the disappointment yet. David 
 forgot all about it till it was too late, and somebody else 
 had snapped them up.** 
 
 44 If you know who bought them and would trust me 
 with the matter, I would see if it is not possible to get 
 them yet, Mrs. Glyn,** said young Melton, interposing 
 eagerly. 
 
 44 Oh, thank you! It is very kind of you; but I really 
 don*t know who did buy them, and I have resigned myself 
 ' by this time to doing without them!** 
 
 44 But I have no doubt I could find out who the buyer 
 was, and I should be delighted,** he persisted with rather 
 too much empressement . 
 
 Doris cut him short. 
 
 44 You must not tempt me, Mr. Melton. It is an ex¬ 
 travagance I am glad to have been saved from. ” 
 
 It was the verv mildest of snubs, delivered with a smile 
 
 jj y 
 
 that had no unkind ness in it; but Melton drew back sharply, 
 as if stabbed, and instantly devoted elaborate attention to 
 Mrs. Hodson. 
 
 It was later in the afternoon when Mr. Bramwell sud¬ 
 denly remembered a promise she had made to send for a 
 little boy, the son of a young mother too recently widowed 
 
Doris's fortune. 43 
 
 to be present herself at any assembly of pleasure, “ to see 
 th£ pretty ladies and hear the music. " 
 
 “ Shall I go and fetch him, Mrs. Bramwell?" asked 
 Doris, with whom little AVillie Hillier was a favorite. 
 
 “ No, we can't spare you, Doris; I must find some good- 
 natured person who won't be missed." 
 
 “ But I won't be long; I should like to go. He lives up 
 by the lock, doesn’t he? Well, I will get somebody to row 
 me upland combine business with pleasure. AYho will 
 row me up to the lock?" 
 
 Half a dozen young fellows of all degrees of incom- 
 
 bank. David interfered. 
 
 “ I can't let you go with any one who doesn't know the 
 river well, Doris. The light is going, and you will have to 
 pass the wear. Let me see—who is the best waterman 
 here? Ah, young Melton knows the river, doesn't he?" 
 
 Of all the men who had heard pretty Mrs. Glyn's speech, 
 he alone had not stirred in answer to her appeal. Of course 
 her husband had not noticed this and paid no attention to 
 her murmured objection. Melton himself caught her low 
 remonstrance, however, and, when David stepped up to 
 him and said, “ You will take care of her, won't you?" he 
 said, stiffly: 
 
 “ Er-perhaps-er—Mrs. Glyn may not care to avail her¬ 
 self of my services." 
 
 “ Don't you want to go, then?" asked David, simply. 
 
 “ Of course—I should be delighted. I am only afraid 
 Mrs. Glyn may have some objection." 
 
 “ Nonsense!" said David, quietly. “ I have an objection 
 to her being drowned, and I know you can manage a boat." 
 
 Melton was making his way to the boats with stiff un¬ 
 graciousness, and languidly unbuttoning the one glove he 
 had on, when Doris made a movement toward one of the 
 other men, as if to secure his services. With sudden eager¬ 
 ness Melton sprung forward, and offered his hand to help 
 her into the boat David had chosen from the rest, as look¬ 
 ing the most comfortable and the safest. Two or three 
 rashly officious hands from among the group on the bank 
 unshipped the rudder in giving her the ropes, splashed her 
 dress in helping to push off the boat, and made their pres, 
 ence felt in similar ways. She thanked them good-hu- 
 
44 
 
 Doris’s fortune. 
 
 moredly, but felt glad when the boat was fairly under way 
 and she was out of reach of their zealous hands. 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 “ Keep to the right, if you please, as close under the 
 bank as you can,” said Melton briefly to Doris, as he bent 
 sulkily over the sculls. 
 
 She pulled the right rope obediently, and, as the boat 
 swam smoothly through the water, she was touched with 
 compassion for her ferryman for having to row in such in¬ 
 appropriate dress. She quite forgave him for looking so 
 terribly cross. 
 
 “ I am sorry to have made a martyr of you, Mr. Melton. 
 It must be very uncomfortable to row in that costume, and 
 hard work too against the stream. ’ ’ 
 
 “It is not at all hard,” said he stiffly, giving the sculls 
 a long strong pull that made the boat rush through the 
 water, to show her that this was child’s play to him. 
 “ Only I can’t think what made Glyn choose an old tub 
 like this. I could have got you to the lock in about a quar¬ 
 ter of the time in a better boat,” 
 
 “ You must excuse a husband’s caution. David thought 
 this one looked safe.” 
 
 “ It is a great mistake to suppose a thing is safe because 
 it is clumsy. You have only got to lurch over to one side 
 or the other in this thing, and over it goes.” 
 
 He gave an illustrative jerk to the left, but with no 
 worse result than to make the boat roll. 
 
 “Yes? Well, don’t doit, please, till you have landed 
 me.” 
 
 “ You need not be afraid. I could sit on the edge of this 
 tub without upsetting it; it all depends on how it is done.” 
 
 “ Yes? Well, I think I’d rather row on quietly without 
 any conjuring tricks, please.” 
 
 “ I was not going to do it,” said he coldly. “ I only 
 wished to show you that safety in any boat depends upon 
 the person in it. You should never get into a boat unless 
 you have confidence in the man in charge of it.” 
 
 “ Why, so I have! David could not have shown more 
 trust in your powers than by choosing you out from among 
 all those boys on the lawn—in spite Of your reluctance.” 
 
DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 45 
 
 “ It was most flattering, I am sure, to be chosen by 
 David as—a safe person,” said Melton, angrily. 
 
 Doris could not help beirs' amused by the young fellow's 
 petulance. She said not! g, but remained intent on her 
 steering. 
 
 “As for my reluctance, as you call it,” he went on 
 presently, in a sulky tone, “ a man does not care to run 
 the risk of another snub when he has already been sat 
 upon once in the afternoon for obtruding the offer of his 
 services. ” 
 
 “ I did not wish to snub you or sit upon you at all. You 
 put quite an absurd meaning upon my wish to save you 
 useless trouble. If I had wanted the horses badly, David 
 —my husband—would have got them for me.” 
 
 “ Please remember that it was not until you complained 
 of vour husband's not getting them for you that I offered 
 to do so. It was enough for me that you wanted them; I 
 did not wait to ask whether you wanted them badly, ” said 
 he, quickly, in a low voice. 
 
 Doris gave him a long cold look, but he would not meet it. 
 
 “ You are very kind,” said she at length, icily. “ But 
 you are mistaken if you think I shall ever have occasion to 
 prefer your services to my husband's.” 
 
 “ Not yet, I dare say,” said Melton, his temper rising, 
 his stroke getting unsteady, his eyes shiftily avoiding hers. 
 “I don't suppose you are tired of worshiping your saint 
 yet. Poor weak creatures who have affections and passions 
 must seem a very poor lot compared to such a—such a sub¬ 
 lime saint. But when his perfection begins to pall, when 
 you begin to get a little tired of his seraphic smile and his 
 calm superiority to everybody else, perhaps you won't look 
 upon other people and other people's offers of service quite 
 so scornfully.” 
 
 “ Gussie,” said Doris, in a low voice, but very sternly, 
 “ do you quite understand what you are saying? Do you 
 remember whom you are saying it to? Do you know, you 
 foolish boy, that you are talking to a wife about her hus¬ 
 band?” 
 
 “ And do you know,” said Gussie hotly, raising his eyes 
 at last, not placidly vacuous now, but flashing with passion 
 to her face, “ that you are talking to a man, not a boy, 
 and that you have made a great mistake in treating me as if 
 I was fourteen, and that I mean to prove it to you?” 
 
46 
 
 DOBIS'S FOBTUKE. 
 
 “You have already proved to me that I have made a 
 great mistake about you. I knew you were headstrong and 
 rash and violent; but I d 7 ’ 1 not know that you were 
 wicked. ' ' 
 
 “ Well, I am wicked!" said Melton, rather soothed for 
 the moment. “ You have treated me badly, and, married 
 or unmarried, I shall just tell you what I think of you/' 
 
 “ When—how have I treated you badly? You are talking 
 at random. " 
 
 “ I am talking the calm sober truth," said he, violently 
 excited. “ You have played with me and encouraged me 
 and amused yourself with me, and made me think you were 
 going to have me, and then thrown me over for a man 
 whom you didn't care much about and who didn't care 
 much about you. And then you say you are not a coquette. 
 Didn't you coquette with me at Ambleside? Can you pre¬ 
 tend you didn't know I was in love with you, when I tried 
 to propose to you eveiy day?" 
 
 6 6 Which is a thing no man seriously in love with a girl 
 could do. Tell me—did any of the people up there—any 
 of the girls, for instance —who saw your very frank love- 
 making and the way I received it, think that you were se¬ 
 riously encouraged?" 
 
 “ I don't know—at least—no, I don't think they did. 
 But they knew I was in earnest; and, when they told me 
 you would never marry me, Iran away—I mean, I wouldn't 
 stay there—to be made a fool of." 
 
 64 You see you are obliged to own that nobody but you 
 saw any of this heartless coquetry in the way I treated you. 
 I was perfectly open and frank in my manner to you from 
 the first. At the risk of offending you again, I must tell 
 you that no gentleman who had not just left school ever be¬ 
 fore bestowed his attentions on me in quite such a headlong 
 fashion. The novelty of it pleased-me—pleased us all, in 
 fact. We all spoiled you, and excused your very eccentric 
 manners, feeling sure they would tone down into something 
 more conventional by and by. Besides, we liked you; I 
 especially found you a charming companion; you were so 
 ready to laugh when one was in high spirits, to be kind 
 when one was dull; you got so much excited about any 
 beautiful scene or lovely music; you were so easily inter¬ 
 ested. Then you were always kind and thoughtful for— 
 your companions, and there was something in the way in 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 47 
 
 which you used to take care of—them, and save them 
 trouble, even when perhaps they had been snubbing you, 
 and, in a light-hearted fashion, treating you rather un¬ 
 fairly, which made me fall quite naturally into the mistake 
 of thinking that, with all your faults of manner, you were 
 a gentleman. ” 
 
 Doris felt a pang of compunction when she felt the boat 
 quiver from the start he gave at these last severe words. 
 
 “ It was not a mistake,” said he huskily. “ That is the 
 cruelest thing you could say to me.^ 
 
 “ I should not have said so till to-day,” said Doris. 
 
 “ You are heartless, whatever you may say!” he broke 
 out passionately, resting on his sculls and forcing her by 
 his vehemence to raise her eyes to his heated face. “ You 
 couldn’t pick even a boy’s love to pieces in that cold way if 
 you were not; and a man of two-and-twenty is not a boy. 
 And it is nonsense to say my love wasn’t worth anything 
 because I showed it; and I don’t believe those calm people 
 who make you think they have such a lot of feeling shut 
 up could shut it up if they felt as much as I do. And, if I * 
 were sixty-two, instead of twenty-two, I should show it just 
 the same.” 
 
 “ You will have shown it for a good many people by the 
 time you are sixty-two, I think, Gussie,” said Doiis, gen¬ 
 tly. “ You seem to forget that, before you showed it for 
 me, you showed it in exactly the same degree for Marion 
 Bryant. Yet I am sure that, if she were to overwhelm you 
 with passionate reproaches, you would think them quite 
 uncalled for.” 
 
 “ That was a different thing! That was a boy’s affec¬ 
 tion, if you like. Marion is a dear, good girl, and I’m aw¬ 
 fully fond of her. But she is years and years older than I 
 am, and she never thought and never could have thought, 
 that I was really in love with her. But you,” said he, his 
 tone suddenly softening as he looked at her, while she 
 leaned tack with her handsome face grave with thought and 
 anxiety, her graceful figure set off by her dainty dress-- 
 “ you are the most beautiful woman I ever saw. I know 
 that, if I were to go all over the world, I should never meet 
 anybody lovelier or sweeter or cleverer. So of course I 
 loved you; and I always shall love you, because I shall 
 never find any one more beautiful or more charming. And, 
 though you can never be anything to me now, I shall ah 
 
48 
 
 BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 ways love you just as much, and nothing you can say will 
 prevent me,” and he went on resolutely with his rowing. 
 
 The stream was very strong at this point, and in the de¬ 
 lay caused by this harangue, which he had delivered resting 
 on his sculls, they had drifted hack some distance. He 
 started again with a stronger stroke, to make up for lost 
 time, and to show Doris, by devoting himself entirely to his 
 work, that he considered his words unanswerable. He felt 
 that there was something rather fine about the self-abnega- 
 tory tone of the end of his speech which must impress 
 Doris. 
 
 But, when she acquiesced in this way of closing the sub¬ 
 ject by saying, in a much relieved and cheerful tone: 
 
 “ Very well, then let us hear no more about it,” he was 
 instantly impelled to reopen it. 
 
 “ You know, I did not want your money, Doris, as I was 
 told you thought I did. I never thought about your money 
 at Ambleside; I thought only about you, and I should have 
 liked you just as much if you had had nothing at all. But 
 the Bryants told me, among other nice things, that you 
 were too rich to think of me, that you would think I only 
 wanted your money. So I went away from Ambleside, and 
 didn't even say good-bye to you. And when I met you 
 again in London, I tried to make you think I was better off 
 than I was, so that you might not think I was mercenary." 
 
 “ I was told you were deeply in debt." 
 
 “Well, it wasn't true. I never have been deeply in 
 debt. People always exaggerate a young man's debts. I'm 
 not extravagant, and, besides, I couldn't get credit if I 
 were, since my cousin's marriage. I have been in low water 
 lately, but through quite another cause;‘and it was not 
 until after you were engaged to Glyn. So now, you see, 
 you have been too hard upon me, Doris; my motives were 
 not a bit more interested than those of Glyn himself." 
 
 She began unconsciously to look rather sorry for him. 
 She was more touched by the suggestion of his difficulties 
 than by the account of his love. She had never had any 
 money-troubles, but she knew they must be very hard to 
 bear; and she thought they must be especially hard for a 
 young man of the idle class. Melton saw her beautiful 
 face soften, and he added, in a very low voice: 
 
 “ So you see, if it had not been for the lies and slanders 
 of some wretched busybodies, who didn't do themselves any 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 49 
 
 good by it, we might have married each other and been 
 perfectly happy. ” 
 
 Doris started, and raised herself from her reclining atti¬ 
 tude in a tumult of indignation at the lad^s presumption. 
 
 “ Is it possible?” she asked, m a very quiet voice, “ that 
 you imagine I could in any conceivable train of circum¬ 
 stances have married you?” 
 
 “ Why not?” said Melton, his face growing crimson at 
 her cutting tone. “ You have told me I am a cad, I know; 
 but you said you did not find it out till to-day. If you 
 fell into the mistake of thinking me enough like a gentle¬ 
 man to flirt with, you might, I should think, have fallen 
 into the mistake of thinking me enough like a gentleman 
 to marry. ” 
 
 “ It has nothing to do with that question. If you had 
 been a duke, or if you had been a dust-man, it would have 
 made no difference, and your wrongs against David and 
 your unknown slanderers are quite imaginary. For I 
 should never, in any case, have trusted my happiness to the 
 keeping of a man younger than myself, quite unworthy to 
 be the ruler of my conduct as he is incapable of guiding 
 his own.” 
 
 Melton made no answer; he was rowing hard and fast, 
 and he listened to her bitter words with teeth firmly set 
 and a lowering expression of face. He did not look at her; 
 but he heard, as the boat shot faster and faster through the 
 water, the rushing sound of the wear which they were near¬ 
 ing in the twilight. Suddenly he raised his head and said, 
 in a harsh voice: 
 
 “So you would never have married me—never have 
 trusted me, I suppose?” 
 
 Doris did not answer. She sat quite still, with the rud¬ 
 der-lines firmly in her hands; but her mind was so dis¬ 
 turbed by the conversation of the last few minues that she 
 lost ail consciousness for the moment of the direction the 
 boat was taking, and was only roused into a sense of what 
 was passing round her by the roar of the water at the wear. 
 She looked ahead, and was startled to find that they had 
 got right out of their proper course and were making 
 straight for the row of tall posts that stood out black 
 against the twilight gray of the water and the banks be¬ 
 yond. 
 
50 
 
 doris’s fortune. 
 
 « 6 
 
 Back water—quick !” she called out, as she pulled the 
 right-hand rope with all her might. 
 
 He rowed on without seeming to hear her. A few more 
 strokes, and it would be too late; the frail boat would be 
 crushed against the posts or sucked down in the rushing 
 waters of the wear. 
 
 “ Gussie, are you mad? Back water, or we shall be over 
 the wear!” she cried. 
 
 And as she spoke, she saw, with horror that chilled her 
 and caught her breath, that he knew, that he was possessed 
 with a mad purpose, that he meant to throw away her life 
 with his own. Without a cry, she leaped from her seat, 
 and slipping on to her knees in front of him, seized the 
 sculls, and, by the force of the fiery will which leaped up 
 in her, compelled the strong man to yield, to reverse the 
 action of the sculls, and to hold the rapidly drifting boat 
 back with all the strength of his sinews. But they had 
 gone too far; every second the current was dragging them 
 nearer to death. 
 
 “Harder, Gussie, harder,” she cried, as she felt that 
 they were creeping steadily forward, closer and closer to 
 the hiss and the roar. 
 
 Great Heaven, I can’t!” said he hoarsely. 
 
 Then row for the right bank! Pull as hard as you 
 can! , 
 
 The right bank was not far. With one strong stroke he 
 put the head of the boat right for it, and, straining every 
 muscle, pulled her across the stream, his right scull touch¬ 
 ing one of the posts as he shot the boat past it, and drove 
 with a shock straight into the bank. The stern of the fragile 
 craft was instantly swung round bytlie stream, but for a 
 moment the bow stuck fast, while Doris seized the boat¬ 
 hook and stuck it deep into the yielding spongy earth. 
 
 Melton sprung ashore; but, in the moment of his doing 
 so, the boat lightened of the burden which had kept her 
 head fixed in the earth, broke away, and the boat-hook, not 
 having strong enough hold on the loose soil of the bank to 
 bear the additional strain, slipped out of its place. Melton 
 flung himself down on the mud and grass of the bank, and, 
 with such hold on root and branch and stone as he could 
 get with the grip of his right hand, he clutched the drifting 
 boat with his left. 
 
 “Up, Doris—quick! I can’t hold it!” he gasped. 
 
 i£ 
 
 nr i 
 
DORIS S FORTUNE. 
 
 51 
 
 In a moment she had stepped across from stern to bow, 
 and, laying a light hand on his heaving shoulder, had 
 sprung ashore. 
 
 “ Thank—thank God!” he almost sobbed. 
 
 In his tumultuous gladness, as he felt her touch and 
 knew she was safe, he would have let the boat go to take its 
 chance. Doris cried imperiously: 
 
 “ Stop the boat; drag her up! We must save her some¬ 
 how !” 
 
 It was easier now that the boat was empty. Doris lent 
 her weaker but steadier hand to his somewhat exhausted 
 strength; and they dragged the boat along till she was out 
 of the rush of the current, and made her fast for a moment 
 to a stump. Then Melton, hatless, wet, covered with mud, 
 his hands blistered, torn, and bleeding, panting with the 
 efforts he had had to make, stooped down to her in broken 
 shamefaced entreaty. 
 
 “ Doris, Doris, I was mad. Can you ever forgive me? 
 David never will!” 
 
 She looked up into his face, which was still nervously 
 quivering—old for the moment with the violent passions it 
 had in those hard-lived past minutes expressed. 
 
 “I forgive you,” she said quietly. “ As for David, I 
 shall not tell him anything about it. He would get your 
 friends to send you to a lunatic asylum.” 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Doris and Gussie stood in silence for some minutes on 
 the bank, amidst the rank vegetation of the water’s edge, 
 while Melton recovered his breath; and Doris, impatient to 
 set off again, wondered what she should say on her return 
 to the gossiping crowd to explain this prolonged absence 
 and the forlorn plight of her companion. With all the ad¬ 
 vantage which her self-command, and the superiority of her 
 moral position, and of her dry and neat condition, gave 
 her over the misguided and half-drowned-looking creature 
 beside her, Doris felt rather afraid of this lad, with his un¬ 
 governable passions and his fits of love and fury. She 
 hardly dared to look at him at first, lest the pity she could 
 not help feeling should draw forth some wild demonstra¬ 
 tion. 
 
52 
 
 DORIS S FORTUNE. 
 
 He was leaning against one of the trees which grew al¬ 
 most close to the water's edge, and, as she looked anxiously 
 out over the river, gray with the evening mist, toward the 
 lock, she heard his labored breathing through all the rush 
 of the wear and the ripple of the current against the bank 
 at her feet. She turned toward him, anxious and fright¬ 
 ened. The hot flush of passion had left his face ghastly 
 white through the mud with which it was smeared; his 
 clothes were disordered, dirty, and torn; blood was drop¬ 
 ping from his hands; his head was thrown back in an atti¬ 
 tude of utter powerlessnes, which in a man of his strength 
 and stature was terrible to the woman's eyes. She touched 
 his arm very gently. 
 
 “ Gussie, Gusie, are you ill? What can I do for you?" 
 
 “ No, no, I am not ill only miserable." 
 
 “ You are wet through. Get into the boat, and I wiT 
 try to bind up your poor hands." 
 
 The anxiety in her voice acted at once upon the young 
 fellow's sensitive, impulsive nature. He stumbled forward 
 into the boat, holding out his hand to help her in, and 
 withdrawing it as he suddenly became aware of its condi¬ 
 tion. She told him to sit on the cushioned seat in the stern. 
 
 “ But I am going to row; I must get you back," he said 
 humbly. 
 
 “ Do as I tell you to do," said Doris gently. 
 
 She placed herself beside him and bathed his cut hands 
 in the river to cleanse them from the mud into which he 
 had plunged, found his pocket-handkerchief and tore it and 
 her own into strips, bound up his hands with them, and 
 wiped the mud from his face with the lace she had been 
 wearing round her own shoulders. 
 
 “ Don't—you'll spoil it," objected the poor fellow, very 
 much soothed by these attentions, which she performed in 
 very few minutes with light quick fingers. 
 
 “ I am afraid I can not make you look very nice— with¬ 
 out a hat and without a brush or a scraper," said she 
 brightly; “ but still I think I have effected a great im¬ 
 provement; and Mrs. Ilillier may be able to lend us some 
 sort of head-gear—one of Willie's garden-hats perhaps. We 
 must fetch Willie, you know. You are shivering again! 
 Have you any cigars about you?" 
 
 “ I don't know. I think so, unless they have fallen 
 out," 
 
BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 53 
 
 He began to feel about with his bandaged hands. He 
 looked so crest-fallen, so unutterably helpless and ashamed 
 of himself, that Doris pitied him with all her heart. 
 
 “ I'll find them for you. You had better keep your 
 hands still, or my not very skillful bandages will come off.” 
 
 “ Oh, thank you; I don’t like to trouble you!” 
 
 No more presumption. His humility was quite piteous. 
 
 She felt in all his pockets, until she had found cigars, 
 matches, and a pen-knife; then she cut the tip off one 
 cigar, put it between his lips, struck a match and lighted it 
 for him, all very simply and brightly, but with a good-nat¬ 
 ured intention of restoring his desperately wounded amour- 
 propre a little by the undeniable coquetry of the action. 
 
 “ Now we’ll get your errand over, and go back as fast as 
 we can; and perhaps you won’t take cold, after all,” said 
 she, 
 
 He answered only by incoherent but not vehement 
 thanks, and Doris took up the spare pair of sculls, for both 
 the other sculls had been lost and had been carried over the 
 wear, and pulled across the river to Mrs. Hillier’s villa by 
 the lock. 
 
 The little boy had been howling with disappointment for 
 some time, as his mother thought he had been forgotten; 
 it was so late that Doris had to use all her powers of en¬ 
 treaty to persuade her to let the child come, promising to 
 send one of her own servants back with him in an hour. A 
 lawn-tennis hat and a rug were procured for the unfortu¬ 
 nate Mr. Melton, who remained in his seat as passenger in 
 charge of little Willie, a fair-haired angel whose will was 
 law in his mother’s household. As Gussie did not feel 
 justified in allowing him to hang over the side of the boat 
 and drink out of the river with his hands, the angel 
 thumped him and thwacked him, and at last, by a happy 
 inspiration, snatched his cigar out of his mouth and threw 
 it into the water. So that his return was altogether igno¬ 
 minious and chastening; and as Doris, who could row very 
 well, and who was moreover pulling with the stream, 
 brought the boat in a very short time back to the shores of 
 Mrs. Bramwell’s garden, where the Chinese lanterns were 
 already being lighted among the trees, the wicked fellow 
 felt that he would infinitely rather be at the bottom of the 
 wear, even without Doris, than face the scrutiny of the 
 
54 
 
 PORTS*S fortune. 
 
 critical crowd on the lawn, which was however already De¬ 
 gin ning to thin. 
 
 Doris landed at the end of the grounds the most remote 
 from the large lawn; but a little group had gathered to 
 meet her and to exclaim that everybody had begun to think 
 she was drowned. Nobody paid much attention to Gussie, 
 or appeared much relieved at his return until Doris ex¬ 
 plained that they had had an accident on landing as she had 
 already told Mrs. Hillier— the boat had been insecurely 
 moored, and Mr. Melton had cut his hands dreadfully in 
 getting her back to the shore, having slipped into the water 
 himself and having had great difficulty in saving both him¬ 
 self and the boat. Mrs. Bramwell herself, who had come 
 up in time to hear this story, was much moved by it, and 
 insisted upon his going in-doors with her immediately to 
 change his clothes, which were still very wet. 
 
 “ I will send you some things of my husband's. I can't 
 promise that they will fit you very well; but it is better 
 than that you should take cold, and they will at least be 
 dry," she said, as she marched him off. 
 
 And, as Mr. Bramwell was a very small spare man, while 
 Mr. Melton was a very tall broad-chested one, Doris won¬ 
 dered what the unlucky culprit would look like when he next 
 appeared before her. 
 
 Doris had been rather surprised not to see her husband 
 among the people who had collected to await the arrival of 
 the boat; she had been afraid lest anxiety on her account 
 should lend him penetration, and that he would not be sat¬ 
 isfied with her explanation. It was too much to hope that 
 her long absence should not have been noticed by him, and, 
 as she returned to the lawn, Mrs. Hodson's voice, from one 
 of the marquees, called out: 
 
 “ There she is! I told you she would come back all 
 right. Oh, Mrs. Glyn, where have you been? I don't think 
 you ought to treat your husband like that already; he has 
 been nearly dancing with fright on your account!" 
 
 “ Yes, Doris, I have been dreadfully uneasy about you," 
 said David, putting his hand on her shoulder and bending 
 down to look at her. “ What have you been doing with 
 yourself? You look very pale, and you are cold! Have 
 you met with any accident, my dear child?" asked he, 
 with sudden alarm. 
 
 “ Oh, no; lam all right. Poor Mr. Melton has had an 
 
DORIS’S FOftTUXE. 
 
 55 
 
 accident, though; he slipped into the water to stop the boat 
 from drifting away, because we had fastened it insecurely, 
 and he cut his hands and got covered with mud. That de¬ 
 layed us, of course, because I had to bind up his wounds; 
 and I had time to get rather cold. Don’t look so dreadful¬ 
 ly frightened, David; indeed there is nothing the matter 
 with me/’ said she, laughing sweetly at his grave face. 
 
 “Don’t keep her standing there on the damp grass/’ 
 broke in Mrs. Hodson’s genial, rather loud voice. She had 
 followed David out of the marquee, and now quite natural¬ 
 ly assumed the office of dictatress in this small emergency. 
 
 “ The poor child’s hands are as cold as stones,” she went 
 on, after holding for a moment Doris’s slim fingers in her 
 own soft pink palm, “ and there you stand, putting her 
 through a foolish catechism of grandmother’s questions, 
 when you ought to be trotting her home to bed. ” 
 
 Suiting the action to the word, Mrs. Hodson drew the 
 young wife’s arm through hers and marched with her 
 briskly across the lawn, followed meekly by the self-re- 
 proachful David, whom she went on scolding with voluble 
 severity: 
 
 “You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Glyn, trusting 
 ycur wife in a boat with a young fool who thinks more of 
 soiling his gloves than of letting a lady sow the seeds of 
 consumption and congestion of the lungs while he is moon¬ 
 ing about all over the river, afraid to pull hard and unable 
 to pull straight! Why, even Bertram”—“Bertram” 
 was the name of Mrs. "Hodson’s husband, always used by 
 her as a type of the lowest depths of masculine degrada¬ 
 tion—“ would never let me get into a boat with a man who 
 didn’t know the river. You ought to be ashamed of your¬ 
 self, Glyn. ” 
 
 “But Gussie Melton does know the river,” protested 
 Doris* “ and he did pull hard! One can’t help accidents; 
 and it is he who is to be pitied, not I, for I only feel rather 
 cold, and can go straight home and get warm, while poor 
 Gussie has cut his hands and had to sit wet through, and he 
 has to get back to London to-night.” 
 
 “ Poor boy!” said Mrs. Hodson, with quick revulsion to 
 compassion. 
 
 Her mature coquetry made her ears always open to a tale 
 of masculine distress, and her wit always ready to suggest 
 
56 
 
 Doris’s forte he. 
 
 a remedy. They had now reached the lodge gates, and 
 Mrs. Hodson did not go through them. 
 
 “ He might come back to the Lawns with Bertram and 
 me to-night/’ she said reflectively. “That would give 
 time for his own things to be thoroughly dried before he 
 had to put them on to go back home. ” 
 
 “ Oh, you are good!” burst out Doris gratefully. 
 
 Mrs. Bramwell’s house was full, she knew, and she had 
 been reluctant to ask Gussie to spend the night at Fairleigh, 
 being afraid of another “ scene ” with that explosive young 
 gentleman. Mrs. Hodson’s good-natured offer relieved her 
 from this difficulty; and Doris felt, as she shook hands 
 with her and wished her good-night, that she could almost 
 forgive the elder lady’s strange freak in calling David by 
 his surname without prefix. 
 
 David glanced back at the somewhat solid and majestic 
 figure of the elder lady, who was at that moment prudently 
 occupied in gathering up her voluminous pale silk train, 
 revealing as she did so dainty French shoes, perfect ankles, 
 and skirts edged with delicate lace. Then he gave his arm 
 to his wife; but, as they went through the gates and along 
 the few hundred feet which lay between the lodge and their 
 own garden gate, he had no more solicitous nothings to say 
 to her. 
 
 “Why didn’t you ask young Melton to stay with us, 
 Doris?” he asked, in his usual mild tone, as he lifted the 
 latch of their own gate. “ It is too bad to impose on Mrs. 
 Hodson’s good nature by consigning the young cub to her.” 
 
 Doris laughed easily. 
 
 “ Oh, David, I never suggested that he should go to the 
 Lawns! The invitation came quite spontaneously from 
 Mrs. Hodson herself. Can’t you see that she likes being 
 kind to young men? There’s a sort of motherly coquetry 
 about her which makes her glad of an opportunity of pre¬ 
 venting them from taking cold, and giving them shelter for 
 the night, and that kind of thing. Wasn’t she very kind 
 to you when you were rather lonely in London, before you 
 went to India?” 
 
 “ Mr. Hodson often took me down to the Lawns to dine, 
 and his wife always backed him up in hospitality. But I 
 don’t think that should be sufficient reason for your sneers 
 at her, ” 
 
DORIS’S FORTUNE. 57 
 
 Doris looked up at her husband with gentle astonish¬ 
 ment: 
 
 “I did not mean to sneer, indeed, David. I admire 
 Mrs. Hodson very much. Those curious, beautiful eyes of 
 hers that puzzle you to tell what color they are, seem to 
 me quite the most wonderful I have ever seen. They are 
 like jewels in the sun which have no particular meaning, 
 yet 'dazzle you by their brilliancy. So that I imagine that 
 Mr. Hodson must have looked at them and looked at them, 
 until, just like a woman looking at diamonds, he could not 
 be satsfied till they belonged to him.” 
 
 “ And do you think they must necessarily have for every 
 other man the charm they have for Mr. Hodson?” 
 
 “ Oh, no, David! Why, did you think I was jealous?” 
 she asked, smiling, as she drew her hand affectionately 
 further through his arm. “ I am too vain for that, indeed, 
 even if Mrs. Hodson were ten years younger.” 
 
 “ Jealous? Of course not! I only thought that perhaps 
 you felt a little natural annoyance that Mrs. Hodson, a 
 married lady of some years* standing, should have absorbed 
 the lion’s share of attention at this garden-party instead of 
 you—a younger beauty and a bride.** 
 
 Doris laughed outright, not quite heartily; for her 
 amusement was mingled with almost contemptuous amaze¬ 
 ment that her husband could possibly imagine her to be so 
 small-minded. In a moment she checked herself, feeling 
 ashamed of her momentary undutifulness. 
 
 “ No, David; I am perfectly satisfied with our relative 
 positions, and I am quite ready to yield Mrs. Hodson as 
 much homage as every one else does. She seems to me to 
 have been born a few centuries too late and a great many 
 ranks too low. She ought to have been a Roman empress 
 instead of an English stock-broker*s wife.** 
 
 “A Roman empress!** It was David’s turn to laugh 
 now. “ Plump, matronly, comfortable Mrs. Hodson a 
 Roman empress! What a woman’s comparison!** 
 
 “ It was suggested to me by a woman, certainly; but I 
 don’t see that it is the more contemptible on that account,** 
 said Doris, gently. 
 
 Down in her inmost heart Doris held the secret, un¬ 
 acknowledged, but unassailable belief that women were the 
 recipients of a heaven-sent illumination, which made them, 
 as long as they kept themselves worthy, high-priestesses of 
 
58 
 
 doris 5 s fortune. 
 
 wisdom and truth to guide the coarse, blind male portion of 
 mankind over the morasses into which their blundering 
 logic led them. She did not, however, kick against the 
 attitude of submission which she had been taught to look 
 upon as the most beautiful attribute of wifehood, holding 
 it to be a graceful concession on the part of the wiser sex to 
 the less wise. So she uttered her protest quite meekly, and 
 David answered without the least suspicion that his intel¬ 
 lectual supremacy had been called in question. 
 
 “ Certainly not, dear,” he said, with a young husband’s 
 indulgence. “ And who was the woman who made it?” 
 
 6 4 Hilda Warren.” 
 
 “ And did she condescend to give reasons for her com¬ 
 parison?” 
 
 “ She says that Mrs. Hodson’s face shows more capacity 
 for cruelty than she ever saw expressed in a human face be¬ 
 fore; that her brightness has something steely in it; that 
 her good nature is only superficial, and comes chiefly from 
 the desire of universal domination. I believe she looks 
 upon her as a sort of moral octopus, clutching at every¬ 
 thing which comes within its wide-spreading reach, and 
 never satisfied until it has crushed to death any poor creat¬ 
 ure that it has once got in its grasp. * ’ 
 
 Doris delivered this speech quite dispassionately, with no 
 feeling more vivid than a wish to prove to her husband that 
 a woman could form and express rather neatly a very strong 
 independent opinion upon a subject in which she had no 
 deep personal interest. But David laughed rather shortly, 
 and did not seem pleased. 
 
 “ Miss Warren has the usual 
 said. 
 
 And Doris, who was not deeply enough interested in the 
 subject of Mrs. Hodson to care for further discussion which 
 had no attraction for her husband, followed him into the 
 house without another word. 
 
 But the author of the unlucky comparison, being as yet 
 free from conjugal fetters and holding her belief in the 
 superiority of her own sex much more obtrusively, was a t 
 that moment picking her fellow-woman to pieces with all 
 the fierceness of which her smart little tongue was capable. 
 Hilda Warren, escorted by Charlie Papillon, was following 
 Doris and her husband from Mrs. BramwelPs garden to 
 Fairleigh, where they were both to pass the night. Tho 
 
 prejudices of her sex,” he 
 
BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 59 
 
 theater where Hilda was engaged was closed for a fortnight 
 during the extreme heat of August, and she was enjoying 
 her liberty with a fullness which made her richer friends re¬ 
 gret their perpetual leisure. 
 
 “ You are most unjust to Mrs. Hodson, Hilda/* said 
 Charlie, as they watched Doris and David in at the front 
 door, and then instinctively made their own way round to 
 the more remote entrance through the drawing-room. 
 
 “Pm not. I only said she was a vampire.** 
 
 “ That is unjust/* 
 
 “ No, it isn*t.** 
 
 “ Let*s go round the garden and argue the point. ** 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Charlie knew perfectly well that argument with Hilda 
 would result neither in victory to his superior logic nor in 
 honorable and instructive defeat. It would end in a mere 
 battle of tongues in which each would have an infinite deal 
 to say, and neither would give in, until some outer accident, 
 such as the appearance of a third person, would put an end 
 to the discussion. But then argument with a pretty girl, 
 on the banks of the Thames, during a summer evening, 
 was of itself an undeniable good; and there was a good- 
 natured moon struggling to get out from a tangle of frown¬ 
 ing clouds to give just the one touch that was wanting to 
 the scene. So he led Hilda along the left-hand path by 
 the evening primroses and larkspurs and honeysuckles, and 
 babbled gently: 
 
 “We must have reasons, reasons. The court cannot 
 admit the expression 6 vampire,* as applied to a lady, with¬ 
 out adequate proof that the term is not misapplied.** 
 
 “ Well, a vampire is a thing in the shape of a woman 
 that has charming manners and no heart, and lives on the 
 blood of human beings.** 
 
 “ That's a ghoul, not a vampire!** objected Charlie, with 
 resignation. “ However, I suppose that*s near enough for 
 a woman.** 
 
 “ Quite near enough,** Hilda retorted, unabashed. 
 “ Well, Mrs. Hodson has manners which imply that she 
 has the right to dispose of the body and soul of every one 
 she meets, and that is considered irresistible by you men, 
 who like to be walked upon, I know.** 
 
60 
 
 Doris's fortune. 
 
 “ I am afraid I shall have to reject this evidence as inad¬ 
 missible, on account of the evident bias shown by the wit¬ 
 ness. " 
 
 “ Nonsense! I suppose you think it quite right of a 
 married woman to monopolize another woman's husband, 
 and to reproach him for not coming to see her, and to give 
 him her lace to carry, and to make him run about for her 
 as his own wife never thought of doing." 
 
 “ Mrs. Hodson makes everybody run about. She makes 
 me run about when I've nothing better to do." 
 
 66 My dear Charlie, she will let you run where you please 
 for the next few months, you may be sure. Mrs. Hodson 
 likes the wise men who bring gifts, and I heard Mr. Glyn 
 promise to get her a King Charles spaniel; I've no doubt 
 she asked for it." 
 
 “ Well, and do you think he would mind Doris's know¬ 
 ing that?" 
 
 “ No; but I think it would be better if Doris did mind. 
 If I had a husband who gave King Charles spaniels to other 
 women, I would never accept a present from him again." 
 
 “ And, if all wives thought the same, no husband would 
 be without a King Charles spaniel ready in his pocket. I 
 think Doris much wiser than you would be, and we need 
 not trouble our heads about her and David. They are 
 perfectly matched-, and make a much better host and host¬ 
 ess than the Arcadian pair who begin by being unable to 
 live out of each other's sight and end by being unable to 
 live in it. I consider them a model product of nineteenth 
 century civilization." 
 
 “ They are much too well matched. You don't want to 
 sit in front of your own portrait." 
 
 “ They did, and they seem to like it." 
 
 “ They don't. They leave the portrait to be admired by 
 other people." 
 
 “ This is not evidence," began Charlie gravely, when the 
 appearance of an odd figure on the other side of the wall 
 which divided Fairleigh from Mrs. Bramwell's garden made 
 him pause, and seemed to supply an odd commentary to 
 the conversation. 
 
 It was the unlucky Gussie, who, anxious for a chance of 
 apologizing to Doris for his conduct in a more formal man¬ 
 ner than he had yet done, but ashamed to come boldly to 
 the door weighted by the disadvantage of another man's 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 61 
 
 clothes, was on the lookout for some happy accident to 
 grant him the interview he did not dare to seek more 
 boldly. 
 
 “ What are you looking for, Mr. Melton?” cried Hilda, 
 in a shrill voice, running toward the wall to prevent his 
 escape. 
 
 “ I—I only wanted to—to wish you good-night,” said he 
 confusedly, preparing to retreat. 
 
 But the appearance of Doris, walking quickly toward 
 them over the lawn, checked him; and he remained by the 
 wall sullen, silent and ashamed, wondering whether his 
 longed-for opportunity was coming. 
 
 “ Hilda, you ought not to stay out so late,” said Doris, 
 in her sweet voice. “ Charlie, don't you know she has had 
 congestion of the lungs?” 
 
 “ Well, you can't have it twice, you know,” said Charlie, 
 whose medical lore was not deep, and who remembered 
 having heard something of the kind about measles. 
 
 Coming closer to the group, Doris caught sight of Gussie 
 on the other side of the wall, bashfully screening himself in 
 his ill-fitting raiment behind a lilac-bush. 
 
 6 6 And you too, Gussie—you ought to be in-doors. It is 
 so easy to take cold after such a plunge as you took. ” 
 
 “ I am all right, thank you,” said he stiffly. 
 
 He felt unspeakably humiliated by her easy, almost affec¬ 
 tionate tone, which implied to his sensitive and irritable 
 mind that his passionate outbreak had affected her only as 
 a child's fit of temper would have done. Some kindly per¬ 
 ception of his wounded feeling prompted her to detain him 
 as he was for the second time turning away. 
 
 “Wait a moment!” she said gently, raising her hand 
 with a gracious gesture of command common to her, and 
 not without charm. “Are you not going back to the 
 Lawns to-night with Mr. and Mrs. Hodson?” 
 
 “ I suppose so. They've asked me to,” admitted Gussie 
 briefly. 
 
 Charlie began to perceive that the irritated naughty-boy 
 tone of the young gentleman on the other side of the wall 
 showed a state of mind to be dealt with only en tete-a-tete. 
 
 “ Shall I take Hilda in, Doris?” he asked dutifully. He 
 had taken a paternal attitude toward Mrs. Glyn since her 
 marriage, and had dropped into use of her Christian name. 
 
 Doris was glad of the chance of a few words alone with 
 
62 
 
 DORIS’S FORTUNE. 
 
 Gussie; and, when the other two had started off at a brisk 
 pace for the house, she put one foot on the earth of the 
 flower-border to bring her nearer to the wall, and said, in 
 her sweetest voice: 
 
 “ David, my husband, wanted me to ask you to stay the 
 night at Fairleigh. He is afraid of your going so far as 
 the Lawns. ” 
 
 “ Mr. Glyn is very kind; but I am not made of ginger¬ 
 bread. 99 
 
 “ Now, Gussie, how canyon be so rude and ill-tempered? 
 The whole world is not in a conspiracy against you, as you 
 seem to think. On the contrary, you have friends who like 
 you very much, who are doing all they can to improve your 
 prospects and make the world brighter for you. I know 
 you have had a hal'd time of it lately and great disappoint¬ 
 ments; and, if I have done anything to make it harder, I 
 am very sorry. I know how dreadful it must be to have 
 troubles, and indeed I would do anything in the world I 
 could to help to clear them away . 99 
 
 She paused, not quite knowing how to go on. Trouble 
 was indeed, as her words naively showed, an unknown ex¬ 
 perience to her. She had grown up placidly and happily 
 under the wing of her aunt, with no knowledge of the cares of 
 the world deeper than that she could gain by sight and hear¬ 
 ing. Being of a kindly nature, she was all the more ready 
 to hold out hands of help toward those fellow-creatures who 
 were struggling with the vague evil; and that her own per¬ 
 sonal friends should suffer from money troubles while she 
 had more than enough caused her the keenest distress she 
 had ever known. This poor Gussie wanted money, she 
 knew; but how was she to frame her offer of it? His face 
 was in shade, but the restless movements of his hands upon 
 the top of the low wall seemed to show that he was ill at 
 ease. She made another step forward, and looked up at 
 him in the moonlight. 
 
 “ IsnT there anything I could do, Gussie, to help you, out 
 of your troubles? You may trust me, you know, and con¬ 
 fide in me just as if I were your sister.” 
 
 Then she smiled reassuringly arid waited for an answer; 
 but for a few moments she got none. Not that Gussie was 
 sulky this time —his ill-temper had suddenly given way be¬ 
 fore her sweetness; but he did not know how to answer her, 
 and in the meantime he was gazing down, under cover of 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 63 
 
 the darkness, upon her beautiful pure face, with a strong 
 sense of shame at his recent conduct toward her and a new 
 feeling of worship toward this fair woman* in the steady 
 gaze of whose eyes he began to read a goddess-like calmness 
 which made his own flickering passions and prejudices con¬ 
 temptible. At last he said, in a gruff tone which did not 
 in the least express his feelings— 
 
 “ You are very kind. But—but I don’t want any help 
 —at least, any you could give.” 
 
 “ Gh, but are you sure? Isn’t there any appointment 
 that David—yes, you are not to get impatient when I men¬ 
 tion David—that he could get for you, or help you to get? 
 You mustn’t think me impertinent, Gussie—perhaps I am 
 quite wrong; but they said you were in difficulties of some 
 sort - — ’ ’ 
 
 “ They! Who’s { they ’?” asked Gussie, hotly. 
 
 u Oh, I don’t know exactly! But, if you are, and you 
 will only tell nie—” 
 
 “ What good would telling you do?” asked he less un- 
 amiably. “ Don’t you know it is out of the question for a 
 man to receive help from a woman, especially—especially 
 me from you?” 
 
 “ I don’t see that at all. I am your friend, am I not, 
 whom you respect and trust? Well, then, you must let me 
 help you just as if I were not a woman, but your own sister. 
 That is understood. Now good-night; go back into the 
 house as fast as you can; I see you are shivering. I begin 
 to wish I had let David have his own way and keep you 
 here; however, he is coming to see you to-morrow, I think. 
 I am afraid you will take cold, after ail. Good-night.” 
 
 She gave him her hand, which he held for a few moments 
 firmly but reverently in both his, before he let her go. 
 
 “ God bless you!” he said at last, as he put both his 
 hands over the wall to restore the white fingers to their 
 owner’s keeping. “ If all women were like you, why, all 
 we wretched men would have to spend our time on our 
 knees!” 
 
 “I think they would get tired of that, Gussie,” said 
 Doris, laughing, as she turned to go back into the house. 
 “ Men like something more exciting.” 
 
 Doris said this lightly; she was too innocent to know the 
 truth of her words, too innocent to perceive that her own 
 
64 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 husband was at that very time on the verge of illustrating 
 that truth rather forcibly. 
 
 Mot that David, when he told his wife the next morning 
 not to expect him home early, as he should call at the 
 Lawns to see whether Gussie had recovered from the 
 effects of his dip in the river, told himself that he had got 
 tired of the calm worship which satisfied his calm wife, and 
 that the society of the vivacious Mrs. Hodson would be a 
 pleasant change. He was not indeed so ignorant as not to 
 know that excitement had a pleasant, almost necessary zest 
 for his phlegmatic nature; but that he should want it now, 
 with his honey-moon scarcely over, was a thought too dis¬ 
 loyal to his beautiful wife to be entertained for a moment. 
 
 So, on leaving at four oVlock the Government office 
 where he still passed his six hours every day, he took the 
 train to Kichmond, and thence walked to the Lawns. It 
 was a large house covered with white stucco, flanked on one 
 side by a small conservatory, on the other by stables, which, 
 having been enlarged several times, now formed a very 
 irregular group of buildings. The house itself, too near the 
 road to be imposing by its size, had no architectural feat¬ 
 ures to redeem it. A mean bay-window in the center, a 
 small flight of stone steps leading to an unpretending front 
 door at one end, were the only breaks to the hospital-like 
 plainness of the building. Under the front windows grew 
 the usual laurels and rhododendrons, and a row of pollard 
 acacias stood up, like green mops set on end, within the 
 plain wooden palings which shut in the drive. The atmos¬ 
 phere of the place, judged from the outside, was middle- 
 class, comfortable, commonplace, not in the least suggest¬ 
 ive of the abode of a siren who would tempt men away 
 from their own homes. Surely a man who could be tempted 
 by the fascinations of such surroundings would be safe 
 nowhere out of heaven—unless indeed the interior would 
 belie the exterior. But no! The door was opened by a 
 pretty maid-servant, who led the way through the conven¬ 
 tional tiled outer hall, luxuriously furnished with a mat 
 and a patent scraper, into the conventional inner hall, car¬ 
 peted, mahogany-chaired, draughty; thence into the draw¬ 
 ing-room, a long, pleasant room, with a fire-place at each 
 end and two great windows that led on to a veranda walled 
 in by thick growths of clematis, wistaria, and Virginia 
 creeper. In this apartment the pre-aesthetic upholsterer 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 65 
 
 had been suffered to do his very worst. The walls were 
 white and gold, adorned by much glass and more gilding. 
 The carpet was bright green, the furniture was bright red. 
 In the taste of the time it was a lovely room; in the taste 
 of all time it was a comfortable one, cool in summer, warm 
 in winter, with easy-chairs that were easy, a grand piano 
 that a celebrated composer had praised, and a very few 
 small tables and stands to tumble over. The ornaments in 
 the room were not of a kind to make one wish for more; 
 there were wax-flowers under a shade, stuffed birds under 
 another, books in bright bindings, formally arranged in 
 twos, a painted chess-table groaning under its load of gilt, 
 and a “ drawing-room " clock, also under a glass, by which 
 one could not tell the time. The room was lighted by gas 
 through cut-glass candelabra on the mantel-piece. 
 
 It was five o'clock when David was shown into the room. 
 The blinds were still down, to keep out the August sun, 
 and were flapping gently in the breeze that was rising to¬ 
 ward evening. As the door opened, the white blind of the 
 larger window flew back in the draught, showing a mass of 
 trailing clematis, and letting in a shaft of brilliant sunlight 
 upon the group inside the room. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson, seated on a low chair, in a filmy white 
 garment of muslin and lace, which would now be called a 
 tea-gown, was displaying her plump pink hands and pretty 
 white wrists to the best advantage as she would a ball of 
 Berlin wool for a barbaric strip of wool-work, the purpose 
 of which was still undecided. Her fingers sparkled with 
 diamonds, her beautiful eyes shone more brightly than the 
 jewels, and so utterly did she absorb the attention of the 
 new-comer with her queenly presence, bright laugh, and 
 genial voice of greeting, that, for the first few moments, 
 David took no notice of Gussie, sitting on a footstool, play¬ 
 ing with Mrs. Hodson's Maltese dog, and was even uncon¬ 
 scious of the presence of his hostess's two daughters, de- 
 mure-looking girls of fourteen and sixteen, who sat, the 
 one on a sofa, the other on a chair, in ill-fitting frocks of 
 pale stuff, patterns of immaculate behavior, and somewhat 
 uninteresting by their apparent lack of any more marked 
 characteristic. 
 
 “ Come and help me to wind my wool, Glyn. I can't 
 trust this boy; but you have grown domesticated lately, 
 and may be promoted," said Mrs. Hodson, only pausing in 
 
66 
 
 Boris’s fortune. 
 
 her work to shake hands with him, and then laughing 
 heartily at his clumsy help, while the shunted Gussie 
 turned his attention to the neutral-tinted little girls. 
 “ Why haven’t you brought your wife?” she wen£ on, as 
 David picked up the ball which he had allowed to slip from 
 his fingers. “It is a most unprincipled thing to do, to 
 marry a lovely woman, and then to shut her up so that no 
 one can see her. If you make your appearance here with¬ 
 out her again, you will be sent straight back to Pairleigh, 
 carriage paid, I warn you!” 
 
 What a frank, generous speech spoken by one woman of 
 a younger and lovelier one! It made Doris’s strictures on 
 the speaker seem almost mean, David could not help think¬ 
 ing, as he reseated himself at Mrs. Hodson’s feet, and 
 Gussie- continued to devote himself to the neglected little 
 
 J irls. What a beautiful, pleasant home might be made of 
 'airleigh, if only Doris could pick up the queen-like man¬ 
 ner which made the Lawns such a delightful place to visit! 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 To a mind inclined to take a cynical view of human 
 affairs, a hearty welcome in prosperity from the person who 
 has proved brusque in time of adversity is a somewhat bit¬ 
 ter experience. But David Glyn was so sweet-natured and 
 simple-minded that when Mr. Hodson came back home from 
 the city at half past six and shook his hand with a warmth 
 which he had never shown to that gentleman before he be¬ 
 came the husband of an heiress, it never occurred to the 
 younger man that he owed this new cordiality to Doris’s 
 fortune. Mrs. Hodson had always been kind, though now 
 even in her kindness there was an added respeec; but, in 
 the old days, before he went to India, David had been used 
 to content himself with very scant attention from his host, 
 who had no better way of entertaining unimportant guests 
 than by gobbling down his dinner with silent savagery, 
 passing round the wine until he had had enough himself, 
 and then going to sleep in the drawing-room. 
 
 Now all was changed. It was Gussie for whom Mr. 
 Hodson, a portly gentleman, with a fine head and the 
 fixed, blase stare of a roue, reserved the perfunctory nod, 
 the careless quest which does not wait for an answer. 
 
xxms's FOKTUHE. 
 
 6? 
 
 David, on the contrary, was asked to give his judgment on 
 the points of a hunter which the stock-broker had bought 
 the week before; and, although he protested that he was 
 ab.mt as well qualified to give an opinion on the age of the 
 Pyramids, lie was escorted with honor through the stables, 
 while Gussie, who understood horses better than anything 
 else, was simply suffered to bring up the rear. 
 
 66 1 think I must have disgusted Mr. Hod-son,” said 
 David to his hostess, when he had beaten a retreat from the 
 stables. 66 1 can see he loves his horses better than any¬ 
 thing else in the world; and really I can not pretend to 
 know much about them.” 
 
 “ Then your wife is a happy woman!” said Mrs. Hod- 
 son, raising her fine eyes to the roof of the veranda with 
 melodramatic effect. “If Mr. Hodson held me a little 
 better than his horse, a little dearer than his dogs, I might 
 perhaps get a little more of his society.” 
 
 Mrs. Hodson's dramatic outcry was perfectly genuine; 
 she really did feel most strongly that she was an injured 
 wife; and simple David was the last person in the world to 
 suspect that, if Mr. Hodson had taken it into his head to 
 become a little fonder of his home, his wife would have be¬ 
 come infinitely less so. V 
 
 David stood beside her for a few moments, mutely sym¬ 
 pathetic, leaning over the wisteria and clematis that hid 
 the veranda railing, watching the diamonds flash on the 
 neglected wife's pretty fingers, and listening with growing 
 indignation to Mr. Hodson's voice, which rang out from 
 the stable-yard with a certain rich self-satisfaction in its 
 tones particularly irritating to the shy, retiring David Glyn. 
 He made a little movement of disgust, and turned quickly 
 toward Mrs. Hodson. 
 
 “ How any man can possibly neglect you—” he ex¬ 
 claimed, and left his sentence unfinished. 
 
 “ I do try to do my duty,” said the lady meekly. “ You 
 really don't know, David—I can speak out openly to you, 
 because you're such an old friend—what a hard struggle it 
 is to be cheerful sometimes, with Mr. Hodson always 
 grumbling at the expenses which I try my hardest to keep 
 down, grudging me even the money to get my girls prop¬ 
 erly educated, neglecting me as you know, bullying me as 
 you see. It is as much as I can do, after lying awake cry¬ 
 ing half the night and struggling with bills all tine morning, 
 
68 DOBIS’S FOBTtJNE. 
 
 to get the tears and the frowns off my face before his re¬ 
 turn in the evening—when lie does return.” 
 
 She paused, and looked away from him, in an attitude 
 unbecoming for her, as it allowed her companion to see the 
 faint line which marked the change from the natural tint 
 of her full throat to the artificial whiteness of her face. 
 But her next words, as she turned toward him again, 
 changed his momentary feeling of disgust to self-reproach 
 and renewed sympathy. 
 
 44 Then the dear, good-natured ladies who live about here 
 find out that I actually use face-powder, and wrinkle up 
 their prim faces at the mention of such a crime. Why, 
 David, I have even condescended to redden my cheeks with 
 lip-salve to hide the ravages his neglect has made in my 
 looks, and to try to please him by imitating his favorite 
 stvle of beauty!” 
 
 There w T as some scornful spitefulness in the last words, 
 but David did not notice this; he was lost in pity for the 
 woman who had to stoop to such degrading means of con¬ 
 ciliating a brute who was not worthy to kiss her shoes. 
 
 44 It's disgusting! I wonder you put up with it!” was 
 all he had to say, though he felt as if to Mr. Hodson he 
 could have spoken very eloquently indeed. 
 
 44 Ah, a woman will put up with anything for the sake 
 of her children!” said she, pathetically. 44 They are grow¬ 
 ing up now, you know; her father insists upon Nellie's 
 leaving school, though she is really much too young. I 
 shall have to sink now into a chaperon and a wall-hower. 
 Don't you find a great change in me since you saw me last, 
 David? Two yeais make an enormous difference in a 
 woman who has to bear as much as I have.” 
 
 “ No, indeed I don't,” said David, heartily. 44 1 think 
 the only difference in you is that you are kinder and more 
 charming than ever.” 
 
 He meant this sincerely. He was surprised to find that, 
 after having, with much coolness and keenness, criticised 
 her appearance on first seeing her since his return, she 
 seemed to have recovered completely her old touch upon 
 his feelings, so that he found in her society just the same 
 charm which had made him, before lie went to India, such 
 a constant visitor at the Lawns. A very innocent chaim 
 it had always been, openly acknowledged, openly indulged. 
 In yielding to it again, and even feeling that he enjoyed it 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 69 
 
 with new zest after long abstinence, David felt no disloy¬ 
 alty to his beautiful young wife, bad no thought of danger. 
 This dear young lady was years older than he. was perfectly 
 honest, undoubtedly irreproachable, and had an acknowl¬ 
 edged empire over her acquaintances. 
 
 It was with quite playful chivalry that David raised her 
 plump hand to his lip? and kissed it. Her pretty sense ox 
 sovereignty, shaken bv her husband's neglect, must be re¬ 
 stored. As his lips touched her fingers, however, some 
 feeling a little stronger than he had expected made his 
 touch firmer, more ardent than he had intended. A hot 
 flush came into his cheeks as he let her hand fall; but her 
 perfect calmness, and the easy self-possession with which 
 she received this attention, at once restored his self-com¬ 
 mand. Though her friends little suspected it, an icy in¬ 
 capacity for any form of passion involving tenderness 
 formed the basis of that bold and brilliant coquetry which, 
 protected by its invisible armor of steel, knew no fear and 
 was generally irresistible. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson w 7 as not in any sense a wicked woman, but 
 she was vain and jealous; and the marriage of any man 
 who had ever formed one of her train of Platonic admirers 
 was an offense which could be expiated only by a little in¬ 
 nocent neglect of the upstart bride in her favor. She had 
 no fear of playing with, fire, never having burned herself 
 yet, and not being of combustible nature. She therefore 
 felt only a tiny thrill of gratified pride as she glanced at the 
 mark which the pressure of David’s lips had made upon 
 her hand. 
 
 “Mr.—Mr. Hodson has felt tho general depression in 
 business, then?” said he, not meaning to be impertinent, 
 but anxious to turn the talk to something very prosaic. 
 
 “ Oh, no!” answered Mrs. Hodson, with much vivacity. 
 She had very strong reasons for combating this suggestion. 
 “ Mr. Hodson is a very clever man of business, as you 
 know, and 1 believe he has made more money than ever 
 this year. But I think money makes a man mean, and, at 
 any rate, it is not on me he spends it.” 
 
 To a more acute person than David this remark would 
 have suggested the mental question, Whose money w r as it 
 that got spent on this diamond-bright lady? But the blind 
 young man only gave a sympathetic sigh at the fearful 
 amount of stock-broking depravity which this speech re* 
 
70 
 
 doris’s fortune. 
 
 vealed. Not that he was a fool; but his companion wai 
 just one of those women in whose society most men would 
 pass for fools. Not intellectual enough to call forth the 
 exercise of intellect in others, she was high-spirited enough 
 to charm men into easy acquiescence with her own arbitrary 
 opinions. Lo David listened, and allowed himself to be 
 convinced, and it was left to a by-stander to discover that 
 he was being played with. 
 
 Standing at the door in the high wall which separated 
 the stable-yard from the garden, Gussie Melton had seen 
 David kiss Mrs. Hodson’s hand, and had failed to put upon 
 the incident the construction David would have wished. 
 He discreetly retreated into the stable-yard, and did not re¬ 
 appear until his host, a few moments later, led the way to 
 the house, clamoring loudly for dinner. 
 
 This meal w T as the chief event of the day to the stock¬ 
 broker, who devoted himself to it body and mind, as he sat 
 between his two upright and solemn little daughters, of 
 whom he was really fond, and to whom he devoted such 
 attention, in the form of snubs, as the great business of the 
 evening left him leisure for. 
 
 Opposite to him sat his wrife, who, to mark her sense of 
 his coarseness, eat scarcely anything, and shot occasional 
 glances through the branches of the epergne at his bent 
 head which were calculated to rouse an onlooker’s sympa¬ 
 thy for that erring man. 
 
 Gussie Melton, who sat on her left, woke up into surpris¬ 
 ing animation, and, undaunted by the presence of the lady’s 
 husband, who indeed was thankful to her Platonic admirers 
 for diverting her attention from his own delinquencies, 
 paid Mrs. Hodson such marked and elaborate civilities that 
 David was left quite out in the cold, and felt an unwar¬ 
 rantable sting to which he could not have given its right 
 name. 
 
 This feeling of irritation was deepened when, after din¬ 
 ner, Gussie left him alone with his host, to follow Mrs. 
 Hodson and her daughters to the drawing-room. Mr. Hod- 
 son was spending his after-dinner eloquence in animated 
 description of the advantages to be gained by subscription 
 to a new Portuguese loan just brought out, a subject which 
 could not be expected to have any attraction for G ussie, 
 who never had sixpence to spare. 
 
 “ Why don’t you go in for it now, Glyn?” said the stock* 
 
DORISES FORTUNE, 
 
 71 
 
 broker, with open-hearted persuasiveness. Mr. Hoc!son 
 was a plausible, enterprising man, with quite as much rel¬ 
 ish for speculation and smart strokes of business as he had 
 for sensual pleasures. He never lost a chance of making a 
 client, never failed to do his best for him and himself at 
 the same time, and believed as faithfully as any vicar in the 
 philanthropic nature of the profession by which he lived. 
 Beginning life with the meager imperfect education of the 
 lower middle-class, his active shallow understanding had 
 shown him the way to extensive though superficial self-im¬ 
 provement. He had forced his way up until his daring 
 and energy had gained for him a position which his lack of 
 prudence and self-restraint alone prevented from becoming 
 one of the best among the men of his own class. Certain 
 extravagant expenses, altogether independent of his estab¬ 
 lishment at the Lawns, had lately made him more actively 
 philanthropies! than ever, and he pressed his Portuguese 
 loan upon David Glyn’s attention with the affectionate solici¬ 
 tude of an indulgent father. 
 
 “ I have no money, for one thing, ” said David, redden¬ 
 ing slightly. 
 
 “ Well, but your wife has; and you are bound to see that 
 she makes the best possible use of it. Now, if you were to 
 persuade her to invest, say five thousand pounds, in this loan 
 (which is taking very well with the public, or you may be 
 sure I would have nothing to do with it), in a week or two 
 you could sell out at a profit, for the shares are sure to go 
 up, and you could make your wife a handsome present with 
 the fifty or sixty pounds you would make on the transac¬ 
 tion. ” 
 
 It was a coarse way of putting it, certainly. But his 
 personal friends—especially those who were also personal 
 friends of his wife—did not expect much delicacy of feeling 
 from Mr. Hodson; and David, who had, for some reason, 
 never felt the disadvantage of being the poor husband of an 
 he: ress so keenly as he did this evening, listened indul¬ 
 gently to the suggestion, and felt tempted. 
 
 “ What do I —what should 1 risk?” he asked. 
 
 “ Nothing—absolutely nothing!” was the warm and 
 prompt reply. 
 
 But this bait was just too large to swallow. The faint 
 fire of interest which had glowed for a moment in David’s 
 blue eyes faded out of them again. 
 
doris’s eortuhe. 
 
 - 
 
 “ Wherever you risk nothing you are not likely to gain 
 much, I should think,” he said mildly. “ An undertaking 
 with absolutely no risk, and with a certain prospect of a 
 large profit would, I imagine, be kept to themselves by the 
 members of the Stock Exchange, and not be offered to 
 ignorant outsiders like me.” 
 
 “ There are not a dozen brokers in the House who fully 
 understand its advantages,” said Mr. Hodson, lowering his 
 voice mysteriously, as if disembodied brokers might be float¬ 
 ing about in the air, ready to snatch up and convey the 
 precious secret to their brethren still in the flesh. “ I do 
 not attempt to deny,” he went on magnificently^ “ that, if 
 an earthquake like the one at Lisbon were to come off, or 
 the King of Portugal, who is as healthy as you or I, were 
 to die, stocks might go down with a rush—and, by the bye, 
 that earthquake, remote as it is ”—Mr. Hodson had not 
 the slightest idea how remote—has shaken the public 
 confidence in Portugal. But, setting aside such contingen¬ 
 cies as those, the possibility of this loan not proving a great 
 success is very small. 
 
 “And, in the event of its not proving a great success, 
 could you guarantee me a certain limit to my loss?” 
 
 “ I will absolutely guarantee you against loss, and under¬ 
 take to bear all risk of loss myself. ” 
 
 David looked at him again. In these circumstances the 
 stock-broker, who had all the plausible bonhomie necessary 
 to the man who believes he extends his connection out of 
 pure good nature, must really be putting him in the way of 
 a good thing; for the trilling commission could be nothing 
 to a man so w 7 eil off as Mr. Hodson. David had a couple 
 of hundreds of his own carefully banked, and lie resolved 
 to make inquiries of some more disinterested person than 
 his host, and, if he found his own money would cover any 
 possible loss, he would make the venture. Having fenced 
 his first attempt at stock-gambling with all the precautions 
 possible, David felt that he should like the excitement of it, 
 though this was not one of the reasons he put forward to 
 support his determination. 
 
 “ When can I see you about it—in the city, I mean, sup¬ 
 posing I make up my mind to—well, not risk it, as you 
 won't allow the word, but—” 
 
 “ Invest? Any time to-morrow between ten and half 
 past five—and as early as you can, my dear boy, for the 
 
BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 73 
 
 shares are being taken.up at a great rate. If you like to 
 hold them a month "Dr so, I can guarantee you a rise of at 
 least six per-cent , and then—” 
 
 “ Thanks. I shouldn’t risk that,” said David, quickly. 
 He had the instincts of a cautious gambler, and, though his 
 end is generally much the same as that of his more dashing 
 fellow-t'ool, his first ventures bear a much less alarming ap¬ 
 pearance. 
 
 The two men made their way to the drawing-room, where 
 Gussie was sitting on a foot-stool, hugging his knees like a 
 great school boy; Mrs. Hodson was leaning back in a low 
 chair, fanning herself with a large light fan, and the little 
 girls, prim and proper as ever, held each a bright drawing¬ 
 room book, while their ears were open for everything that 
 went on around them. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 “ I have been proving to our friend Glyn the advantage 
 of having an astute member of the Stock Exchange for a 
 friend,” said Mr. Hodson, as he went into the drawing¬ 
 room. 
 
 “ Talking Portuguese loan to him, I suppose that 
 means,” said his wife, in her usual genial tones. 
 
 “ You know all about it then?” asked David. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson was one of those vivacious, much-flattered 
 ladies who believe themselves to be competent to pass an 
 opinion upon most subjects, and who consider the rest not 
 worth passing an opinion upon. 
 
 “ Of course I do. Mr. Hodson never takes up anything 
 important without consulting me.” 
 
 It was true; this inconsistent gentleman being proud of 
 his wife, and placing a superstitious faith in her loudly ex¬ 
 pressed convictions. 
 
 “And what do you think of it?” asked David, failing 
 into the same error. 
 
 “ I think it is a good thing undoubtedly,” said she. with 
 as much confidence as if Portugal had been her own private 
 property. 
 
 It was the feather that turned the scale. David made 
 an appointment with Mr. Hodson for the next morning be- 
 
74 
 
 Doris's fortune. 
 
 fore they went into the billiard-room. David did not care 
 for billiards, and he felt besides that he was leaving Doris 
 alone too long. But he wanted an opportunity of asking 
 Mrs. Hodson about the dog he was to bring her, and he felt 
 also an unavowed curiosity as to whether young Melton had 
 been asked to extend his impromptu visit. So the whole 
 party left the drawing-room together, and David played a 
 game with Mr. Hodson, who beat him easily; while Ethel, 
 the younger of the little girls, was set to “ mark." Her 
 father took a special delight in appointing her to this work, 
 as she disliked it, and as it afforded him an opportunity of 
 teasing her by peering into her face with his short-sighted 
 eyes ciose to hers, or of chucking her under the chin to 
 upset her dignity, with the playful question, ‘‘Now then. 
 Ugly, what's the game?" Ihese attentions the prim little 
 girl received much as the Princessde Lamballemay be sup¬ 
 posed to have received those of the Republican mob. 
 
 David, having covered himself with discredit, yielded 
 up his cue to Gussie, who was a fair player; while Mr. 
 Hodson retired in favor of his favorite daughter Nellie, 
 who, showing unexpected skill and neatness, and being 
 complimented thereon by the gentlemen, v r as promptly 
 snubbed by her mother for chalking her cue “ like a bil¬ 
 liard-marker." However, Mrs. Hodson could not prevent 
 die young men from considering the girl, after this, with 
 more attention. Gussie, in particular, watching Nellie's 
 round young face flushed with the excitement of the game, 
 made up his mind that she would grow into a pretty girl 
 by and by, when time and necessity should have got the 
 better of the maternal instinct for keeping daughters young 
 by clothing them in m’sshapen garments. David meanwhile 
 had f )und an opportunity of getting from his hostess exact 
 details concerning the King Charles spaniel he was to bring 
 her; but it was nearly eleven o'clock before he discovered 
 that he had scarcely left himself time to catch the last train 
 from Richmond. 
 
 “ You will walk as far as the station wi(h me, Melton, 
 won't you?" he asked, as he shook hands with the little 
 girls. 
 
 “ Oh, I don't think he 1*3 well enough for us to let him 
 off the sick-list yet! He had better stay here anotner 
 night," interposed Mrs. Hodson hospitably. 
 
 “ Oh, nonsense! He isn't made of gingerbread, a great 
 
doris’s fortuke. 
 
 75 
 
 broad-shouldered lad like that!” said David half playfully, 
 but half angrily too. 
 
 And Gussie, who-had wavered for a moment, at once 
 declared that he was quite well, and must get back to town 
 that night. 
 
 “ Are you still living with your mother, Melton?” asked 
 David, when the hospitable leave-taking was over, Mr. 
 Hodson had called out a last injunction to Glyn not to be 
 late at his office, and the two young men were walking fast 
 toward Richmond Station. 
 
 “ No, not just now,” answered the other rather hastily. 
 “ My mother is at Torquay, staying with some relatives, so 
 I’m on my own hook at present. Nice people the Hodsons 
 are—make one so welcome!” 
 
 “ Yes; it’s quite the pleasantest house I know.” 
 
 And they walked on together without David’s having the 
 penetration to wonder why Gussie had answered his ques¬ 
 tion so shortly. 
 
 Indeed David had enough to occupy his mind; for he 
 felt a little conscience-stricken at having left Doris so long 
 alone; when he had not even positively told her that he 
 should not return to dinner. So he parted with Gussie with 
 a vaguely-expressed hope that he should see him. again 
 soon, and an inward wish that the meeting might not take 
 place at the Lawns. 
 
 Doris met her husband at the gate of. Fairleigh; she ut¬ 
 tered a little cry as he came near, but did not come out to 
 him. Not quite easy in his conscience, David stopped with 
 a half-offended air, thinking he was in for a wifely lecture, 
 and putting himself at once on the defensive. But the tone 
 in which she almost sobbed out “ Oh, David!” reassured 
 him. It was the unmistakable cry of relief from heart-felt 
 anxiety. He came up at once to the gate, and, putting his 
 hand down upon hers, which touched the latch, felt that 
 she was cold and trembling. 
 
 “ Why, child, what is the matter with you?” he asked, 
 in his usual calm, sweet voice. 
 
 “ I—I didn’t know where you were. I thought some¬ 
 thing must have happened to you. Oh, I am so glad you 
 are safe, so glad that I can’t speak!” 
 
 “ Silly girl! Didn’t you know that I was going to the 
 Lawns to see Gussie Melton; and don’t you think you 
 
76 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 might have had the sense to guess I should have to stay to 
 dinner?” 
 
 46 Yes, I know it was very silly of me to he frightened. 
 I am ashamed of myself already. But you shall see, David, 
 I won’t tease you by such foolishness again,” said she apolo¬ 
 getically. 
 
 Her husband almost thought for the moment that there 
 must be a little veiled bitterness in her simple words; but 
 he did not understand the full force of the rigid notions of 
 wifely duty which Mrs. Edgcombe had instilled into her 
 granddaughter. 
 
 “ And how is poor Gussie?” she asked, as she walked 
 quickly back into the house by her husband’s side, avoid¬ 
 ing his touch for fear he should find out how cold she was. 
 
 Oh, he is all right! He went back to town to-night!” 
 
 “ Do you know his address, David: The poor boy .is in 
 difficulties, I am afraid; and I want to help him—if I can 
 do it without hurting his feelings.” 
 
 “ His feelings? I don’t suppose he is particularly sensi¬ 
 tive. He is nothing, it seems to me, but a gawky, ill-man¬ 
 nered young cub, and would be ready enough to force him¬ 
 self and his grievances upon any one, I have no doubt.” 
 
 David spoke with more irritation than Doris had ever 
 heard in his tones before, and she uttered her next words 
 apologetically. 
 
 “ Of course, if ’ you would rather not let me help him, 
 I—” 
 
 “ Oh, no, you can help him, of course, if you wish! It is 
 very kind of you to think of it. I will find out where he 
 lives from Papillon.” 
 
 Doris said, 46 Very well, David,” but was puzzled by her 
 husband’s manner. A certain reserve, founded by David’s 
 own somewhat phlegmatic taciturnity and increased by his 
 wife’s respect, had always existed between them; but, al¬ 
 though it had before now disturbed her womanly dreams of 
 the complete confidence which should subsist between hus¬ 
 band and wife, this was the first occasion upon which it 
 ha 1 cost Doris absolute pain. It flashed at once into her 
 mind that he must have met with some disagreeable ex¬ 
 perience, from the result of which lie was still suffering. 
 Gussie had probably broken out again, and in spite of all 
 his penitence to her the night before, had again insulted 
 David, who could not quite hide his disgust at the foolish 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 77 
 
 young man's conduct. She resolved to give Gussie a still 
 more severe scolding than before, and in the meantime she 
 thought it best to turn from the distasteful subject. 
 
 “ Did you meet some nice people, David? Charlie says 
 there are always nice people at Mrs. Hodson's house,” she 
 said, as they went through the hall to the drawing-room. 
 
 “ There was no one there except Melton.” 
 
 “ What is this great attraction which makes the Lawns 
 quite a celebrated place?” she asked playfully. 
 
 Doris had no thought of being jealous; but David, who 
 had conventional ideas about women, could conceive of no 
 other motive for her question, and answered, guardedly: 
 
 “ There are sometimes pretty girls among the visitors; 
 that, I should'think, is the attraction for Papillon. For us 
 greedy fogies the great charm of the place is Mr. Hodson's 
 wines.'' 
 
 Doris laughed. 
 
 “He is a v ery amusing man to men, isn't he? It is 
 funny to see him eat, Charlie says, without paying any at¬ 
 tention to anybody.” 
 
 “ That is Charlie's view. He is a clever man of business, 
 though, and I propose, with your sanction, to invest some 
 money of yours in a very profitable manner to-morrow, 
 under his direction.” 
 
 “My sanction, David. My marriage gave complete 
 sanction to anything you please to do with the money; it is 
 yours, and you understand what to do with it better 
 than L'' 
 
 Doris never doubted that business capacity came as in¬ 
 stinctively to a man as she understood that a knowledge of 
 housekeeping came to a woman. She asked for no details, 
 and went upstairs happily, quite as satisfied that the im¬ 
 maculate David could do nothing foolish as that he could 
 think nothing wrong. 
 
 It was not until nearly a week later that Doris learned 
 Gussie Melton's address from David, who brought it from 
 Papillon, with the tidings that Gussie was ill with rheu¬ 
 matic fever, and alone, in lodgings in town. 
 
 “ I think it would be only kind if you were to pay him 
 a visit, Doris,” continued David, who was rather conscience- 
 stricken at having advised Gussie's .departure from the hos¬ 
 pitable shelter of the Lawns. “ It is a lonely thing to be ill 
 
78 
 
 doris's fortune. 
 
 in a dark London lodging. I know that myself, by ex¬ 
 perience." 
 
 Doris acquiesced in this most heartily; and the very next 
 day she went by train up to town, called on Mrs. Edg- 
 combe, her grandmother, and then went off with the old 
 lady to the dingy bouse in a dingy West-end street, where 
 they were surprised to find that the fastidious Gussie occu¬ 
 pied only one room on the top floor. 
 
 Mr. Melton was alone, the servant said; she believed he 
 was very iil; no one had been to see him except the doctor 
 and one other gentleman. 
 
 “ You had better wait for me down here, dear," said 
 Mrs. Edgcombe to Doris. “ I will go up and see him." 
 
 But Gussie got so excited on hearing that Mrs. Glyn was 
 in the house, and begged so hard to see her “ just for a 
 moment," that Doris had to come up too. 
 
 “ You can't be very comfortable here surely!" said she, 
 when she had shaken his hot hand, trying to stop his inco¬ 
 herent outburst of gratitude. 
 
 “ No, no; it was horrible until you came; but I shall 
 love this room now you've been in it—both ot* you," he add¬ 
 ed, hastily, as his feverishly bright eyes glanced quickly 
 from Doris to the old lady, who seemed much astonished 
 by his vehemence. “ You don't know, Mrs. Edgcombe, how 
 good she has been to me, and when I didn't in the least de¬ 
 serve it. I've thought it all over again and again while 
 I’ve been lying here, until I think, if you hadn't come like 
 this to-day, I should have been obliged to crawl up and 
 get to Fairleigh to thank you—I should indeed!" 
 
 “ What is all this? What is it my granddaughter has 
 done for you?" asked Mrs. Edgcombe, with dignity. 
 
 “It is nothing at all, grandmamma: Gussie is wander¬ 
 ing a little this afternoon," said Doris, laughing gently. 
 
 “ No, I'm not wandering, Mrs. Edgcombe. Doris helped 
 me out of my difficulties; she sent me money—yes, money— 
 I'm not ashamed of owning it. I would accept anything 
 from you as I would from an angel from heaven. Papillou 
 brought, it me in a letter from her. And after all my rude¬ 
 ness and petulance! No woman but Doris would have 
 done it." 
 
 He spoke hotly, impetuously, like the overgrown boy he 
 was. Mrs. Edgcombe was touched, and gave a little soft 
 laugh that suggested something sweeter than merriment. 
 
BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 79 
 
 Doris was always good,” she said. 
 
 Yes; and nobody else knows how good except me/’ 
 
 “ And her husband,” corrected the precise old lady. 
 There was a momentary pause in the excitement of the 
 dialogue, which plainly intimated that Gussie did not ac¬ 
 cept the amendment. But the old lady was not going to ac¬ 
 cept contradiction from this lad. 
 
 “ Doris is a lucky woman to have secured a husband 
 worthy of her,” said she, with grave obstinacy. 
 
 Gussie was obstinate too. 
 
 “ No man is worthy of her,” he said hardily. 
 
 Doris did not think Gussie’s opinion of enough value for 
 her to be more than amused by this little skirmish; but 
 Mrs. Edgcombe, who took things more seriously, sent her 
 granddaughter down-stairs first, when their visit came to 
 an end, and stood by the invalid's bed somewhat magisteri¬ 
 ally. 
 
 “ Do you know, young gentleman, that it is not a wise 
 or a right thing to do to shake the pedestal on which a 
 young husband stands in the heart of his young wife. 
 He’ll come down quite soon enough, you may be sure.” 
 
 I quite agree with you, Mrs. Edgcombe; and I think 
 there’s no time to be lost in bringing him down gently, to 
 save his coming down with a rush.” 
 
 “ What do you mean?” 
 
 “ That I know what men are, and don’t care to see them 
 worshiped for what they are not. And, if you want to see 
 Mr. David Glyn off his pedestal, see him at the Lawns.” 
 
 Mrs. Edgcombe was too proud to ask another question, 
 preferring to treat the young man’s bold assertion as an in¬ 
 valid’s hallucination. She instantly turned the subject by 
 asking if she should come again to see him, and then went 
 slowly down-stairs, considering the startling information 
 she had just received. She was not personally acquainted 
 with Mrs. Hodson, but knew of her as a pleasure-loving 
 matron of whom no one said anything worse than that she 
 declined to sink into middle age. Leaving David Glyu’s 
 estimable character out of the question, it seemed absurd 
 to imagine such a woman the rival of his beautiful and 
 sweet young wife. Nevertheless the matter had to be 
 sifted, and they were no sooner in the brougham than Mrs, 
 Edgcombe began the process. 
 
80 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 “ You and David see a good deal of the Hodsons, my 
 dear, don't you?’' 
 
 44 Oh, no -at least I don't! I've never seen Mr. Hodson, 
 and Mrs. Hodson only once since our marriage. David 
 sees more of them than I do; he's gone down there to-day." 
 
 44 Gone there to-day! Without you?" 
 
 44 Oh, I told him I should stay in town to dine with you!" 
 
 44 And he will come and take you home, of course?" 
 
 44 No, it is so far to come. I told Charlie Papillon to 
 come and fetch me." 
 
 44 Oh, it is very convenient for your husband to have a 
 band of obliging young gentlemen always ready to take the 
 trouble of looking after you off his hands!" 
 
 44 Dear grandmamma, it was my own proposal," said 
 Doris, gently. 44 1 wanted to see Charlie." 
 
 44 And David wanted to see—whom? Mrs. Hodson?" 
 
 Doris laughed. 
 
 44 No, Mr. Hodson. They have been doing some busi¬ 
 ness together lately. David has great confidence in his 
 judgment." 
 
 This seemed such a reasonable explanation of the ground 
 of Gussie's fancies that Mrs. Edgcombe drove home with 
 her granddaughter somewhat comforted. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Of course David Glyn, having tasted the sweets of Stock 
 Exchange speculation, did not stop at his first venture. 
 He made a little money by it—not indeed so much as the 
 sanguine Mr. Hodson had predicted, but still enough to 
 confirm his faith in that gentleman as a safe leader to that 
 elysium of independence of one's wife's fortune which is 
 the sure reward of intelligent investment on the Stock Ex¬ 
 change. 
 
 For David felt the galling chain of his wife's wealth more 
 and more heavily as the feeble loyalty—which was all that 
 remained of the love of his passionless marriage—daily 
 diminished. She was cold, he said to himself, to excuse 
 the tepid ness of his own feelings toward her, the perfunc¬ 
 tory caresses which sometimes brought the troubled look of 
 a puzzled child into his wife’s face, and increased her re¬ 
 serve toward him until it became a constraint that was al¬ 
 most fear. 
 
Doris’s fortune. 
 
 81 
 
 Doris liad been married six months, and David’s in¬ 
 difference had been increasing rapidly for more than four 
 before the young wife dared to own, even to herself, that 
 there was a gult between her and David, widening so surely 
 that she felt that in a short time there would be no person 
 of all her acquaintance with whom she had so little sym- 
 ' pathy, or from whom she could expect so little, as her own 
 husband. 
 
 At first she tried to stave off this knowledge with the 
 common-sense argument that the honev-moon was a season 
 when every man allowed himself a little extravagance of 
 tenderness which must calm down with the wear and t( ar 
 of every-day life together. But then had David shown 
 much extravagance of affection? Doris was a very innocent 
 woman, a particularly correct and well-brought-up woman, 
 knowing little of the nature of the passions, or even of the 
 affections, and not unduly curious to know more; but even 
 she could noc help feeling that, if the calmly kind atten¬ 
 tions Da id had paid her during the first three or four 
 weeks of marriage had really been an unaccustomed over¬ 
 flow of tenderness, then the every-day stream of his affection 
 could not be a very copious one. 
 
 She too had entered into marriage calmly, schooled by her 
 practica. grandmother into thinking more of the duties 
 than of the pleasures of her new life. But the duties were 
 so light that she had time to find that there was a void in 
 her heart, and that the evenings she spent with her hus¬ 
 band were scarcely less solitary than the mornings spent 
 without him. However he did not seem to be unhappy— 
 that was one comfort; the “ business ” which was now his 
 constant excuse for abstraction, in her presence, or for an 
 occasional evening spent away from her, had evidently 
 awakened a strong new interest in life for him; and Doris 
 tried to be glad that at least the care of her money had 
 given him an interesting occupation, if her society had 
 small attraction for him. She was not suspicious at all, 
 by nature or by habit; she was not jealous—yet. So she 
 remained perfectly docile, perfectly good-humored, and was 
 e^en meek-spirited enough to be thankful that her docility 
 did not irritate him. 
 
 Davdd, on ? he other hand, was far less easy of mind than 
 she. He knew by this time that the influence of Mrs. 
 Hodson was far stronger upon him than that of his wJEe; 
 
82 
 
 DORIS'S FOliTUKE. 
 
 but then, as it was perfectly innocent and even helpful in 
 maintaining his respect for Doris, whom Mrs. Hodson was 
 most careful to praise, he did not blame himself on that ac¬ 
 count. But the fever for speculation was growing upon 
 him. Always with Doris's sanction, too easily got to be 
 valued, he had by this time plunged pretty heavily into in¬ 
 vestments, sometimes fortunate, perhaps more often 
 otherwise, which involved continual intercourse with Mr. 
 Hodson, now his recognized man of business, and kept him 
 in a constant intoxication of excitement which it required 
 a more mature mind than Doris's to soothe. So he told 
 himself, so he thought; and he carried his feverish troubles 
 to Mrs. Hodson’s kindly ear, and allowed her to soothe him 
 until it was time to return to Fairleigh, in a state of torpid 
 reaction from excitement which, while insuring domestic 
 peace, was quite incompatible with domestic joys. 
 
 “ You are late this evening, David," Doris plucked up 
 courage to say one December day, when her husband came 
 home, flushed and absent at eight o’clock, after having 
 ordered dinner for half past six. Her heart was beating 
 violently as she made the timid accusation, the first meek 
 revolt that she had ever attempted. 
 
 “ Yes, I am late, and I am very hungry," he answered, 
 rather shortly, sensitively aggrieved at her hint of insubor¬ 
 dination. 
 
 But she felt that he was in the wrong; and when they 
 were seated at dinner, and he had satisfied the first pangs 
 of a hunger which did not seem to be so very acute after 
 all, she returned to the charge with the steady persistency 
 of the meek person roused. 
 
 “ You have been very often late these last few weeks, 
 David, and, when you do come, you seem tired and wor¬ 
 ried. I am afraid this ‘ business' you have grown so fond 
 of is not good for you." 
 
 Her hands trembled as she crumbled up her bread and 
 looked steadily into the fire that blazed into the oaken-tiled 
 fire-place by which she now so often sat brooding hour 
 after hour. 
 
 David looked up at her from the cutlet he was eating, 
 and a cold light seemed to shine from his blue eves as she 
 glanced at him, which gave her a sudden shock and made 
 her turn her face quickly again to the fire. 
 
DORISES FOKTUHE. 83 
 
 “ If you are dissatisfied with my management of your 
 affairs; of course you have only to say so, Doris. ” 
 
 She half started from her chair, her face on fire, tears in 
 her eyes; then, suppressing the sob which rose to her lips, 
 she sat down again, and for a moment did not speak oc 
 look at him. 'he habit of self-control, carefullv instilled 
 
 J 1/ 
 
 by her educaticr 'elped her to bear the first deep wound 
 she had ever received. 
 
 “ You are cruel—and unjust,” she said at last, in a low 
 voice. “ Whatever you do, I always accept as right—it is 
 right for me. ‘ Affairs/ ‘ business,’ are mere woras to me, 
 I know nothing about them. But to see you looking worn 
 out and harassed through looking after my interests hurts 
 me very much. Your health and your happiness do con¬ 
 cern me—surely you will allow that? Why don’t you leave 
 the business to Mr. Hodson?” 
 
 “ That would scarcely be a conscientious way of going to 
 work, Doris,” said David, disarmed, but still rather stiff 
 and constrained through the feeling that his words were 
 not quite honest. 
 
 “ But if I don’t mind! If I would rather have vou home 
 a little earlier, and see you a little less tired, and—and 
 worn out, than have you working and worrying yourself to 
 make me richer! What do we want with more money? 
 We have already more than enough.” 
 
 “ I have always looked upon your money as a trust, 
 Doris,” said David, in his old sweet voice. “ I should not 
 feel happy without doing my best with it.” 
 
 Doris thought this was a perverse way of looking at 
 things, and, if she had known that at that moment, through 
 her husband “ doing his best,” she was risking the loss of 
 some thousands, she might have felt strengthened in this 
 view. 
 
 “ I feel at the same time that you are justided in accus¬ 
 ing me of being dull company,” he went on, musically. 
 
 “ Accusing you! Oh, no, indeed; I never thought of 
 such a thing!” protested she. 
 
 “ Well, well, you said 1 was dull, and I admit it,” he 
 corrected, with the excessive magnanimity of the person 
 who knows himself to be in the wrong. “ I am rather a 
 fogy, and my society must be tedious, 1 know. Let us sit 
 down after dinner and concoct invitations to all the n ee 
 people we know, and fill the house for Christmas-time. 
 
84 
 
 PORIS'g ^ FORTUNE. 
 
 There are Melton and Papillon and Hilda Warren; let us 
 have them all, and as many more as you can think of. and 
 we'll see if we can't make the place more cheerful than a 
 solemn old husband can hope to do. " 
 
 He had carried the war into the enemy's camp, silenced 
 her by his pathetic, implied reproach to h^r for not being 
 content with silent devotion. Doris chilled; she did 
 not attempt to rebut his unjust accusation, but contented 
 herself with the usual dull interchange of desultory remarks 
 about the quantity of ice in the creek that morning and the 
 lameness of one of the carriage-horses, until dinner was 
 over, and they went into the drawing-room. 
 
 It had been a freak of Doris's to spend the winter in this 
 big river-side house, instead of going up to town, where 
 her grandmother wanted them to take a house near her. 
 The solitary young wife had repented some weeks before of 
 this arrangement; but she would not propose an alteration 
 for fear of being charged with caprice. As she led the way 
 through the square comfortable hall with its dark curtains, 
 the fire-light bickering and hashing on the oak doors and 
 wainscoting, the remembrance of the old place as it used to 
 be in the days before her marriage, with laughing girls and 
 ubiquitous young men filling each room with life and gay- 
 ety, suddenly came upon her so vividly, in contrast to her 
 present solitary seclusion with a husband who was practical¬ 
 ly to her little more than an animated statue, that the tears 
 rushed blindingly to her eyes, and she stopped, leaning 
 against the oak taole. 
 
 Her husband, who was following, came quickly to her 
 side. 
 
 “ What is the matter, my darling? Are you ill?" he 
 asked tenderly, passing his arm round her for support. 
 
 She leaned against him gratefully, encouraging his ca¬ 
 resses, as she faltered out that there was nothing the matter 
 with her; she must have w T alked too far that morning—that 
 was all. She was quite well—sorry to have frightened him. 
 
 He dried her eyes, whispering loving words to her, and 
 led her to the drawing-room; there, instead of taking up a 
 book and remaining silent on pretense of reading, which 
 had become a too oinmoii practice with him when alone 
 with his wife, he sat on the sofa near the lire with her, and 
 tried his best to be entertaining, and succeeded perfectly in 
 making his wife happier than she had been for some time. 
 
Boris's fortuhe. 
 
 t;5 
 
 Unfortunately for the success of this experiment, David 
 found it exceedingly irksome, and felt glad when the even¬ 
 ing was over. Poor Doris's gratefully affectionate mood, 
 which would have made him entirely happy if his conduct 
 toward her had been altogether right, puzzled him, stung 
 his not unsensitive conscience, and long before eleven 
 o'clock began to bore him too. 
 
 The next morning, however, when the night's sleep had 
 distanced the remembrance of Mrs. Hodson, Doris's fresli 
 young face, made more beautiful and gentle by the mem¬ 
 ory of the happy evening before, won upon him, and in-* 
 duced him to make a faithful promise to be home early, so 
 that they might have another long evening together. And, 
 as he kissed her tenderly before leaving for town, he won¬ 
 dered how he could have found the evening long, and made 
 a vague resolve to keep away from influences which tended 
 to separate him from her. 
 
 But the influences were not to be kept away from. When 
 David paid his usual visit to Mr. Hodson, who always wait¬ 
 ed for him at some given rendezvous after four o'clock, he 
 found that Mrs. Hodson had driven up to town to fetch 
 her husband; and, as that husband protested that he had 
 another business call to make before returning home, she 
 commanded rather than begged David to come as far as 
 Piccadilly with her. 
 
 He made a faint semblance of protest—had promised to 
 be home early. He had neglected Doris too much lately— 
 she was dull at Fairleigh alone— 
 
 “ Of course she is. You selfish creature, to shut up a 
 pretty wife in a big dreary old house by the river, where I 
 shouldn't wonder if she ended by drowning herself as a re¬ 
 lief from your prosy society! Take Charlie Papillon down 
 with you, and she will forgive you for being a few minutes 
 late. Well, and now tell me all that you and Bertram have 
 been concocting to-day." 
 
 David gave her a full account of some new speculation on 
 which he proposed to embark, and she, with a parrot-like 
 surface knowledge of Stock-Exchange business and busi¬ 
 ness terms, picked up from her husband's table-talk, prated 
 “ debentures " and “ preference shares " with an audacity 
 so adorable that, when at Thornhill's she took a violent 
 fancy to a silver-mounted toilet mirror which “Bertram's 
 meanness " made her unable to buy, he found the tempta- 
 
86 
 
 Boris's fortukr. 
 
 tion to give it to her too strong to be resisted. He had a 
 check-book in his pocket—lie had just been settling up 
 with Mr. Hodson—so he wrote out a check for thirteen 
 guineas; and the lady’s child-like delight over the gift— a 
 Christmas present, he said gayly—was so charming and so 
 
 S retty that it was not until he had left her at the corner of 
 ermyn Street that he had time to remember, even vaguely, 
 that Mrs. Hodson was not a proper person on whom to 
 spend Doris’s money It was past six already; he had 
 promised to be home at five. There was nothing left for it 
 now but to carry out Mrs. Hodson’s commands and take 
 Charlie Papillon home to dinner. The spell of Doris’s 
 bright morning face was broken, and he felt that another 
 evening alone with her, after such a bad start, would be 
 more wearisome, more fraught with blunted but sensible 
 conscience-pangs, than the last. So he called at Charlie’s 
 rooms—modest ones shared with a friend, and brightened 
 by photographs of girls—on the chance of finding him there. 
 He was fortunate. Gussie, having borrowed a sovereign 
 from some one, had just called to take Papillon to the Cri¬ 
 terion to dine. But both young men were delighted to 
 give up their bachelor dinner, to be followed by the theater 
 to go and see Doris. 
 
 Their eagerness amazed David, who had given his invita¬ 
 tion hesitatingly, feeling envious of the programme they 
 had set themselves and sure they would not care to change 
 it. Melton had been away lately, and Charlie had grown 
 rather shy of visiting unasked the young household where 
 he was sharp enough to see that all was not going on rightly. 
 
 Their young men’s chatter amused David and kept his 
 thoughts away from unpleasant subjects all the way in the 
 train down to Fairleigh. “ Old David,” who had had im¬ 
 pecunious days himself, insisted on paying their fares him¬ 
 self, an item in the pleasure of the excursion to be duly 
 considered when one young gentleman had in the pocket of 
 a perfectly made coat twopence and a latch-key, and the 
 other’s borrowed capital of a sovereign would have to be 
 made somehow to last for pocket-money a week at least. 
 
 So they all three marched up to Fairleigh in high good 
 humor, and David led the way into the hall, feeling proud 
 of himself for having with much neatness got out of a little 
 difficulty. Doris’s bright sweet voice was heard faintly in 
 the distance as they came in. David’s dull ear did not no- 
 
DORISES FORT CINE. 8? 
 
 tice that its tones were happier than they had been for some 
 weeks. To the other two young men, in high spirits at the 
 thought of seeing a particular favorite and altogether jolly 
 and perfect person, of course it came with no deep signifi¬ 
 cance at all. 
 
 “ Let’s hide!” said Papillon. 
 
 And he and Gussie scrambled round the curtains like a 
 pair of clumsy kittens. 
 
 Doris came into the hall quickly, all in white, like a fairy 
 with the soft lamp-light from above and the red flames 
 from the fire casting deep shadows and faint flickering lights 
 upon her. The boys saw her, and were sorry for their 
 light-hearted maneuvers, as, peeping through the curtains, 
 they saw on her face a lovely, holy joy as she raised her 
 arms toward her husband, which made them wish David 
 would take her away without having seen them. 
 
 But on David himself the significance of her expression 
 was lost, or else he would not read it aright. He took her 
 raised hands and put them on his shoulders as he kissed 
 her. 
 
 “ I am not going to scold you for being late,” she said. 
 “ I am sure you are sorry. And we will have another hap¬ 
 py evening, won’t we?” 
 
 “Yes, my dear, I hope so,” said he, in his sweet voice; 
 “ and I have brought two naughty boys down with me to 
 share it with us.” 
 
 And the boys saw her arms suddenly fall, and her face 
 change, and, without knowing why, they wished they had 
 not come. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Almost before Gussie and Charlie had had time to note 
 the sudden chill on her face, Doris spoke, in a voice as kind 
 and bright as usual: 
 
 “I think I can guess who the naughty boys are. But 
 what have you done with them?” 
 
 They came out from their hiding-place, and she greeted 
 them warmly, and scolded them playfully for neglecting 
 Fairleigh so long. Then they all went into the drawing¬ 
 room, and, as there was half an hour to spare before din¬ 
 ner, Doris sunk down carelessly, as in the old days, on the 
 bearth-rug, and sat there with one of the young men on 
 
88 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 each side of her, “ to talk about nothing, Doris, just as if 
 you weren’t married at all,” as Charlie said. 
 
 “ Don’t you remember how we used to scramble up in a 
 hurry, if we heard grandmamma’s step outside, for fear she 
 should scold me for behavior ‘ more like a tomboy of four¬ 
 teen than a lady of four-and-twenty,’ as she used to say?” 
 
 “ Yes, and how I used to coax her into forgiving you 
 when you behaved ‘ in a manner unbecoming to a young 
 gentlewoman.’ It was always 1 who begged you off, Doris 
 —remember that!” said Charlie, sentimentally. 
 
 “ Yes, my dear Charlie—and how I had to pay for that 
 blessing immediately afterward by unlocking the cabinet 
 where I keptrny marrons glacees . Do you remember that?” 
 
 At this Gussie began to jeer and gibe, and Charlie wrig¬ 
 gled round the hearth-rug with the intention of threatening 
 him. But, suddenly changing his tone, he wriggled back 
 again and said haughtily: 
 
 “1 despise that fellow. Don’t take any notice of him, 
 Doris. He has just incurred the merited contempt of all 
 right-minded persons by falling in love.” 
 
 Doris laughed, while Gussie protested violently, and even 
 angrily. 
 
 ‘ 4 Well, why shouldn’t he? Is it a crime you yourself 
 have never been guilty of?” 
 
 “Never,” said Charlie, emphatically—“that is, seri¬ 
 ously! It requires a lot of encouragement on one’s own 
 part as well as on that of the lady, to make a fellow fall in 
 love seriously; and that encouragement I can honestly say 
 I have always denied myself. ” 
 
 “ Oh, Charlie, this is heart-breaking! Then the vows and 
 protestations you used to make me were not serious after all!” 
 
 “ As far as they went—yes,” admitted he unblushingly. 
 “ In fact, my worship of you was my great passion, since 
 which my heart is seared, you know—seared. Now, I only 
 philander. When I find my heart beating a little too fast 
 for Maud I take a turn at Helen.” And he turned up the 
 ends of his long mustache, and put his head on one side in 
 a rakish manner. 
 
 “ That is to say, when you have spent all your screw 
 on hansoms and ices with Hilda Warren, you pass a little 
 more time with Hose at the Criterion bar,” interposed 
 Gussie, bluntly. 
 
 Tact was not Gussie’s strong point, and he was angry, 
 
 ... . - . . jrn. ■-»*« • .. —' I i Mlf II > if f _ th- tu MA ■■ M 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 89 
 
 rudely, rustically angry, with Charlie for his bantering 
 accusation. 
 
 “ Whom am I in love with?” he continued, brusquely, 
 since neither would take any notice of his last remark. 
 
 David had just come into the room, and was sauntering 
 up to the group on the hearth-rug, with the amused 
 paternal smile on his face which had done so much to earn 
 for him his proud title of 44 Old Davie.” 
 
 My dear fellow, don't excite yourself. I dare say it is 
 business investments that take you down to the Lawns.” 
 
 “ The Lawns!” echoed Gussie, in unmistakable astonish¬ 
 ment. 
 
 44 Charlie's large round blue eyes were as vacant as ever; 
 but the change that instantly passed over David's face, 
 which he could see reflected m the glass over the mantel¬ 
 piece, was not lost upon him. 
 
 44 1 dare say it is pleasanter to discuss business there than 
 at the office,” Charlie went on, without any change of 
 tone. 
 
 David had sat down in an arm-chair close to the group; 
 and, as Charlie was the nearest to him, it was quite natural 
 for the younger man to look up at him as he did so, quite 
 natural too that he should put up his hand and give that 
 of 44 Old Davie '' an affectionate pat. 
 
 44 Of course I don't know whether it is (he prospect of a 
 charming mother-in-law that tempts you—'' 
 
 44 Mother-in-law! What are you talking about:'' Gussie 
 cried, hotly. 44 I never can see the charm people talk 
 about in a made-up, middle-aged woman like that. And I 
 give you my word I haven't the least idea which of those 
 dolly little girls I am supposed to admire.” 
 
 All this time Charlie, under pretense of laughing at 
 Gussie, was glancing up at David's face, watching the cloud 
 that was gathering there. 
 
 44 Why are you so angry? Why do you let him tease 
 you, when you see how he enjoys it?” said Doris, though 
 she too could not help laughing at the young fellow’s im¬ 
 petuous displeasure. 44 Are Mrs. Hodson’s daughters 
 grown up then?'' she asked of the calmer Charlie. 4k I've 
 seen them only once, and (hen they were quite little girls.” 
 
 44 So they are,” interposed Gussie, abruptly. * 4 One 
 gives them sweets.'' 
 
 44 To please mamma/' added Charlie, demurely. 
 
90 
 
 DORIS’S FORTUNE. 
 
 <e It wouldn’t ‘ please mamma ’ to pay attention to her 
 daughters,” said Gussie still hotly. 44 She wants all the 
 attention herself.” 
 
 44 What nonsense, Gussie!” 
 
 44 It isn’t nonsense. Every man who goes often to the 
 Lawns must either be in love with madame or pretend to 
 be. We call—they call—the Lawns 4 the toll-gate.’ ” 
 
 David jumped up from his chair, crying abruptly, “ Din¬ 
 ner!” They all scrambled up from the hearth-rug, and, 
 by the time they were on their feet, the anticipated dinner- 
 bell rang. 
 
 The volcanic subject of the Lawns and its occupants was 
 wisely avoided during dinner; but, when Doris had left the 
 gentlemen in t] e dining-room and had sat down in the arm¬ 
 chair David had occupied during the discussion, the danger¬ 
 ous topic was brought again under her notice in a rather 
 abrupt manner. 
 
 44 You don’t really believe I am in love with any one at 
 the Lawns, do you?” asked a gruff but plaintive voice at 
 her side. 
 
 She looked up with 44 Oh!” and a start of surprise to see 
 Gussie, flushed and troubled, looking down at her with 
 dog’s eyes of humble devotion. He had slunk in so quietly, 
 he looked so much disturbed, that Doris for a few moments 
 could only look at him and laugh indignantly, as at the 
 unexpected caress of a spoiled Newfoundland. 
 
 44 Why shouldn’t you be?” she asked, kindly. 
 
 44 Don’t laugh at me—please don’t laugh at me,” he im¬ 
 plored; then, coming meekly a step nearer— 44 May I sit 
 there?”—touching a stool at her feet. 
 
 44 Yes, you can sit there if you like. But don’t look so 
 miserable about a joke of that silly Charlie’s, or I shall be 
 obliged to laugh again.” 
 
 44 But he shouldn’t say things like that—lies—for I tell 
 you they are lies!”—passionately. 
 
 44 Now, Gussie, you must not be so petulant. You used 
 to bear chaff quite well at Ambleside.” 
 
 44 Ah, yes, at Ambleside!” said Gussie, softening. 
 44 Look here—I can stand chaff now, too, when it is only 
 chaff. But this about the Lawns is different. I tell you I 
 have been in love only with one woman ever, and—” 
 
 44 Gussie!” interrupted Doris, in a voice of warning. 
 
 44 It is all right,” he protested, nodding his head in a 
 
I 
 
 r>OKiS*S EOETUKE. 91 
 
 quaint reassurance. “ Look—see how quiet and good I 
 am! I’m not going to be a fool again. I was only going 
 to tell you that you are the only—” 
 
 “ I don’t want to be told anything. ” 
 
 “ Well, that I never, since that evening on the river with 
 you —” 
 
 “ Please leave me out of the question.” 
 
 ' “ But I can’t explain myself without bringing you in.” 
 
 “ I don’t want you to explain yourself.” 
 
 “ Don’t be so unkind!” 
 
 “ Don’t be so babyish! Really, Gussie, I don’t think you 
 will ever grow up!” 
 
 “ That’s just it,” said he, seizing the opportunity. “ I 
 don’t mean ever to grow up, or to fall in love, or ever to 
 be anything but a boy. I’ve found, you see, that my ideal 
 of womanhood is not to be found, except just one specimen 
 which is locked up in a glass case and is private properly. 
 So I don’t want to grow up to manhood, you see, but to 
 remain a good little boy, and come and peep at the glass 
 case sometimes, and rub the dust off the glass very care¬ 
 fully; which means that I’ll come and cheer you up as I 
 used at Ambleside—if I may.” v 
 
 A most discreetly uttered speech for Gussie, without any 
 violence or undue haste, but some most honest, genuine 
 feeling in his voice, as he tenderly embraced his own knees, 
 after a favorite ungainly fashion of his, and glanced up 
 from the tire to her face with looks too humble to be affec¬ 
 tionate. 
 
 Doris was touched, and he saw that she was, and his 
 heart ached for her in the loneliness of her life; for both 
 he and Charlie saw a good deal more than Doris did, and 
 Gussie, who worshiped her most loyally since that interview 
 with her over Mrs. Bramwell’s wall had revealed to him 
 the beautiful purity and kindliness of her nature, could 
 afford a very magnanimous pity for her now that his wild 
 assertions concerning David’s coldness had proved to be too 
 well founded. For the moment Doris found it difficult to 
 answer, and Gussie hal the sense not to disturb her. When 
 she spoke her voice trembled a little. 
 
 “ Iou are a good fellow, Gussie; and, as long as you 
 don’t talk nonsense, you are one of the kindest old friends 
 I have.” 
 
 He thought she was going to say more; but, instead of 
 
92 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 that, she got up rather abruptly, and walked away to the 
 piano. GussiVs heart leaped up, and he felt a great thrcb 
 pass through him impelling him to rush after her headlong. 
 "But he got the better of himself the next moment; and 
 clutched his knees more firmly than ever. 
 
 “If I get up," he said to himself, “ she’ll think I’m 
 going to make love to her again, and then it will be all 
 up." 
 
 So lie remained looking at the fire until the voices of the 
 other men sounded in the hall, when he sprung up as if 
 shod from a cannon, and rushed across the room to Doris. 
 
 He gave her one inquiring look, as if to ask, “ Have I 
 done right?" And the answering glance she gave him 
 from moist shining eyes assured him that he had. 
 
 “ Shall I find some music for you, Doris?" he asked, as 
 the others entered the room. 
 
 But Charlie hated music. It took a girl's attention 
 away from himself. The only occasion on which he ap¬ 
 proved of it was when he was between two girls, a plain 
 one and a pretty one. Then, if anybody proposed music, 
 he always turned to the plain one and said, “ Oh, yes, do 
 let us have some music! That lovely sonata thing I've 
 heard you play, with the little runs at the top of the piano!" 
 Now he would not hear of Doris's playing; and, as a night¬ 
 ly performance on the piano, while David placidly dozed, 
 had not increased her fondness for the practice, it was not 
 difficult to lead her away to the fire again to talk. 
 
 “ Have you heard how disgustingly Melton's cousin has 
 been behaving?" asked Charlie, when he had his coffee. 
 
 “No. Tell me." 
 
 “ Well, you know how he came back from Australia, 
 and, when everybody thought he was a bachelor, suddenly 
 produced a portmanteau containing an Antipodean wife 
 and about eighteen Antipodean children." 
 
 “ Eight," interrupted Gussie, in a voice which seemed to 
 imply that in the exact number lay the atrocity of the 
 thing. 
 
 “ Well, now he has fallen ill, and a week ago he had the 
 audacity to send for his innocent victim—1 mean our friend 
 Gussie—just to see if he would make a proper sort of 
 guardian for the eight young bushrangers, I expect." 
 
 “ No, no; very likely he means to leave him a handsome 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 93 
 
 legacy. That would be only fair, since he is so rich, and 
 Gussie was the heir for so long. ” 
 
 Gussie shook his head. 
 
 “ No, I think his wife would prevent that. She is a 
 hard, coarse woman, and she seems to have great influence 
 over him. He wanted to speak to me alone, poor fellow, I 
 believe—to tell me he was sorry for my disappointment. 
 But she would not leave us for a single moment, and she 
 didn’t seem happy until I was at the door to go. It was a 
 very unpleasant visit for me; and I was glad to be out of 
 the house, I can tell you." 
 
 “ Where do they live?” 
 
 “ At Reigate. ” 
 
 “Shall you spend Christmas there, Gussie?” asked 
 Doris. 
 
 “ Oh, no; my cousin is much too ill! Besides, I don’t 
 like them. ’ ’ 
 
 “ Then will you come and spend it with us? I shall 
 write to your mother to ask if she will come, too. She is 
 in town, is she not?” 
 
 “ Yes. She came up from Torquay yesterday.” 
 
 “Aren’t you going to invite me, too, Doris?” asked 
 Charlie, meekly. 
 
 “ If you are good, I will. Hilda Warren will be here, 
 and some more nice people.” 
 
 “‘Thank you. Lots of girls, please! Christmas is hor¬ 
 rid without lots of girls. 1 say, Doris, are you going to do 
 some beautiful Christmas shopping as you used to do with 
 Mrs. Edgcombe? Going to Covent Garden to get fruit, 
 and all that?” 
 
 “ Yes, I am going up to town on the twenty-third.” 
 
 “ The twenty-third? Don’t say the twenty-third, or I 
 sha’n’t be able to go with you, as I wanted to.” 
 
 “ Then let me go with you instead of him. I have noth¬ 
 ing to do on that day; and I’m a first-rate judge of 
 plums,” pleaded Gussie. 
 
 “The only thing he learned at school,” explained 
 Papillon. 
 
 “ I don’t want either of you. Y"ou forget I have a hus- 
 band to escort me now.” 
 
 Charlie made a grimace, and David’s sweet voice chimed 
 in upon the babble. 
 
 “ [ am afraid I shall not be able to accompany you on 
 
94 
 
 DORISES FORTUKE. 
 
 the twenty-third, Doris. I have a shareholders’ meeting 
 on that day. You had better accept Melton’s offer.” 
 
 Doris’s first impulse, in the moment of chagrin, was to 
 declare she would go alone or with her grandmother. But 
 a resentful thought, the first she had ever felt toward her 
 husband, suddenly prompted her to turn to Gussie and 
 make the appointment with him. 
 
 “ And we’ll choose Christmas presents,” said Gussie, 
 with the delight of a boy. 
 
 “ Hush!” said Charlie, tragically. “ The tyrant will 
 o’erhear you.” 
 
 “ Oh, the tyrant is not jealous!” said Doris, with less 
 sweetness than usual. 
 
 “ I may accept a Christmas present, may I not, David?” 
 
 “ Certainly,” said he at once. 
 
 And the appointment was settled. 
 
 Both the visitors were to spend the night at Fairleigh, so 
 the little party could sit and chatter until what time they 
 liked. It was late before they broke up. Just as they 
 were separating for the night a most unexpected ring at 
 the front-door bell arrested them, and the next moment a 
 telegram was brought in for Mr. Melton. A message had 
 been sent from Reigate to his modest lodging in town, and 
 telegraphed on to Fairleigh. It was from his cousin’s 
 solicitor. 
 
 “ Mr. Roderick Melton is worse. Come at once.” 
 
 The last thing that Gussie said to his hostess, as she shook 
 hands with him at the door, where the dog-cart was waiting 
 to drive him as far as Croyden, was— 
 
 “ Don’t forget, Doris, you have promised. You are to 
 be at Waterloo Station at three o’clock on the twenty- 
 third.” 
 
 “ I remember, Gussie. Good-bye!” 
 
 And, as he drove away, his three friends conjectured 
 among themselves whether this sudden summons portended 
 a change in his prospects. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Not one word in satisfaction of their curiosity concerning 
 Gussie and his visit to his sick cousin did Charlie or Doris 
 or David get during the fortnight which elapsed between 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 95 
 
 his abrupt departure from Fairleigh and the twenty-third 
 of December, the day of his appointment with Doris in 
 town. 
 
 Mrs. Glyn did indeed receive at breakfast two days later 
 what she thought must be a letter from him. Bat, on 
 opening the envelope, it proved to be only a card with these 
 words— 
 
 “ Dear Doris, —You won't forget the twenty-third, 
 will you? I am thinking of nothing else. 
 
 “ Yours very sincerely, 
 
 46 Gussie." 
 
 Her husband asked to see it, and she wondered what 
 effect the ardent expectation expressed in the note would 
 have upon him. It had none. Ail he said was— 
 
 “ No black edge! His cousin didn't die then;" and then 
 he took up the city column of the “ Times " again. 
 
 Doris sent no answer to the note; but on the twenty- 
 third, after another fortnight of uneasy reserve with her 
 husband, which she had not the courage again to attempt 
 to break, she was surprised to find how much the little ex¬ 
 citement of the shopping excursion with her old playfellow 
 affected her. She ran upstairs after her solitary luncheon, 
 rejected one bonnet because it was of a dull green color, 
 which Gussie had ignorantly condemned as aesthetic, passed 
 her mantles in review, to choose the most becoming, and 
 was unusually particular about the exact shade of her 
 gloves. She had lost heart of late to concern herself with 
 these little coquetries, not being frivolous enough by nat¬ 
 ure to take pleasure in them except for some definite 
 object; and to please David was no longer a definite 
 object, since he always gave her the same sweet, but not 
 enthusiastic, smile of satisfaction, and never noticed any 
 change in her dress. 
 
 A sense of this came suddenly upon her as she was trying 
 to make up her mind between a brown veil and a black 
 one. She had not until lately been used to analyzing her 
 own feelings and motives; but the disappointment of her 
 vague, young-girl hopes of a full and complete happiness 
 with the husband of her choice had during the last few 
 weeks made her moody and thoughtful; and, as she stood 
 looking at her own handsome face in the glass before her. 
 
96 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 not with vanity, but curiosity, her expression changed from 
 the light-hearted expectation of a girlish pleasure into the 
 sad wondering look of the woman who knows she is 
 neglected and can find no reason why. 
 
 Perhaps she did not try hard enough to please her hus¬ 
 band, she thought, as she herself noticed how the mo¬ 
 mentarily animated beauty of her face seemed to change 
 into still marble as the remembrance of David came into 
 her mind. But her conscience was free on that point; if 
 she did not take special pains with her person for David, it 
 was because he saw no difference between a careless toilet 
 and a careful one—at least on her. This little pang of 
 vague jealousy pricked her at the memory of certain not in¬ 
 judicious criticisms which she had heard him pass on the 
 dress of other women. 
 
 Perhaps it was an indispensable condition of married life 
 that at the end of a couple of months husband and wife 
 should become wax-work figures each as far as the other 
 was concerned, and remain flesh and blood to all the world 
 besides. This did not seem right, certainly; but what had 
 she and David done that they should be exceptions to the 
 general rule? Why did he look at her, speak to her, as if 
 she were a picture on the wall, instead of a living, breath¬ 
 ing woman at his side? 
 
 And feelings, tumultuous, rebellious, such as her calm 
 life had never before known, rushed up from the very 
 depths of her heart, astonishing her by their impetuosity, 
 frightening her, seeming to raise the very anchors of her 
 untutored simple faith in all that was right and good. She 
 had done no wrong; she had tried hard, very hard, to do 
 right; she lived a blameless life; she bore neglect and the 
 hardest of all solitude, the solitude with a living compan¬ 
 ion, bravely, silently, and she was suffering as if she had 
 done some great wrong. It was the first time that she had 
 admitted—the first time indeed that she was fully conscious 
 —that it was suffering, this numb pain which had suddenly, 
 without any warning, burst out into acute misery. For a 
 few minutes she gave way; and, throwing off her pretty lit¬ 
 tle bonnet, fii lging down the seal-skin mantle that had been 
 her last choice, she knelt down on the floor with her head 
 against the bed and sobbed bitterly. 
 
 Then the soft tap of her maid, whom she had sent to get 
 her a camellia from the conservatory, made her start up 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
DORISES FORTUHE. 
 
 9? 
 
 &nd rush to wash her face with an impetuosity very unlike 
 the usual dignity of her movements. When she put on the 
 little bonnet again, it surmounted a tear-stained and 
 swollen face to which the aesthetic green or any other head- 
 gear would have been equally unbecoming. The choice be¬ 
 tween the veils now fell at once on the brown, as the thick¬ 
 est; and Lufton. followed her mistress in the deepest depths 
 of amazement as to what had “ come over her.” 
 
 All Doris’s girlish pleasure in her expedition had faded 
 away. She sat looking out of the window of the railway 
 carriage at the cold flat country, and then at the uninterest¬ 
 ing backs of rows of suburban houses, considering the slow 
 but sure growth of the blight upon her life which marriage 
 had brought to her, and wondering whether the effect was 
 the same upon David. She would speak to him that very 
 night—open her heart to him, if he would let her! That 
 was the point. At any sign of a wish on her part to carry 
 the conversation beyond the chitchat of details concerning 
 their every-day life to the more intimate discussion of 
 moods and feelings, David had a manner of growing utterly 
 blank and absent which suddenly raised a six-feet-high bar¬ 
 rier between them and effectually protected him from en¬ 
 croachments upon his own reserve. However, she would 
 try; she would resolutely speak through the barrier, break 
 it down if possible by the force of her own feelings. Since 
 the outburst in her own room of an hour before, Doris still 
 felt sensitive, excited, not only unwilling, but unable to go 
 on quietly with her still, cold, every-day life without some 
 relief to the pent-up emotions which the merest accident 
 had quickened within her. 
 
 She was impatient for the day to be over that she might 
 put her new resolve into effect before reflection and the 
 force of daily habit had had time to make it grow cool. In 
 order that she might take what time she liked over her 
 purchases in town, David had himself suggested that she 
 should dine at her grandmother’s; as for him, he would 
 either take Papillon to a restaurant or perhaps go down (o 
 the Lawns; she need not trouble herself about h’m. She 
 was glal therefore that she bad some occupation to pre¬ 
 vent her timi iity from getting the better of her courage 
 during the hours before she could meet him; but she Had 
 absolutely no other feeling left about her expedition with 
 Gussie. 
 
 4 
 
98 
 
 DORISES BOBTUNJE. 
 
 It came with a little shock upon her therefore that at 
 Waterloo Station, where he was waiting on the platform, 
 he sprung upon the carriage-step as nimbly as any guard, 
 and, panting out, almost inarticulate with excitement, 
 “ Train was late—thought you weren't coming!" took her 
 hand with a frantic tremor in his which showed plainly to 
 what a pitch of eagerness for the meeting he had worked 
 himself. 
 
 He helped her out on to the platform, with just one look 
 up at her face, a look so strangely intense that Doris asked 
 wonderingly— 
 
 “ What is the matter with you, Gussie? Hare you been 
 ill?" 
 
 “ No, no, no!" said he impatiently. “ I am quite well. 
 There is nothing the matter with me. Now you can send 
 your maid back. I’m to take care of you now." 
 
 She looked at him again when she had dismissed Lufton, 
 and said abruptly, as it' relieved— 
 
 “ I see what it is. You are in mourning. I knew there 
 was some change in you; but I could not quite make out 
 what it was." 
 
 44 Yes," he answered, in a rather constrained voice; 
 “ my cousin died on the eleventh." 
 
 “ Oh, that was the day you wrote to me! Why did you 
 say nothing about it?" 
 
 “ He did not die until the evening." 
 
 “ You were there?" 
 
 “ Yes, of course. You have seen all the Christmas num¬ 
 bers?"—they are passing the book-stall. 
 
 “ David brought them aovvn—all those I wanted to see." 
 
 The subject of his cousin's death was distasteful evi¬ 
 dently. It could not be from his excessive grief; Gussie 
 had never been more to the elder Mr. Melton than “ next 
 of kin. ” He must have been disappointed in his natural 
 hope of a legacy. 
 
 But waiting at the side of the platform was a very neat 
 brougham, drawn by a chestnut horse, at which Doris 
 glanced admiringly as the footman opened the door. She 
 raised her eyebrows with a smile as Gussie stepped in after 
 her. 
 
 “ A present, an extravagance, or what?" she asked good- 
 humoredly. 
 
 4 4 Neither. A loan," he answered quickly. 
 
BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 99 
 
 u What a lovely rug, Gussie!” she exclaimed, as he 
 wrapped a soft, handsome bear-skin carefully round her. 
 
 “ Yes; I like dark furs. ” 
 
 66 But it makes my sealskin look shabby.” 
 
 “ No, it doesn’t. It shows off your face; it makes you 
 look like the lovely queen you are!” he burst out in his ex¬ 
 travagant Ambleside fashion. 
 
 “ Gussie, if you begin to talk like a baby, I shall stop 
 the carriage and go back.” 
 
 “ No, you won’t. Both the men are under spells; they 
 have been hired for the occasion out of the 6 Arabian 
 Nights/ and, without the utterance of the proper words, 
 which you don’t know, they would drive round and round 
 the West-end forever.” 
 
 Doris laughed. He was so exuberantly happy, so en¬ 
 tirely like the old playfellow of whom she still had an affec¬ 
 tionate recollection, that she could not help being cheered 
 by his high spirits, now doubly exhilarating since the dull 
 depression in which she had lately lived. As they went 
 from shop to shop, choosing Christmas-cards and Christ¬ 
 mas presents, through the bright alley of Co vent Garden, 
 buying fruit and flowers, Gussie grew more and more buoy¬ 
 antly happy, and Doris caught the infection. He lagged 
 behind her as she went through the stalls outside the cov¬ 
 ered market toward the brougham, and she had to wait for 
 him; when he came up with her, she was so struck with 
 consternation to see that his arms were piled high with flow¬ 
 ers, the loveliest she had admired as they walked through 
 together. 
 
 “ Gussie!” she exclaimed, not knowing what to think. 
 
 “ It's all right; it’s a commission!” he explained hastily, 
 as if to clear himself of an implied charge of theft. “ Now 
 you’ll come and see my mother, won’t you?” said he, in a 
 tone of strong but suppressed excitement which puzzled 
 her. 4 ‘ She wants you to come. She told me to beg you 
 to come. You will come, won’t your” 
 
 “ Certainly,” said Doris readily, a little surprised by his 
 vehemence. Mrs. Melton was a dry and melancholy lady, 
 much cast down by the rude force of adverse circumstances, 
 and very tiresome by the persistency with which she im¬ 
 pressed upon her acquaintances that circumstances had been 
 adverse. What she would be like since this recent blow of 
 the late Mr. Gresham’s marriage and her own son’s conse- 
 
100 
 
 DORIS’S FORTUXE. 
 
 quent disappointment Doris dared not imagine. “ Where 
 is Mrs. Melton staying now?” she asked presently. 
 
 “ You’ll see,” answered Gussie enigmatically. 
 
 When Doris did 66 see,” she w 7 as overwhelmed with as¬ 
 tonishment. 
 
 For, on the brougham's stopping at a big new hotel near 
 the Strand, Gussie impetuously dragged her out, seized her 
 arm firmly, and rushed upstairs with her as far as the first 
 floor, where a man-servant threw open the door of an osten¬ 
 tatiously new and magnificent room, in which Mrs. Melton, 
 in mourning deep enough to be dignified and not too deep 
 to be handsome, rose, rustling with black silk and tinkling 
 with jet, from a sofa to meet her. 
 
 “ Mamma, go and see if the things I have ordered have 
 come yet!” said Gussie impetuously. “ You can talk to 
 Doris afterward. ” 
 
 And “ mamma,” trying hard to maintain an expression 
 befitting her mourning dress, while there shone in her eyes 
 keen satisfaction at meeting on equal terms, as far as rai¬ 
 ment was concerned, a woman before whose furs and laces 
 her own alpacas and cottons had aforetime figuratively 
 quailed, obediently gave Doris a less lugubrious kiss than 
 usual, and sailed with chastened step out of the room. 
 
 Some idea of the truth was beginning to dawn on Doris’s 
 mind. She turned suddenly from watching Mrs. Melton’s 
 exit to face the young man who had so naively secured a 
 tete-a-tete with her. 
 
 “ Gussie, you have been playing me a trick,” she said, 
 bewildered. 
 
 “ And what if I have? I had* a right to tell you my 
 news in my own way. Sit down—sit down here, and I’ll 
 tell you everything. I am mad to tell you.” 
 
 He was indeed so much excited that, to calm him, she 
 obeyed at once, and sat down in the low chair he had 
 brought to the hearth-rug for her, ready to hear the news 
 she had already partly guessed. He flung himself down on 
 the floor in front of her, and, putting his hands up to her 
 throat very gently before she could prevent him, unfastened 
 her cloak and threw it open. 
 
 “ You will catch cold if you sit in that,” he said, with 
 his flushed face close to hers, and his eyes drinking in the 
 fairness of her face. 
 
 She drew back a little, and pushed his hands away coldly. 
 
Doris’s fortune. 
 
 %c No, no, you must not be unkind; you must listen to 
 me kindly. You will see now you were wrong to think I 
 wanted your fortune when I worshiped you so at Ambleside; 
 I believed myself to be then what I am really now, the heir 
 to my cousin’s property, in need of no woman’s money. 
 Doris, Doris, it is true. My cousin was not married at all 
 —the woman was not his wife. Everything is mine, mine! 
 Oh, Doris, Doris, if it had only come a year ago!” 
 
 He was kneeling at her feet, rubbing his head in his 
 hands, in utter abandonment to an excitement which in¬ 
 fected Doris. 
 
 She tried to calm him with cold and severe words, ut¬ 
 tered in a trembling voice which took away their sting. 
 She wanted to rise; but he would not let her go. 
 
 “ No, no!” he cried passionately. “ You must say 
 something kind to me first; you must tell me you are sorry 
 you ever thought me interested--” 
 
 “ I am sorry, Gussie—I am sorry. I have believed in 
 you, you know. I am very, very glad you are well off; I 
 feel certain you will make a good and noble use of your 
 money, better than I have a chance of making of mine,” 
 she added sadly. “ Now you must let me go; 1 am late 
 already.” 
 
 “Wait, wait; you haven’t had my Christmas present. 
 David said I might give you a Christmas present, didn’t 
 
 he; 
 
 
 “ Well, bring it down w r ith you to Fairleigh, Gussie, 
 where we can all see it together, and you can make me a 
 beautiful speech about it,” said she nervously. 
 
 But he stamped with childish impatience at the idea of 
 deferring his own promised pleasure, sprung to the chair 
 where he had thrown his overcoat, and dragged out of one 
 of the pockets a large flat morocco case. Doris gave a lit¬ 
 tle cry of fear. He pulled it open and placed it in her 
 lap. It was a set of diamonds and sapphires, the stones of 
 large size, the setting perfect, the value obviously alarming. 
 
 She made a movement to thrust it aside. 
 
 “ No, Doris!” he said imperiously, seizing her hands 
 and looking up with flashing eyes into her face. “ I ac¬ 
 cepted from your hands help in money, a pretty good proof 
 that you know me well enough to take a present from me. 
 You have no jewels worthy of your position—I have heard 
 Mrs. Edgcombe say so. Since jewels are of so little value 
 
102 
 
 doris’s fortune. 
 
 in jour eyes, they are just as worthless in mine. You 
 must keep these—you shall! Let me put them round your 
 neck, just as I would put flowers on the altar of a goddess, ” 
 
 But Doris repulsed him quickly, rising as she did so. 
 She spoke in a low tremulous voice. 
 
 “ I will keep them, Gussie, on condition that you let me 
 leave at once.” 
 
 He stepped back, doubtful, hesitating. With one glance 
 at his excited face, she left the room, with the jewels 
 against her breast. 
 
 CHAPTER XIY. 
 
 Doris left the hotel hurriedly, got into a cab, and drove 
 to Waterloo Station. As she drove off, she saw Gussie 
 Melton rush out of the door-way on to the pavement; but 
 she drew back and would not let him see her. She was so 
 much agitated by the emotions which the young man’s im¬ 
 petuous outburst of gratitude and affection had awakened 
 in her that she felt she could not now expose herself to the 
 keen scrutiny of her grandmother’s eyes. She must get 
 back to Eairleigh, where she would still have two or three 
 hours alone to compose herself before her husband’s return. 
 
 She wished with all her heart that she had not gone up 
 to town. Gussie’s boyish devotion, coming so quickly after 
 her outburst of misery at her husband’s neglect, had ex¬ 
 cited her so strangely that she had scarcely been able to 
 control herself while listening to him—had been on the 
 point, innocent as she was, of breaking into tears at the 
 dangerous touch of sympathy. Until those last few mo¬ 
 ments at the hotel, when his impetuosity had suddenly 
 frightened her, she had certainly been happier with Gussie 
 than she had been for weeks; for the pleasure she had en 
 joyed in her husband’s society on that one evening when hw 
 had devoted himself to trying to please her had been fever¬ 
 ish, uneasy, fraught with fear lest he should not find her 
 so fascinating as she found him. All the time-honored 
 jests and gibes at the infelicity of the married state, which 
 she had formerly thought so coarse, had then a terrible 
 foundation of truth! Doris rebelled against this conclu¬ 
 sion. A means of testing David’s feeling for her came into 
 her mind through the jewels she carried imher hand, If 
 he could submit coolly to his wife’s receiving such a presen‘6 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 103 
 
 from another man, then indeed she felt that husbands must 
 be made of different clay from other men. Whether this 
 action would be quite fair to Gussie she was too typical a 
 woman to consider. It is a very exceptional woman who 
 has room in her head or heart for more than one man at a 
 time; the feelings, interests, of the outsiders count for 
 nothing. 
 
 That her conscience might be free from the reproach of 
 taking more pains for another man than for her husband, 
 rather than with any thought that these pains would have 
 much effect upon David, Doris put on that evening 
 a new tea-gown of coral-colored liberty silk trimmed with 
 coffee-tinted net embroidered with gold. No reigning 
 beauty ever looked lovelier than she, as, with an unusual 
 flush in her cheeks and light in her eyes giving luster to 
 her dark beauty, she sat in the drawing-room, in the sub¬ 
 dued varying light of fire and lamp and shaded candles, 
 playing with the sparkling stones whose only value in her 
 eyes lay in the use to which she was going to put them. 
 
 Eleven o'clock, half past eleven, twelve struck before the 
 bell rang and she heard the faint sound of a door shutting 
 as a servant went to let the master in. Doris had left her 
 seat by the fire twenty times to walk across the room, un¬ 
 fasten the shutters, open the window, and listen in the still¬ 
 ness. Now, with the longed-for moment so near, she sat 
 quite still, feeling the loud quick beating of her heart and 
 a heavy weight at her temples. She no longer felt the case 
 in her hands; it fell to the ground as she rose, trembling, 
 on hearing her husband's step outside the door. The slight 
 noise it made in falling frightened her; but she did not 
 stoop to pick it up. The door opened, and David came 
 in. He started at sight of her, and, as he did so, she no¬ 
 ticed that he wore the usual abstracted weary look after a 
 long day devoted to “ business”*—it even seemed to her 
 that he was more absorbed, more absent than usual. 
 
 “ You up still, Doris? I thought you would have been 
 in bed hours ago!” 
 
 “ I waited to see you, to speak to you,” she answered, 
 in a very low and subdued voice. 
 
 44 To speak to me! Anything wrong then?” 
 
 A quick glance at her—not the glance of loving interest, 
 6ut of suspicious curiosity—apparently satisfied him that it 
 was nothing serious—to him. 
 
104 
 
 DORIS’S FORTUKE. 
 
 “ No, David, nothing is wrong—at least, you will think 
 not. ” 
 
 44 Won’t it keep till the morning? I am very tired. 
 
 He looked very white and weary, and Doris twisted an 
 arm-chair round to the fire, and with very tender hands, 
 led him to it and coaxed him to sit down. 
 
 46 1 would rather speak to you now, if I may. I have 
 been waiting three hours to see you, and I—I can speak 
 better now than in the morning . 99 
 
 She felt that this terrible strain of excitement which she 
 had been suffering all the evening would leave her utterly 
 incapable of producing any effect by her eloquence in the 
 cold hours of the morning. 
 
 “ I will be very quiet, and I will not keep you long,” 
 she continued, in a low measured voice, in which she care¬ 
 fully suppressed every sign of excitement except a slight 
 tremor; and she dropped gently on to her knees beside him, 
 put one hand on his, and looked steadily at the fire, so that 
 she might not see the cold film rise in his eyes and shut her 
 out from him as she spoke. “We have been married six 
 months now, David, haven’t we? And all that time we 
 have never had one quarrel, one disagreement even. You 
 have always been kind and indulgent to me, and I have al¬ 
 ways done what you told me to. And indeed I love and 
 honor you as I ought to do, and would do anything to 
 please you and make you happy. And yet I am afraid— 
 sometimes I think—that I don’t try quite in the right way, 
 that there is something I fail in, something that would be 
 quite right if I were a little wiser, if I knew a little more. 
 And 1 want you, if you can—you, who are so good and so 
 indulgent with me even as I am—to help me to find out 
 what it is that I miss. You will say that you are satisfied 
 with me as I am—I^know that. But I want you to be 
 more than satisfied; I want you to—to make me more to 
 you, if you only can; to confide in me, and see if I don’t 
 deserve it—not for your sake—you are a man, and can be 
 sufficient to yourself; but I am a woman, and I can’t. 
 David, please forgive me for saying this; but to see you so 
 distant, so shut up from me, is terrible; I can not bear it!” 
 
 She paused a moment, not yet daring to look up, hoping 
 for some word of tenderness, of kindness. She had kept 
 her voice so low, so gentle; the thrill of heartfelt earnest¬ 
 ness that rang in her words only made them softer, 
 
 - .. .. - ' • . .a.*- . v: 
 
DORISES FORTUHE. 
 
 105 
 
 sweeter. Now, as she waited, she felt his left hand, on 
 which her fingers were resting, slip gradually from under 
 hers down on to his knee. She felt a chill of great fear. 
 He had been cold, passive, under her timid caresses before; 
 hut never before had he absolutely repulsed her. She raised 
 her eyes to his face with the dumb agony of a mortally 
 wounded animal. 
 
 David was asleep. 
 
 Her soft voice had acted as a lullaby to the tired man, 
 whose faculties had at once relaxed on finding that her 
 serious conversation did not concern the subjects just then 
 of most vital interest to him. 
 
 As cold and statuesque as David in his most reserved 
 moods, Doris quietly rose, picked up the despised case of 
 jewels to which her attention had been called by her acci¬ 
 dentally treading upon them, and, without another look at 
 her slumbering lord, swept from the room like another 
 Vashti. 
 
 The next morning she returned the jewels to Gussie, 
 sending them by the groom, with a rather formal note, say¬ 
 ing that she hoped he would not think her unkind, but that 
 she could not accept a present of so much value; if she 
 were to keep them, it would be ungracious not to wear 
 them; and, if she wore them, they would excite remark. 
 
 To her husband that morning she was very cold; but the 
 change in her escaped his attention. She told him of Gus¬ 
 sie's accession to fortune, and that he, in a frantically 
 generous mood, had offered her a Christmas present so 
 handsome that she was obliged to return it. At this Da¬ 
 vid's face clouded, and his wife watched the uneasy look in 
 his eyes with some hope that she had awakened by accident 
 the faint jealousy which she had given up the thought of 
 exciting by design. 
 
 “ You refused it!" he began, without looking at her; 
 then, after a moment's pause—■“ I think you are too par¬ 
 ticular, Doris; it was scarcely kind to snub poor Gussie for 
 such a very natural impulse toward a lady who had been 
 kind to him. When a man, an old friend too, has been 
 hospitably entertained a great many times at the same 
 house, he welcomes Christmas as an opportunity of reliev¬ 
 ing himself gracefully from an obligation." 
 
 Doris said nothing. For the moment she felt again the 
 some sharp sting of disgust and rebellion against this un- 
 
106 
 
 Boris's fortuke. 
 
 impressionable King Log which she had felt the night be¬ 
 fore. She could not know that, their thoughts running as 
 usual in separate grooves, her husband's words were merely 
 an apology to himself for his action of the day before in 
 taking down to the Lawns a pair of diamond solitaire ear¬ 
 rings as a peace-offering to Mrs. Hodson, who was offended 
 by a conscience-stricken excuse he had made when she re¬ 
 quired his attendance on two consecutive evenings. 
 
 So both Doris and her husband remained mute and un¬ 
 easy after this marital snub; and, as Christmas-eve was a 
 holiday at his office in Somerset House, David loafed about 
 the house by himself for a little while after breakfast, and 
 then sneaked off to the Lawns, trusting to luck and his 
 wife's overrated indifference for her to believe that he was 
 spending the day as usual in town. Mrs. Hodson's society 
 had become a necessity to him now. The settling influence 
 of marriage had in his case resulted in confirming him in 
 domesticity indeed, but by the wrong fireside. Where he 
 had been tolerated before he was now welcomed; and Da¬ 
 vid, though he was beginning to feel very acute tortures of 
 remorse now that the tide of speculation seemed to have 
 set in unfortunately for him, found that the feeble efforts 
 he made to escape were quite insufficient to break the chains 
 which the stock-broker's ingenuity and his wife's matronly 
 fascinations had bound securely round him. 
 
 By the last post that night Doris received a stiff note 
 from Mrs. Melton, evidently inspired if not dictated by 
 Gussie, regretting that their recent bereavement rendered 
 it impossible for them to pass Christmas at Fairleigh, as 
 Mr. and Mrs. Glyn had so kindly invited them to do. So 
 the party was incomplete, and the festivities were damped, 
 and the only people who enjoyed themselves with an un¬ 
 alloyed joy were Charlie Papillon and Hilda Warren, who 
 gave some of their time to a very serious discussion of the 
 “ something wrong " in the young household, and of course 
 disagreed violently as to the cause of it. 
 
 “ He neglects her, I am afraid," sighed Hilda sorrow¬ 
 fully. 
 
 “ She bores him, J am sure," said Charlie promptly. 
 
 “ He shouldn't have married her, if he was the cort of 
 man to be bored by a good woman." 
 
 “ Seven thousand a year blinds one to mere possibilities 
 Don't you think it would blind you?" 
 
 ' ' -***' .Hu.' i 6-. i V.. Ml j. ... . . h* * .. 
 
BORINS BQRlOTEo 
 
 10 ? 
 
 8S Yes, 5? answered Hilda frankly, “ I suppose it would. ” 
 
 “ Now, if I had seven thousand a year, you would over¬ 
 look my faults. 99 
 
 Poor Hilda! She was only too ready to overlook them 
 now. But Charlie, with that discretion which was not only 
 an empty boast, had sought her society less of late, having 
 no intention of burdening his easy life by the care of 
 a wife. If he were in Gussie’s place, it would be different; 
 and Charlie felt it very hard that he, of the three once-im- 
 pecunious friends, should be the only one left in poverty. 
 He now checked the passionate outburst which was in Hil¬ 
 da’s heart and on her lips by reminding her that they 
 must both “ marry money;” and the girl, with a pang of 
 jealousy, wondered whether the money were already daz¬ 
 zling his fickle and somewhat mercenary eyes. 
 
 Christmas was passed very quietly, and soon afterward 
 Doris, finding the loneliness of her life in the large house 
 by the river quie insupportable, expressed a wish to live in 
 town, to be near her grandmother. David, who was now, 
 under the pressure of business excitement, losing his usual 
 calmness and growing irritable and almost morose, agreed 
 at once; and they took a small furnished house near Glouces¬ 
 ter Eoad Station, a situation which David found very 
 convenient for Kichmond, and Doris pleasantly near to old 
 Mrs. Edgcombe’s home. 
 
 The old lady was always well informed concerning the 
 movements of the society around her, and it was she who 
 put Doris in possession of a piece of information concern¬ 
 ing the household at the Lawns which the latter imparted 
 to her husband in ihe evening, with startling effect. 
 
 “Do you know, David,” she said solemnly at dinner¬ 
 time, “ I have heard such a strange thing about Mrs. Hod- 
 son! I should scarcely like to repeat it, except that grand¬ 
 mamma told it me as a fact—and you know how particular 
 she is about scandal. 99 
 
 “What is it?” asked David, with cold blue eyes that 
 might have been of glass. 
 
 Why, it seems that, although her husband is known to 
 be in difficulties, Mrs. Hcdson dresses better than ever, 
 wears more jewelry, and has just ordered a new carriage! 
 It appears that Mrs. Bramwoll, who told grandmamma 
 this, and who is very vulgarljr inquisitive, as you know, was 
 having her brougham repaired at the same coach-builder's; 
 
108 
 
 doris's fortune. 
 
 and, hearing this pretty new victoria was for Mrs. Hodson, 
 she said she wondered he was not afraid of supplying goods 
 to such an extravagant household. And the coach-builder 
 said Mr. Hod son was not the gentleman to whom the bill 
 was sent in. " 
 
 Some strange change, showing interest, if not curiosity, 
 which came over David's face at her first mention of this 
 gossip caused her. to repeat it much more at length than 
 she had intended to do. When she finished, he asked 
 dryly: 
 
 “ And who is the gentleman?" 
 
 ‘ £ I am afraid to think . 9 9 
 
 There was a pause before he said, in a voice which would 
 have sounded uninterested and stony if he had ever shown 
 vivid interest in his talks with his wife— 
 
 “ Well, you have made some guess, of course?" 
 
 “ I am afraid it must be Gussie . 99 
 
 She was watching Mm, fearful lest he should think her 
 unduly censorious. At this, her answer, he made a move¬ 
 ment with his right elbow, so slight, so very slight that, as 
 he was turning away from her to feed the dog, she might 
 almost have thought it insignficant. But, for some reason 
 or other, that scarcely perceptible motion woke in the 
 young wife's mind the first faint breath of vague impalpa¬ 
 ble suspicion. It frightened her—for the moment, seemed 
 to stop her breath. The next minute David was gently 
 scolding her for listening to gossip, asserting his belief that 
 Gussie had nothing to do with Mrs. Hodson and her car¬ 
 riages. 
 
 66 Why, my dear child, look how often I am obliged to 
 be there on business with Mr. Hodson! And I tell you I 
 am sure Gussie is not at the Lawns once a week." 
 
 David hated himself for this speech; but he was too deep 
 in tho mire now to draw back from an occasional lie, im¬ 
 plied or spoken; and his wife was in a mood that must be 
 satisfied, he thought. 
 
 But it was a bad sign that she seemed satisfied so easily; 
 she said no more on the subject, and, if David had under¬ 
 stood women better, he would have been alarmed. 
 
 The next day Mrs. Glyn drove to the Lawns to call upon 
 Mrs. Hodson. That lady was out, but was expected to re 
 turn immediately; in the meantime, would Mrs. Glyn see 
 the young ladies? They were both in the drawing-room. 
 
DORISES FORTUM. 
 
 109 
 
 .Doris decided to remain, and to renew the acquaintance of 
 .Nellie and Ethel, whom she had not seen since they were 
 children. The girls “ took " to her, and in a few minutes 
 were chattering to her on very friendly terms. 
 
 i6 I wish you "would come as often as Mr. Glyn,” said 
 the elder and more impulsive one, when the ice was broken. 
 Doris smiled without pleasure. 
 
 “ He goes about more than I do. " 
 
 “ Why, yes, he's always here!'' said Nellie, with a tinge 
 of contempt. 
 
 Doris saw the younger and shrewder-looking girl give a 
 warning glance at her incautious sister; and a sharp pain 
 shot through her heart like a knife. The dull pain of sus¬ 
 pense and neglect was over; she was jealous. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Doris Glyn felt strongly tempted, on feeling the sharp 
 pang which the two little girls had innocently given her, 
 to leave the Lawns abruptly and hasten home to prepare 
 for meeting her husband. A few moments' reflection how¬ 
 ever was enough for her to remember that she really had 
 no ground for demanding the explanation she wished from 
 him. He had never concealed from her the fact that he 
 paid frequent visits to the Lawns, and the jealous suspicions 
 she had formed in a moment, based upon a few words and a 
 look passed between two thoughtless and ignorant young 
 girls, would not form a very substantial ground foi a direct 
 accusation. So she decided, while still listening unintelli- 
 gently to the prattle of Nellie and Ethel, that she would 
 see Mrs. Hodson; perhaps the meeting would either allay 
 her jealousy or give her stronger reasons for it. Doris felt 
 besides a sudden vivid interest in the woman whom she be¬ 
 lieved to be her rival in her husband’s affection; she must 
 judge for herself these charms for which she had been neg¬ 
 lected. 
 
 She had not to wait long. When, at the end of another 
 ten minutes, a loud ring at the bell was followed by Mrs. 
 Hodson's high-pitched bright laugh in the hall, Doris's 
 heart began to beat violently. The next moment it seemed 
 to stand still; for she heard her own husband's sweet low 
 voice in tones as measured as usual, but more cheerful than 
 those he kept for domestic use. 
 
110 
 
 Doris’s fortuhe. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson apparently dashed into the drawing-room 
 before the servant had a chance of telling her who was 
 there; for, as the door opened and she sailed in with David 
 in her train, both their faces suddenly changed. Of course 
 the lady recovered herself immediately, and rushed impul¬ 
 sively up to Doris with outstretched hands and such expres¬ 
 sions as are usually reserved for friends returning home 
 after long and dangerous voyages. But David, less ex¬ 
 perienced, remained a light yellow-green color during the 
 embarrassing interview, and kept as much in the back¬ 
 ground as he could. Both knew that Doris’s unexpected 
 call was more than a regrettable accident—both would 
 have guessed it from her manner. 
 
 She did not express any surprise at seeing her hustand 
 and responded to Mrs. Hodson’s warm welcome with per¬ 
 fect though somewhat frigid courtesy. But there was an 
 entire lack of spontaneity in every word she uttered, a 
 statuesque stillness about her manner, which could be the 
 result only of a stem fight with emotions too strong to be 
 allowed the least vent. 
 
 “ You are looking very pale and ill, Mrs. Glyn,” said 
 the elder lady boldly, resolved not to find her guest’s cold 
 dignity disconcerting. That is the worst of these boys,” 
 she continued, with a lively and contemptuous nod toward 
 David; “ when they marry, they don’t in the least know 
 how to treat a wife. I am always telling Mr. Glyn ”— 
 somehow Mrs. Glyn’s expression seemed to preclude the 
 use of her husband’s Christian name before her—“ that he 
 doesn’t deserve to have a wife at all.” 
 
 “ It is very good of you,” said Doris. 
 
 “ I am afraid you are too indulgent with him,” con¬ 
 tinued Mrs. Hodson undauntedly. I don’t believe in 
 letting a man have too much of his own way. You should 
 have a will of your own, and let him know it. You are 
 spoiled,” she added, turning to David. 
 
 Dragged thus by force into the conversation, he said 
 huskily— 
 
 “ I dare say I am. Most women are too good for their 
 husbands. ” 
 
 A spasm of pain crossed Doris’s face. Her husband’s re¬ 
 mark was not made in a sneering tone, but she felt in a 
 moment that it formed the staple of any complaint he 
 would bring against her, {She was too good for him, she 
 
DORIS’S FORTUNE. 
 
 Ill 
 
 who had thought herself so much honored by his choice of 
 her! Mrs. Hodson came to the rescue in what would have 
 been an extremely awkward moment. 
 
 “ Most women? All women!” she said, in her round 
 emphatic tone. “ Even Bertram would allow that. Now 
 will you stay and dine with me? My husband will not be 
 home to dinner, and it will be a charity. ” 
 
 Doris made civil excuses, reflecting that, but for her ap¬ 
 pearance, David and Mrs. Hodson would have passed the 
 evening tete-a-tete , with the demure little girls playing open- 
 eared propriety. As it was, when she rose to go, David 
 had no choice but to go too. 
 
 Mrs. Hodson was very snappish and silent with her little 
 girls when her visitors were gone, dropping at once the 
 brilliant manner for the domestic one, which had in her 
 case few charms. Nellie and Ethel, who, while kicking a 
 little against her maternal regime of suppression, worshiped 
 her loyally as the queen of the world, had the little flicker- 
 ings of liveliness by which they tried to entertain her 
 promptly extinguished in a most galling manner; for in 
 the inopportune appearance of Doris Glyn that afternoon 
 Mrs. Hodson foresaw more than the spoiling of an evening. 
 So did David. He took his seat in the brougham by his 
 wife’s side, intrenched in the sullen silence with which he 
 meant to meet her torrents of righteous wrath. She had 
 never given him a “ lecture ” yet; but David, convention¬ 
 ally minded in this as in other things, cherished a great 
 horror of a woman’s tongue, and a belief that all women 
 were at heart termagants, more or less restrained by good¬ 
 breeding. That the moment was ripe for good-breeding to 
 snap in his wife’s case lie did not doubt. So he waited for 
 the deluge. 
 
 None came. Doris sat beside him as silent as he, until 
 they were very near their home. Then she said, in a voice 
 almost as kind as usual, though there was a break in it now 
 and then— 
 
 “ Shall I go on to grandmamfria’s and ask her if she will 
 come in and dine with us this evening? She has not been 
 with us for four days, and she may perhaps begin to think 
 herself neglected. ” 
 
 “ It is very thoughtful of you,” said David, with heart¬ 
 felt relief at the prospect of a third person to break that 
 ghastly silence or still more distressing dialogue which was 
 
112 Boris’s fomuhi. 
 
 all that was possible that evening between himself and hk 
 wife. 
 
 He was not indeed without qualms of fear, as he stepped 
 out of the brougham and told the coachman to drive to 
 Mrs. Edgcombe’s, lest Doris should be reserving herself for 
 an onslaught upon him in the presence of a person whom 
 in the meantime she would have turned into an active ally. 
 But he had to own to himself that this would be mean and 
 unlike Doris; and he was not surprised, when the ladies 
 returned together, to find the elder at least as cheerful and 
 affectionate as usual. He had one fright, however, when 
 dinner was over, and he was preparing an orange for the 
 old lady. Mrs. Edgcombe cleared her throat and folded 
 her pretty fragile little hands one in the other as her custom 
 was when she had anything important to say. 
 
 David quaked, and the knife and the orange remained 
 for a moment still between his fingers. 
 
 “ I have something to say to you, David, to which I shall 
 be glad if you will give particular attention. It is a matter 
 on which Doris has just spoken to me herself, and, as it 
 concerns the welfare of both of you very nearly, I hope you 
 will not consider that I am taking too much upon myself 
 in mentioning it first. ” 
 
 It was an alarming preamble to listen to with a guilty 
 conscience, certainly, though the dignified manner of it 
 was but a habit of the old lady’s. 
 
 “ Anything you have to say will of course have all my 
 attention,” he answered very stiffly, arming himself at all 
 points, and coldly hating Doris for putting him into this 
 intolerable position of being dictated to by an outsider. 
 
 “ I have been thinking, and Doris agrees with me, that 
 you both want a change, a thorough change. Doris, as 
 you must see, as everybody sees, is looking like the ghost 
 of what she was a year ago, and you are not the same man 
 at all that you were before you got so much absorbed in the 
 affairs of the city. None of the pretty little attentions you 
 used to pay me six months ago— Why, that is the first 
 orange you have prepared for me in the careful way I like 
 for weeks! You are growing irritable, and your irritability 
 tells on poor Doris; I can see it myself, though she never 
 complains. ” 
 
 Doris tried to interrupt her; but the old lady put up her 
 little hand, and went on— 
 
 
Boris’s fortune. 113 
 
 * e You must get right away from business and everything 
 connected with it.” 
 
 These last words, innocently said, made him wince. 
 
 ‘ 4 You have had no honey-moon; you would carry out your 
 new-fangled ideas, and do without it. But the old-fashioned 
 way is the best. Be entirely dependent upon each other’s 
 society for a little while among strangers, and you will get 
 used to each other and grow into each other’s ways, as you 
 have never yet had a chance of doing. ” 
 
 Yes; but to be entirely dependent upon each other’s 
 society when each had failed to like it! The suggestion 
 was a knell in David’s ears; for he knew by his wife’s 
 silence that she acquiesced in the proposed arrangement, 
 and in the circumstances he was not in a position to refuse 
 any proposal of hers. 
 
 “ Where do you want to go, Doris?” he asked, in a voice 
 which did not sound promising for the threatened lengthy 
 tete-a-tete. 
 
 6 6 Well, even grandmamma would not propose an abso¬ 
 lute wilderness, I should think. W T hat do you say to 
 Paris?” 
 
 “ I have nothing to say to it. It is just as you please. ” ' 
 
 “ Paris let it be then, and let us go soon,” said Doris 
 quietly. 
 
 David’s manner was ungracious; but it could scarcely be 
 expected to be anything else just now. His affairs, while 
 under his own control, having been marvelously ill-con¬ 
 ducted, were being gently but firmly taken out of his hands; 
 and David the godlike, in the position of a naughty boy 
 found out, was out of his element and sufficiently pitiable. 
 Even he did not feel the bitter pathos of the situation as 
 keenly as Doris, who was soon as anxious to get rid of the 
 innocent old grandmother, whose shrewdness and ingenu¬ 
 ousness were alike dangerous, as she had been in the after¬ 
 noon to get her. 
 
 When David returned from escorting Mrs. Edgcombe 
 home, he found Doris engaged in the drawing-room pack¬ 
 ing away in cases specially made for the purpose certain bits 
 of valuable china which had been among their wedding- 
 presents. ' 
 
 “ What are you doing?” he asked somewhat sullenly. 
 
 “ Putting these little things out of reach of the servants 
 fingers while we are away/’ 
 
114 
 
 DOKIS*S FOKTUKE. 
 
 “ When do you propose to go then?” 
 
 “ Can’t we be ready by the day after to-morrow?” 
 
 David spoke “ a hundred miles away ” from her. 
 
 “ And what is to become of my business—your business^ 
 Affairs in the city are in a very critical state just now.” 
 
 Indeed they were in a state more critical for him than he 
 knew. \ 
 
 “ You can leave the business safely in the hands of a 
 man in whom you place such absolute confidence as you 
 do in—your financial adviser, surely? And at your office 
 you have only to ask to get your holiday when you please. 
 Isn’t that so, David?” 
 
 He muttered an unwilling assent, and turned toward the 
 door. His wife’s heart leaped up. If this were shame at 
 his own conduct, there was hope for them yet. She flew 
 across the room, and stopped him on the threshold with a 
 gentle hando 
 
 “ David, David, don’t you want to go away with me? 
 Won’t you try to be happy with me?” 
 
 David was not hard, though in his weakness he often 
 had to shield himself behind a dull reserve which made 
 him appear so. At his wife’s appealing cry he stopped at 
 once; but there was no flood of devoted affection rushing 
 up from her heart to impel her to encircle him with loving 
 arms and win him to her then and forever. Timidly, ap¬ 
 pealingly, she crept up to him, and, with modest, humble 
 glances, looked into his face and failed utterly to read 
 through the cold blank blue eyes the need he felt of some 
 emotion stronger than his own to break through the crust 
 of his daily self and get at the better man within him that 
 had not the courage to break its own bonds of custom. In¬ 
 deed Doris felt no passionate affection for this pretty gen¬ 
 tleman, who had treated her, in a perfectly calm and well- 
 bred way, as badly as such a pretty gentleman could do. 
 Her reverence for him had, with scarcely any preparation, 
 given place to a chaotic confusion of feelings in which in¬ 
 dignation ancl^ contempt struggled with womanly pity and 
 forbearance toward the man who, after all, was her hus¬ 
 band, the companion bound to her for a life which, how¬ 
 ever one’s ignorant illusions about it might be shattered, 
 one was still bound to make the best of. This attitude was 
 of course not tender or emotional enough to strike into an 
 
Doris’s fortune. 11,1 
 
 ardent flame whatever love he still had for his wife. He 
 only said gently— 
 
 “ Oh, yes, we both want a change—you especially, I am 
 sure!” And then, after waiting for a moment for the out¬ 
 burst which was further off than ever, he left her to her¬ 
 self. 
 
 Two days later they started for Paris. David did not 
 dare to see either Mr. or Mrs. Hodson again, restrained by 
 mingled feelings in which perhaps shame and embarrass¬ 
 ment at his new position had the largest share. He con¬ 
 tented himself with writing letters to t both—to the former 
 a purely business communication, to the latter a civil note 
 regretting that he was leaving for Paris without a chance 
 ©f wishing her gooi-bye—not an affectionate note by any 
 means, but one in which the ingenious Mrs. Hodson could 
 read between the lines that her hold upon him was not 
 relaxed. 
 
 On the contrary, after the first few days of this deferred 
 mock honey-moon, David felt more than ever the need of 
 the vivacious society of the broker’s wife. Had he been by 
 himself in Paris, he might have found stimulating attrac¬ 
 tions; but the duet of perpetual good behavior between him 
 and his wife made the boulevards dull, sight-seeing a bore 
 to both of them. Doris’s natural cheerfulness and ready 
 wit, which had easily earned for the young heiress the repu¬ 
 tation of brilliancy, deserted her and left her spiritless and 
 leaden in the never-ending strain to afford her husband a 
 pleasure which her society seemed incapable of yielding 
 him. He on his side conscientiously tried to meet her half¬ 
 way, and his forced attention and liveliness made her regret 
 his old taciturnity. So they passed a horrible fortnight of 
 new constraint worse than the old, which the one had not 
 the courage and the other had not the will to attempt to 
 break, until a startling piece of news from England released 
 them from this galling bondage. 
 
 It was the announcement, in an English paper, of Mr. 
 Hodson’s failure on the Stock Exchange. 
 
 David was at breakfast with his wife when he read a para¬ 
 graph containing the tidings in the “ Times” of the day 
 before. Doris saw him turn white, and asked timidly what 
 was the matter. 
 
 “Mr. Hodson has failed,” he said, in a tone he could 
 scarcely keep tranquil. 
 
116 
 
 doris’s fortuhb. 
 
 “ Oh, I am sorry!” she returned, in a low voice, after a 
 moment’s shy pause. Then, as her husband rose from his 
 chair, she asked diffidently, “ Will it affect you?” 
 
 “Yes; and that unfortunately includes you,” he ad* 
 mitted, in a dull measured voice. 
 
 “ Oh, never mind that!” cried Doris, with animation, 
 as, seeing a hope that this might perhaps help to bring 
 them together, she got up and almost ran to him. “ What 
 does that matter? You did your best,"and money is such a 
 trifling thing between husband and wife, between—you and 
 —me. It can’t be helped, and, if we have lost anything, 
 if we have lost a great deal even, it will not trouble me at 
 ail. ” 1 
 
 “ I can not take the matter like that, Doris, ” said he 
 gently, but avoiding her eyes. “ I must go back to Lon¬ 
 don this very day, and see what the position of affairs really 
 is, and what is to be done.” 
 
 “ We must go back?” she faltered, with the slightest 
 possible emphasis on the pronoun. 
 
 “No, no, not you. I shall travel in a hurry and may 
 be back* to-morrow. You won’t mind being left by your¬ 
 self just for a day, will you?” 
 
 Doris looked at him imploringly; she dared not venture 
 to plead in words; away from her grandmother, with no 
 one to support her proposals, she felt timid; and the result 
 of her first move toward complete confidence had been too 
 appallingly barren for her to be bold again. So she 
 packed his things herself, and saw him off with a horrible 
 sense of loneliness and longing. 
 
 “ You will come back soon, won’t«you?” she entreated 
 with all-possible sweetness and docility, as he gave her a 
 warm but well-bred hand-pressure in the publicity of the 
 barrier at the station. 
 
 And he said, “Yes,” of course he would, smiling at 
 her much more brightly than he had done since their com¬ 
 ing to Paris. 
 
 Rut Doris watched him disappear from, her sight with 
 fear at her heart. 
 
 CHAPTER X7I. 
 
 It was past seven o’clock and qui^e dark when, bv her 
 husband’s departure, Doris found herself alone in Paris, 
 
doris's fortune. 
 
 11? 
 
 She waited at the barrier until the whistle and steaming of 
 the engine announced that the train had left the station; 
 and then, turning very slowly and absently, she made her 
 way back to the fiacre in which she and David had come. 
 Her husband had wanted Whitaker, the maid, to accom¬ 
 pany them to the station, in order that Doris might not be 
 alone when he left her. But she had rejected the proposal, 
 moved by a strong but timid hope that during the last 
 quarter of an hour together some impulse of affection to¬ 
 ward the young wife he was leaving might move David, and 
 
 f ive her the opportunity she longed for of opening her 
 eart to him and pouring out the sweet loving words which 
 were ready to come straight from her very soul on the least 
 encouragement, and so prepare the way for a happy meet¬ 
 ing on his return to Paris. 
 
 But David had given her no such encouragement. She 
 had sat beside him on the narrow seat of the little coupe, so 
 near to him that she wondered he did not hear the beating 
 of her heart or feel the tremor that shook her limbs. He 
 gave her most full and particular directions to take care of 
 herself, with more animation than usual in his soft voice. 
 But it was not a sympathetic cheerfulness, being apparent¬ 
 ly excited by no more tender feeling than exhilaration of 
 spirits at the prospect of leaving her. And now he was 
 gone, and the strain of receiving his elaborate civility with 
 an appearance of gratitude was over; and Doris got into 
 the coupe again, feeling that the second honey-moon had 
 been a far more disastrous failure than the first. 
 
 “ A Vhotel , madame V’ asked the driver. 
 
 Doris hesitated. It was not much past seven: she had 
 dined already with David; there was a long, long, dreary 
 evening to be got through alone. 
 
 “ Au Bois/ 9 said she. 
 
 So, at the delightfully slow pace of the carriage hired by 
 the hour, she was driven through the Champs Elysees, the 
 avenue, and along the now dark roads of the Bois de Bou¬ 
 logne It was a cheerless excursion, and, finding that the 
 blank dreariness of the coldly shining water and the sway¬ 
 ing leafless trees failed to heip her thoughts to any profita¬ 
 ble practical issue, she was glad to turn back to the bright 
 lights of the city. 
 
 Th e fiacre was approaching the boulevards again, when a 
 wish struck her for active exercise to ease the burden of her 
 
118 
 
 Doris’s portxjK^. 
 
 thought; and, with the daring of the Englishwoman, she 
 got out, paid the driver, and continued her progress on 
 foot. The street in which she had stopped was rather dark, 
 very narrow, and almost deserted. Doris could see bright 
 lights and hear the loud hum of traffic at the further end. 
 
 As she walked on quickly, feeling already some sense of 
 her own hardihood as she remembered that she would have 
 to ask the way to her hotel, she came suddenly upon a little 
 group of figures crouching in a door-way. Miserable ob¬ 
 jects they were—a man, a woman, and a child, slinking 
 through the darkest streets by easy stages, creeping into 
 holes and corners to rest and to evade the sharp eyes of the 
 Paris police, while they plied their wretched trade of beg- 
 ging. 
 
 Doris’s heart was stirred, not by pity, but by a strange 
 illogical envy, as she saw the man draw the woman’s un¬ 
 kempt head down upon his shoulder. The tears rushed to 
 her eyes as she walked on. Happy even in their wretched¬ 
 ness these poor creatures must be, she thought—she who 
 was beginning to feel that she would surrender everything 
 which she had been taught to look upon as necessary to 
 her very existence just to remove that slight upon her 
 womanhood, her husband’s neglect. Then she heard a soft 
 shuffling patter of footsteps behind her, and a woman’s 
 whining voice imploring “ the dear lady to whom Heaven 
 had given everj r blessing to have pity on poor wretches 
 without a roof or a crust.” 
 
 Doris stopped, took out her purse, and gave generously, 
 foolishly, hurrying on afterward, but not before the woman, 
 too much overwhelmed to remember her set formula of 
 commonplace blessings, had flown stealthily back to the 
 corner where her wretched companions awaited her. 
 
 Doris was in the sensitive mood to profit by a great les¬ 
 son. The chance contact of her own misery, which she 
 had considered overwhelming, with another sort of misery 
 which she had to acknowledge was more acute still, opened 
 her mind quite suddenly to two new ideas. The one was 
 that even people whom she envied might be more unhappy 
 than she was; the other, that, since she was an object of 
 envy to other people, perhaps it was only fair that she 
 should have trials too. 
 
 And Doris bore her suspense more patiently after that, 
 and also the little shock caused two mornings later by Da' 
 
doris’s eortuhe. 
 
 ii.9 
 
 vid’s letter. He was sorry he could not return to Paris 
 immediately; their affairs had been even more seriously 
 affected by Mr. Hodson’s failure than he had expected. He 
 apologized lengthily, elaborately, with stiff and awkward 
 humility and penitence, for having embarked in specula¬ 
 tions with her money, which however he had had every 
 reason for considering safe; and he wound up by saying 
 that, in order that she might not be dull without him, he 
 had already dispatched Hilda Warren to bear her company 
 until he could come to fetch her himself. 
 
 Doris resented this letter at first, and felt that David had 
 no right, since he could not or would not come to her him¬ 
 self, to foist another person upon her without consulting 
 her. But, when that evening the young girl arrived, and, 
 warned by a telegram, Doris met her at the station, the 
 lonely wife could not fail to feel comforted by the sight of 
 a bright and familiar face. 
 
 Hilda at first showed some reserve in her mention of Da¬ 
 vid; but Doris, guessing from this that she knew something 
 ji the strained relations between her and her husband, de¬ 
 termined to force the girl to be frank. 
 
 “ You have seen my husband, Hilda?” she asked ab¬ 
 ruptly, when dinner was oven 
 
 “Yes; he called to ask mamma to let me come.” 
 
 “ Did he say anything about coming over himself— 
 when he should come, for instance?” resumed the young 
 wife diffidently. 
 
 “ No,” answered Hilda shortly. Then, with an outburst 
 of passionate sympathy, she continued, “ Don’t talk about 
 him; it makes me ill. He is your husband, I know; but to 
 hear you, young, beautiful, clever, and good as you are, 
 worrying yourself about that ungrateful, cold-blooded rattle¬ 
 snake is too much for my patience! Leave him to that 
 woman, Doris, and let her pick his very bones. ” 
 
 Bat Doris, instead of taking fire at this confirmation of 
 her fears, began meekly to cry in most weak-minded fash¬ 
 ion. 
 
 “He went back for her then—for Mrs. Hodson?” she 
 quavered out, very intent on the contents of an etagdre by 
 her side. 
 
 “ Yes, of course. You were too good for him, Doris. 1 
 like men much better than women, as a rule, as you know. 
 But you are different from oibc” women, and I really think. 
 
I %0 DORISES FORTUKR. * 
 
 Doris, you ought never to have condescended to care for 
 any man.” 
 
 Doris had risen from her chair, and was wandering about 
 the room. She came and stood behind Hilda, and spoke 
 very sadly, though she tried to be playful. 
 
 “ Certainly I am a failure as a wife.” 
 
 “ No; David is a failure as a husband.” 
 
 “ But he would not have been a failure as the husband 
 of Mrs. Hodson.” 
 
 “ And you wouldn’t have been a failure as the wife of— 
 Gussie Melton!” 
 
 “Hush!” said Doris peremptorily; but, after another 
 aimless ramble as far as the window and back again, she 
 leaned over the chair she had been using, and said, “ It is 
 too late to be reticent now. What do you mean about 
 Gussie? You want to make a romance out of nothing.” 
 
 “ No, I don’t. I am tired of romances.” 
 
 “ Tired? How about Charlie Papillon?” 
 
 “Charlie?”—with a hard struggle to be indifferent. 
 “ Oh, Charlie is going to marry that rich umbrella-mak¬ 
 er’s daughter, Binks, or Jinks, or something like that her 
 name is; but she will have two thousand a year!” 
 
 “ Oh, Hilda, I’m so sorry!” 
 
 “Are your I’m not. I knew it must end somehow 
 like that; and it might have ended worse. I am a little 
 sore, of course; but you have no idea how quickly I should 
 get over it if only a young gentleman with two thousand a 
 year would turn up to pair off with me.” 
 
 “ You don’t mean that?” 
 
 “Yes; I do;” and Hilda looked up and nodded most 
 honestly, with a quaint shrewd face to which feeling and 
 intelligence gave variable and interesting expression. 
 
 “You are an odd girl, Hilda. I think you have read 
 too much Thackeray and seen too many of Gilbert’s plays.” 
 
 “ I’ ve seen too much of life and known too many people 
 —not only, as you have, on launches and in ball-rooms, 
 where to me, who know them better, they seem mere ape¬ 
 like caricatures of themselves; and I have learned to take 
 life as it comes, as so many of the pretty young men of 
 your acquaintance do; to live a little brightly in the world, 
 and a great deal gloomily out of it; to be prepared to see 
 love ride away, and to be thankful the very same morning 
 that butter has gone down twopence in the pound. That 
 
DORISES FORSlJKEc 121 
 
 sort of experience is worth all the Gilbert and Thackeray 
 in the world for making one cynical. " 
 
 “ I've never heard you talk like this before, Hilda. " 
 
 “ No. Talk like that would have had no meaning to 
 you once. You see, although you have been in the world 
 two or three years longer than I have, you know compara¬ 
 tively little of it. If you had been happy in your married 
 life, I should never have disturbed your innocent igno¬ 
 rance; but trouble makes the pretty wax-work human, and 
 so—and so you have the noble privilege of seeing my char¬ 
 acter in all its revolting mercenariness. " 
 
 Doris laughed softly as she looked into the young face 
 somewhat lined already by thought and passion. 
 
 “ Poor child!” she said gently. Then she added, after 
 a short pause, “ I am glad you have spoken plainly to me. 
 What you say about trouble is true, I think—I seem able to 
 understand better than I used to do. And, now that I have 
 a sorrow of my own, I feel so very differently about other 
 people's sorrows—they are not only jjjst words now. I be¬ 
 gin to think that, if I had had some trouble before I mar¬ 
 ried, David would have found me more interesting—-less 
 like wax-work." 
 
 Hilda was sorry she had used that word; but it was too 
 late to repent it now. 
 
 The next moment Doris, with a new warmth in her kind¬ 
 ness, was asking her young guest what sh^ would like to 
 see next day; and they avoided dangerous subjects for the 
 rest of the evening. 
 
 A laborious programme of sight-seeing was arranged for 
 the benefit of Hilda, who had not been in Paris since she 
 was a child; and the next morning Doris spoke, on their 
 first meeting, of nothing but the business of the day. Yet 
 her companion was shrewd enough to notice that it required 
 an effort for her to keep her attention from wandering, 
 and that the young wife's face fell when the post from Eng¬ 
 land came and brought only one letter. This was from 
 Mrs. Edgcombe, and, after reading it, Doris sat in silence 
 for some moments; then, meeting Hilda's sympathetically 
 inquiring eyes, she said, in a low voice: 
 
 ‘‘ My grandmother knows nothing, has heard nothing. 
 And yet she has seen David. He may come yet. You see, 
 things arc not so bad as you thought. I—I will write; I 
 cun now.” 
 
122 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 Doris’s placid innocent face had lost*'all its calm beauty 1 
 Hilda felt a great throb of pity for her, knowing well what 
 acute misery the change betokened. 
 
 “ Don’t trouble yourself so much about him, Doris. He 
 isn’t worth it,” she whispered, putting her arms round her 
 friend, as she had never before thought of doing to that 
 majestic young woman. “ It will all come right again. He 
 will never have the pluck to run away with her, and she is 
 the last person to be carried away by her emotions or any- 
 thing else. He will come cringing back to you, and then 
 you will have him at your mercy and can walk upon him 
 as much as you like.” 
 
 This vague satisfaction seemed the most appropriate to 
 suggest to a stately lady like Doris, too much bound by the 
 laws of convention to break away altogether from her hus¬ 
 band, too timid to make any strong efforts to win him 
 back. Indeed Doris presented, during the whole of that 
 day, a most puzzling problem to her more worldly-wise 
 friend. After having received Hilda’s cynical attempts at 
 comfort with only a gentle remonstrance, she again became 
 reserved on the subject which was engrossing her thoughts 
 and feelings, and devoted herself, with a grace which com¬ 
 panionship with the unsympathetic David had taught her, 
 to appearing interested in the long rooms full of pictures at 
 the Louvre and the Luxembourg, which were a source of 
 real delight to the young artist. 
 
 On their return to the hotel an hour before dinner-time, 
 Doris shut herself up in her bedroom to write a letter to 
 her husband; she had every word of it ready in her head, 
 so that she wrote it, folded it, went down-stairs, and with 
 her own hand dropped it into the letter-box within a quar¬ 
 ter of an hour of her return. 
 
 This was the letter: 
 
 “ My dear David,—I am very unhappy now that you 
 are gone away. I never was so unhappy before; and this 
 makes me think that perhaps you, who are older than I by 
 eight years, can not have passed thirty-two years of life 
 without trouble, have found me unsympathetic through my 
 not having known so many feelings as you have known. I 
 think it has very likely made me seem cold and conceited, 
 so that there has been no sympathy between us because we 
 did not understand each other. I can not express what I 
 
DORIS'S FORTUM. 
 
 125 
 
 mean very well; but I feel so many feelings now* angry 
 ones and sad ones and loving ones, that all seem new and 
 strange to me, that I can not write much for fear of saying 
 something that will offend you and make you stay away 
 from me longer. If you will only come, I will try to please 
 you harder than I have done, and, if you are unhappy I 
 will be sorry too—I will indeed! Please do come, if you 
 care ever so little for 
 
 “ Your affectionate wife, 
 
 “*Doris. ” 
 
 Then she went into the sitting-room to dinner, with a 
 feeling that she had taken a very bold step indeed, and an 
 anxious flutter of the heart as to the fate of the letter, every 
 sentence of which rang again and again in her mind, while 
 she tremblingly asked herself. Was it too cold? Was it too 
 bold? Would it leave him as untouched as her shrinking 
 caresses used to do? 
 
 Both Doris and Hilda were rather silent at dinner, for 
 which the fatigue of sight-seeing made a satisfactory excuse. 
 The situation was growing too serious for discussion of tri¬ 
 fling subjects, while the presence of the waiters closed their 
 lips on serious ones. 
 
 Dessert was on the table when a card was brought in 
 with the information that a gentleman wished to see ma- 
 dame. 
 
 Doris’s face grew pale with anxiety, Hilda’s red with in¬ 
 dignation, when they read the name—“ Mr. Augustus Mel¬ 
 ton. ” 
 
 “ You won’t see him, will you?” asked Hilda, in a low 
 voice. 
 
 I must know why he has come,” murmured Doris. 
 
 I will see him for you, if you like. You can go into 
 
 your room. ” 
 
 Doris seemed relieved. Hilda looked straight into her 
 friend’s eyes after the waiter had gone down-stairs to escort 
 the gentleman up. 
 
 “ You would rather not see him yourself, seriously?” 
 she asked gravely. 
 
 “ I would rather not, indeed, just now. But I am deep¬ 
 ly, miserably anxious to know why he has come. I am 
 afraid his coming means—” 
 
 ~ Ill-luck. I shall tell him so,” said Hilda promptly. 
 
 C( 
 
 ec 
 
 
12 4 
 
 BORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 “ Don’t be harsh to him/’ said Doris, as she put hei 
 hand on the door which led straight from the sitting-room 
 into her bedroom. “ He is a kind-hearted fellow. He 
 showed me the most warm-hearted sympathy when I was 
 unhappy a little while ago. ” 
 
 “ He has no business to bring his sympathy here now!” 
 answered Hilda, with ferocity. 
 
 And, as she closed the door abruptly on Doris and seated 
 herself in an attitude of rigid dignity by the table to receive 
 Mr. Augustus Melton, her pretty face expressed a very 
 strong determination to “ let him have it.” 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 When Mr. Augustus Melton, all fire and impetuosity, 
 dashed into the sitting-room where he expected to find 
 Doris Glyn, he grew suddenly calm and meek and crest¬ 
 fallen on finding himself face to face with another lady. 
 
 “ How do you do?” said Hilda, with a very frigid bend 
 of the head. 
 
 “ Oh—er—I’m quite well, thank you! Very glad to see 
 you. Er—where is—er—Mrs. Glyn?” 
 
 “ Mrs. Glyn has asked me to see you for her, as she does 
 not feel equal to receiving visitors this evening.” 
 
 “ Visitors? No. But she might see me, I should 
 think. ” 
 
 “Unfortunately Mrs. Glyn does not see any reason for 
 making a distinction. ” 
 
 “ I don’t know what you mean, Miss Warren,” broke 
 out Gussie violently. “ t tell you I must see Doris.” 
 
 “ Hardly against her will, I should think! Even you 
 would scarcely venture on that.” 
 
 “ I tell you I have news for her of the most vital impor¬ 
 tance.” 
 
 “ Then you may intrust it to me, and I will undertake 
 to convey it to her in the most accurate manner. ” 
 
 Again and again Gussie glanced at the closed folding- 
 doors, as if he suspected Doris to be within hearing, and 
 hoped that his words might bring her out. But Hilda ap¬ 
 parently paid no heed to the direction of his eyes, and re¬ 
 mained so indifferent that he ended by keeping his gaze 
 fixed upon her. 
 
DORICS FORTUHE. 
 
 125 
 
 “ What I have to say concerns her husband; it can not 
 be told her too gently." 
 
 “ Then it is as well that the telling should not be in your 
 hands . 99 
 
 Gussie, who had been busily brushing his hat with his 
 hand, now grasped it firmly and rose. 
 
 “ Sit down and say what you have to say, to me/* said 
 Hilda imperiously; and, after standing for a moment in an 
 attitude of heroic indignation, he sat down. 
 
 “ Mr. Hodson has failed on the Stock Exchange and has 
 run away from his wife; and she has run away from him, 
 and David Glyn has run after her/* he blurted out simply. 
 
 Hilda sat quite still, with her head tilted at the same con¬ 
 temptuous angle as before, and uttered a short ejaculation 
 of supreme disgust. 
 
 “ And do you think that would be a proper communica¬ 
 tion to make to Mrs. Glyn?** 
 
 “ At any rate, it is something she must know.** 
 
 “ And something you are glad to be able to tell!** she 
 cried, her tone changing suddenly into one of the utmost 
 ferocity. “ Here are tidings shocking enough to kill a 
 sensitive woman like Doris, and you ring them out with 
 triumph, thinking that one man's fall must be another 
 man's victory!'* 
 
 “ She can get a divorce/* suggested Gussie, in a low 
 voice. 
 
 “ What would she gain by that?** 
 
 “ She would be free." 
 
 To take another of you, I suppose! She will be in a 
 great hurry to do that after such an experience!'* 
 
 “ You are too hard. Miss Warren/* said Gussie uneasily, 
 moving restlessly on his chair and looking at his hat. 
 “ Men are not all alike, any more than women are. You 
 don't think that—that I would have treated a—a woman 
 so?" 
 
 “ No; but you would have done something a great deal 
 worse if I hadn't happened to be here." 
 
 Gussie started, and looked up with a hot angry flush on 
 his face. But Hilda continued pitilessly— 
 
 “ You know how delicate a woman's position is when 
 her husband abandons her; and yet, without a moment's 
 thought for her name, you bounce over here, all passion 
 and sympathy and goodness knows what, to show up your 
 
126 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 own beautiful devotion in sharp contrast to the other man's 
 neglect, never caring what the consequences may be, ready 
 to risk what people may say of her, or the danger of her 
 husband's turning round upon her and declaring that it 
 was well-founded jealousy which made him cruel. Oh, you 
 men are noble creatures! I am glad I was born a woman, 
 that I may have the privilege of falling down and worship¬ 
 
 ing you 
 
 v> 
 
 “ How dare you say such things to me! How dare you 
 talk to me as if I were a cur! You abuse your feminine 
 privilege when you say such things to a man as that." 
 
 “ I am sorry your delicate ears should have to listen to 
 such unpleasant truths. And now, having given your mes¬ 
 sage, don't you think you had better leave the delivery of 
 it to me? I will put your conduct in its most chivalrous 
 light, I assure you." 
 
 “ You are too hard; you will be sorry some day for hav¬ 
 ing spoken to me like this. Perhaps I have been rash; but 
 I have been nothing worse. I never thought of what peo¬ 
 ple would say; I only thought of her being alone without 
 any friends. And she has always treated me like a boy, 
 and so, like a hot-headed fool, I came. I am sorry now. 
 I will go back to-night, if I can, and nobody shall know I 
 came. And—and I am sure, if you have any heart at all, 
 and if you are not all tongue "—with a resentful, wound¬ 
 ed look at her—“ you will be sorry presently for having 
 spoken to me like that. And—and I wish I could leave 
 her in the hands of a sweeter comforter. Good-evening, 
 Miss Warren." 
 
 Hilda was touched. She would not have let him go like 
 this; but, before she could do more than raise her head to 
 speak, the folding-doors opened and Doris came in. 
 
 Gussie drew a long breath, struck with horror at the 
 change in her. The fair goddess-beauty was gone, the 
 placid eyes were dull and troubled; new and sudden fur¬ 
 rows in the smooth face made it look years older. She 
 held out her hand to the young man with a smile strangely 
 different from the old serene one, but her voice was kinder 
 than ever. 
 
 “ I am glad to see you, Gussie, believe me. Hilda has 
 been rather hard upon you; but you will forgive her, for 
 you know what generous feeling prompted her severity. 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 127 
 
 Stay in Paris until to-morrow morning, and you shall take 
 us both back to England/* 
 
 Gussie bowed over the hand she still held as if he had 
 been receiving the commands of an empress. Whether it 
 was owing to Hilda*s presence or not, her husband s deser¬ 
 tion had taken Doris further away from him than ever. 
 
 6 'Then! may come again in the morning?** he stam¬ 
 mered out humbly. 
 
 “ We will meet you at the station to-morrow morning in 
 time to catch the train for the midday boat. Thank you 
 for your kindness, Gussie. Good-night.** 
 
 “ Good-night, Doris.** 
 
 He bowed to Hilda with a last resentful, triumphant 
 glance, to show her that she had not so much the best of 
 the situation as she thought, and left the room. 
 
 Then Hilda grew soft again, and came and threw herself 
 down on her knees beside Doris, whom she coaxed into an 
 arm-chair. 
 
 “ What are you going to do, dear?** she whispered. 
 
 (C I am going to my grandmother first,** answered Doris. 
 
 “ And then?** 
 
 “ I don*t know yet. I must think and know more than 
 I do now. ** 
 
 She was not quite so sweet as she had been before; her 
 face was more drawn, and her manner was altogether 
 rather more determined; that was all the outward change 
 Gussie*s blunt tidings had made in her. She refused to 
 speak again of her husband; and, when they started for 
 England the next morning, Hilda did not in the least know 
 what feeling toward him was. uppermost in the soul of the 
 deserted wife. Gussie telegraphed to Mrs. Edgcombe on 
 the way, and the old lady met them at Victoria with care 
 on her kind face which told them she was prepared for the 
 tidings they brought. She was very cold to Gussie, very 
 warm and gracious to Hilda, whom she daringly congratu¬ 
 lated on Charlie Papillon’s engagement. 
 
 “ He was not good enough for you, my dear,** she said 
 sharply. “ And, when we see how a man turns out even 
 when we thought he was good enough for the woman he 
 married, we may thank Heaven for an escape from a man 
 who didn*t reach even that standard.** 
 
 This discourse, delivered partly for the benefit of Gussie, 
 who of course was far beneath the lowest standing Mrs. 
 
c28 
 
 DORIS’S FORTUNE. 
 
 Edgcombe could conceive, tickled Hilda into an irreverent 
 mood; and, after kissing Doris and seeing her packed 
 safely into her grandmother’s brougham, she turned to the 
 crest-fallen young fellow with a sardonic laugh. 
 
 “ Do you think you are too far outside the pale of re¬ 
 spectability to get me a hansom? It will cost me twopence 
 if I have to send a porter.” 
 
 W hen he had got one for her and helped her in, he said 
 meekly, feeling badly the need of opening his heart about 
 a friend he cared for as much as he did about Doris— 
 
 “ I suppose you wouldn’t let me see you home?” 
 
 “ Yes, I would,” said she promptly. 
 
 6 ‘ It has been a most unfortunate journey for you,” he 
 said, as they drove out of the station. 
 
 “ Yes,’’sighed Hilda; then she added frankly, “ But not 
 half so unfortunate as not going at all would have been.” 
 
 “ What—when poor Doris was so miserable?” 
 
 She would have been more miserable without me, and 
 I should not have seen Paris.” 
 
 “ You didn’t see much of it,” suggested Gussie, after a 
 pause, during which he debated whether he should be 
 shocked, and decided not. 
 
 “ No; but enough to live upon through at least three 
 weeks of fog and mud and poverty in London.” 
 
 “ Ugh! Yes, I know,” said Gussie sympathetically. 
 “ It’s bad enough for a man; but, by Jove, I suppose it is 
 even worse for a pretty woman. ” 
 
 “ Pretty!” ejaculated Hilda scornfully. “ It takes time 
 and money and a good looking-glass to be pretty, and I 
 have none of those things. Why, I’m older than my own 
 mother already, because she laid in a good stock of enjoy¬ 
 ment when she was young, and I have only been able to 
 glean a few ears, as it were, of happiness. How does it 
 feel to be rich after you have been poor?” 
 
 “ Oh, jolly!” said Gussie, with feeling. “ And you feel 
 so much better too. Everybody is always assuring me now 
 that I’m a credit to my species, instead of a poor devil on 
 sufferance wherever he goes. ” 
 
 “ But rich people are better than poor people,” said 
 Hilda earnestly. “ If you give when you’re rich, you are 
 generous and open-handed; if you give when you’re poor, 
 you are an improvident rascal. And look how sunny-tem- 
 perea and sweet you can be when you can get everything 
 
DORIS’S FORTUtfE. 
 
 129 
 
 you want! Most of the virtues are out of reach of us pooi 
 people. ” 
 
 44 Most of the pleasures are, anyhow,” assented Gussie. 
 44 Look here—you bullied me last night in a way that, when 
 I was poor and therefore wicked, would have made my 
 blood boil; even now that I am rich and virtuous, it made 
 me rather wild at the time. But, if you like to forget all 
 about that, and come and talk about the best way of being 
 good to Doris when we are both calm and less tired, Iil 
 come and take you to a concert to-morrow afternoon. ” 
 
 44 I hate concerts!” said Hilda, with a grimace. 
 
 4 4 Well, I’ll take you to Charbonnel and Walker’s. ” 
 
 Hilda’s face softened. 
 
 44 What time will you come?” asked she. 
 
 44 One, two, three, four! Don’t make it too late; the 
 afternoon is gone now before you know where you are.” 
 
 Hilda did not want to name too early an hour, but would 
 not for the world put off the pleasure for longer than de¬ 
 cency demanded. 
 
 44 Say half past two,” said she. 
 
 So the appointment was made; and, Hilda’s lodgings 
 being soon reached, they parted good friends, without hav¬ 
 ing had time to disagree upon any subject. Hilda went 
 in-doors wondering why Doris did not marry him, instead 
 of David; and Gussie went away asking himself why on 
 earth Charlie Papillon did not stick to his colors and risk 
 a struggle, rather than lose such a pretty amusing little 
 wife. 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 * 
 
 Doris listened to her grandmother’s lamentations over 
 lien’s perfidy until the carriage stopped, when she asked 
 very quietly— 
 
 44 Where have—where has he gone, grandmamma?” 
 
 44 To Brighton, my dear. They have gone en famille, it 
 appears; the girls have been taken too.” 
 
 44 The girls—Nellie and Ethel!” cried Doris, with relief. 
 44 In that case—” 
 
 44 Don’t be alarmed, my dear; the case is quite strong 
 enough for you to get your separation. You have only to 
 wait a few months, and you can prove that he has deserted 
 you, which is all you want. For I am sure you do not wish 
 to appear in the Divorce Court.” 
 
 44 No, granny dear, I don’t want to appear in any court 
 
130 
 
 Boris's fortune. 
 
 at all. I want to wait for him—for him to come back to 
 me/ ? she ended in a whisper. 
 
 “ My dear child, you don't understand the case yet/'said 
 Mrs. Edgcombe, with autocratic asperity. As she had 
 made this marriage, so she now held herself qualified, upon 
 its proving a failure, to break it. “ David Glyn has mis¬ 
 used your money to the extent of crippling your income 
 considerably; Mr. Hamlin, your remaining trustee under 
 your father's will, says he has, as far as he can make out, 
 lost every penny it was in his power to risk. To trust your¬ 
 self any longer in the power of a man who has proved to be 
 little better than a common swindler would be madness. I 
 can not allow it." 
 
 Doris was silent for a few minutes, looking at the fire. 
 Then she said, in such a low voice that it was almost a whis¬ 
 per— 
 
 46 Granny, David 4ias behaved very badly, I know. But 
 it wasn't his fault so much as hers. And I—I think he 
 had something to complain of in me. Will you try to hush 
 it up, and wait a little? If he does not come back, why, 
 then you must do as you please, and I will do as you please; 
 but I would rather take him back—if he would come— 
 now. Granny, you must humor me, or I—I shall break 
 my heart!" 
 
 Mrs. Edgcombe held out her arms, and Doris sobbed for 
 some minutes softly with her head in the old lady's lap. 
 Then she rose and dried her tears, and, without another 
 word, but with one long look exchanged by sorrowful eyes, 
 the compact was sealed between them. 
 
 For a fortnight no news was heard of David. Mr. Hod- 
 son, to escape his creditors, had gone abroad. It was now 
 clearly proved that his foolish client had swamped in specu¬ 
 lation, under his direction, some thirty-three thousand 
 pounds. Doris cared little about the loss of her money, 
 and would not allow that, in risking it, David had been 
 worse than foolish; she bore her mournful semi-widowhood 
 with quiet dignity, and refused to leave town, as her grand¬ 
 mother wished her to do, hoping against hope each day for 
 her husband's return. She persisted, with this object in 
 view, in remaining in her own house, instead of staying at 
 Mrs. Edgcombe's, as the latter wished. He would come 
 home some evening quite quietly, she thought, and, walk¬ 
 ing into the drawing-room with the cold look she knew so 
 
doris’s fortune. 
 
 131 
 
 well, would express great surprise that she had felt any 
 uneasiness on his account. Oh* how she would welcome 
 the coldest look now! 
 
 For Doris felt within her a power of dealing with his 
 chilling moods which she had never felt before. Since he 
 had warmth of feeling for another woman, she argued, why 
 should he not in time have some for her too, now that, 
 with amazing perversity, there had grown up in her, since 
 the discovery of his delinquencies, a tenderness which she 
 had never felt for the immaculate marble self he had always 
 shown himself to be when with her? 
 
 The letter she had written to him in Paris she fomnd un¬ 
 opened in the library, where it had been put by the house¬ 
 maid, ignorant of his address and already suspicious of the 
 truth. Every evening, after sitting, sometimes alone, 
 sometimes with her grandmother, hour after hour, listen¬ 
 ing, writing, Doris would, as the clock struck eleven, creep 
 into the library to make sure that David had not come in 
 so quietly with his latch-key that she had not heard him; 
 but night after night she only saw, by the light of her can¬ 
 dle, her own letter waiting for him, growing darker and 
 dustier each night, undisturbed on the mantel-piece. 
 
 And at the end of three weeks Doris felt that she could 
 wait no more. 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 One morning, after a night spent in struggles between 
 her pride, her feminine timidity, and the yearning for a rec¬ 
 onciliation with her husband which grew stronger every 
 day, Doris came down-stairs with a high color burning in 
 her cheeks and her eyes flashing with the excitement of a 
 bold resolution. After breakfast, she wrote a note to her 
 grandmother, went upstairs again, summoned her maid, 
 and superintended the packing of a small portmanteau. 
 
 Then she got a time-table, found an early train to Brigh¬ 
 ton, and ordered the brougham for half past twelve. She 
 spent the time before starting in fluttering about from book 
 to newspaper, from window to clock, like a restless child, 
 afraid lest Mrs. Edgcombe should call, as she sometimes 
 did in the morning, and try to hinder her in her great pur¬ 
 pose. David would not come back to her of his own accord; 
 she had resolved to humble herself and try to bring him 
 
132 
 
 BORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 back; it might be shame that kept him from her. Per¬ 
 haps the yearning eagerness she felt to see him again might 
 hare more power over him than her quiet submission had 
 had. 
 
 Always the same old arguments, the same trembling 
 hopes and chilling fears that had kept her on the rack for 
 the last three weeks! What reason had she for thinking that 
 the charms which had had no attraction for him a month 
 ago would be irresistible to him now that he was more com¬ 
 pletely than ever under the sway of an entirely different 
 type of woman? Poor Doris! She was too innocent to 
 understand these things; and so she traveled down to 
 Brighton, with a feverish longing to be at the end of a 
 iourney which must, she felt confident in her excitement, 
 bring her to the crown of her passionate hopes. 
 
 With the arrival in Brighton however, and the solitary 
 installment of herself and the lymphatic small-minded 
 Whitaker at the Queen's Hotel, came a sense of isolation 
 and discouragement. After a short and lonely luncheon, 
 she watched from the window the gray sea and the pass¬ 
 ers-by, not daring to go out, being suddenly oppressed by 
 a vivid fear of meeting the very person she had come to see. 
 
 If he should be with that woman! Now that she was in 
 the vicinity of her rival, Doris's feeling toward her had 
 suddenly become more bitter. She pictured to herself the 
 triumuh with which Mrs. Hodson would look at her, if she 
 should come suddenly face to face with the young wife 
 whom she had robbed of her husband. And Doris wished, 
 with a sharp revulsion of feeling, that she had not come. 
 
 Having come however, she must make the best of the 
 situation; and, having schooled herself into such outward 
 calmness as would allow her to pass for a reasonably con¬ 
 tented person, she left the hotel alone, just as the evening 
 mist was beginning to spread over the sea, for a walk along 
 the cliff. When she was opposite to the old chain pier, she 
 took a fancy into her head to go on it; she would have it 
 almost to herself, she knew, and could think better. As if, 
 poor creature, she wanted to think, or as if the only 
 thought she was capable of— “Will he come back to 
 me?"—would answer itself happily by dint of frequent re¬ 
 petition! 
 
 She went down the steep stone steps, past the antiquated 
 bazaar where school-girls on Saturdays are tempted to ruif* 
 
I 
 
 dorxs’s fortune. 
 
 138 
 
 ous extravagance over wax-flowers and photographic al¬ 
 bums, and the mad excitement of a wheel of fortune. The 
 pier was almost deserted, as she expected; at the end, on 
 one of the sheltered seats, two girls were seated, talking. 
 Doris passed quite close to them, and they recognized her at 
 the same moment that she, glancing in the direction of the 
 voices, knew them as Mrs. Hodson’s two daughters, Nellie 
 and Ethel. The elder started up, crying, “ Mrs. Glyn!” 
 while the younger whispered “ Sh!” and tried to draw her 
 more impulsive sister back. 
 
 Doris stopped, and both girls made a step timidly 
 toward her. 
 
 “ Nellie—Ethel! How do you do?” said she, in a rather 
 quavering voice. 
 
 “ Quite well, thank you,” said Nellie; and there was a 
 pause. 
 
 “ I’ve only come down to-day,” said Doris at last. 
 u Have you been here long?” 
 
 “ Since the failure—papa’s failure, ” said Nellie, in a 
 constrained tone, with a sense that Ethel’s eyes were upon 
 her and that she must be circumspect. 
 
 “ Where are you staying?” 
 
 “ On the .Parade;” and they told her the number. It 
 was not far from the pier. 
 
 “ What are you going to do, dears? It will bring a 
 terrible change for you, I am afraid, this unhappy business. ” 
 
 Nellie looked at her curiously; but face and voice were 
 both so kind, so sympathetic, that from curiosity concern¬ 
 ing the lady’s state of mind she fell into anxiety about her 
 own. 
 
 “ Yes, it has brought a change, of course, and I don’t 
 know what will become of us. Mamma never did care 
 much about us. Just now we are a convenience; but—” 
 
 She was stopped by a sharp elbow—Ethel’s. The next 
 moment, however, she burst out more vehemently: 
 
 “ What is the use of hiding what everybody knows—- 
 what Mrs. Glyn knows too? It isn’t as if it was only we, or 
 only she; it is all of us. Mrs. Glyn, we are bound to stay 
 with mamma; but you are not bound to have anything 
 more to do with a husband like yours; and, if I were you, 
 I would leave him to come to his senses by himself. At 
 first mamma found it very amusing to have any one who 
 was not papa about her every day, and Mr. Glyn, who ha« 
 
134 
 
 DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 rooms two streets off, might call as often as he liked; it 
 was all perfectly proper, because we were there. But Undo 
 Eugene, her eldest brother, has written to her—she had 
 the letter this morning—telling her, if she doesn’t go to 
 him and take us with him, he shall come and fetch us him¬ 
 self. It made her very cross, and she snapped at Mr. Glyn 
 to-day dreadfully; but I think she will end by taking us.” 
 
 “Pm sure she will,” said the wide-mouthed, preter- 
 naturally solemn Ethel, with an old trenchant manner 
 which told a strange tale of the influences among which 
 the girls had been brought up. 
 
 One thing more Doris wished to learn; but she did not 
 know how to frame the question. At last she said hesitat¬ 
 ingly— 
 
 “ At least, it is not so bad for you as if you had had no 
 relatives to help you, and nothing to—to fall back upon.” 
 
 Ethel gave forth a short ejaculation which was too short, 
 too bitter, for a laugh; and Nellie said: 
 
 “ You think, I see, Mrs. Glyn, that, because we have 
 gone to apartments on the Parade, just as we used to do, 
 we have money to pay for them with; but we haven’t. 
 You don’t understand mamma. She has been used to do 
 everything with as much thought of money as a queen; 
 and, now that she finds that there is nobody to write out 
 checks, or to buy her anything she fancies, she is a great 
 deal more like a helpless child than we are.” 
 
 Doris was appalled, as much by the fact that so young a 
 girl should he able to make such a coldly shrewd valuation 
 of her mother’s character as by the unhappy position in 
 which she saw her own husband to be placed. 
 
 Ethel, who underneath her shrewdness had plenty of 
 warmth of feeling for those who wanted it, put her arm 
 round the pale lady’s neck, and, as her appealing look was 
 met by a smile, kissed the handsome face very gently. 
 
 “ I expect you care more for Mr. Glyn than mamma 
 does for papa,” she said, in a low voice; “ and, if so, I 
 think it will all come right for you. He is so affectionate 
 that, when he finds out how cold mamma is, he will be 
 very glad to—to be good again. ” 
 
 So affectionate! Doris’s heart leaped up with a pang of 
 mingled anger and astonishment and remorse. Had she 
 then at the outset coldly misunderstood him, and mistaken 
 the hard shell of his habitual reserve for the kernel it con- 
 
DOKIS S EORTUOTC. 135 
 
 cealed? If this were so, there was hope yet, and she would 
 risk any humiliation in atonement for her mistake. 
 
 She did not know what she said to the girls after that; 
 she spoke incoherently about trifling things, longing to be 
 away, yet afraid to meet her husband and Mrs. Hodson, 
 who were both, Nellie said, somewhere on the pier. She 
 made an appointment to meet the two sisters again on the 
 following day, and, glancing before and behind her as she 
 went, hurried off the pier without meeting any one, got 
 into a cab, and drove back to her hotel. Here she wrote a 
 letter to her trustee, a very old friend both of her late fa¬ 
 ther and of her grandmother, and begged him, he being by 
 this time, as she knew, aware of the deadlock to which 
 her relations with her husband had come, to send David 
 money to the address she gave. She headed her letter with 
 the number and name of the street the girls had given her 
 as the place where he was staying, and, as the post-mark 
 would be “ Brighton,” she knew that the money would be 
 sent under the impression that she and her husband had 
 become reconciled. In this way, at least, David would be 
 rescued from the miserable pennilessness into which her 
 trustee’s angry remonstrances had thrust him. 
 
 The letter written and dispatched, Doris yielded most 
 unwisely to the morbid attraction the old chain pier now 
 had for her, and went back to it again—too soon. For, as 
 she drew near to the end, in passing one of the little towers, 
 where dreary collections of untempting pebble ornaments 
 offer their hard attractions to the susceptible excursionist, 
 she heard the tones of a soft voice which now had unspeak¬ 
 able terrors for her. She stopped, and then passed to the 
 left side of the little tower, from which point she could just 
 see a portion of a mantle heavily trimmed with sable tails 
 which had become historical for its costliness among Mrs. 
 Hodson’s acquaintances. 
 
 Doris’s first impulse was to meet them, to confound 
 them; but, before she could do so, she heard some words 
 from her husband’s lips which gave her a shock so over¬ 
 whelming that all thought of maintaining an attitude of 
 imposing dignity left her, and, like a beaten animal, she 
 crept away out of the sound of the soft voice that was 
 lacerating her heart. She had heard her husband, the 
 calm, passionless David, whispering, with excitement and 
 vehemence of which she had thought him incapable, wordsi 
 
136 
 
 doris’s fortune. * 
 
 which could be nothing but a mad entreaty to this woman, 
 another man’s wife, to give up her children, her duty, to 
 go away with him. She fled straight back to the hotel, and 
 met her maid with a weird white face that alarmed that 
 simple-minded person. 
 
 “ You shouldn’t go out alone, ma’am, so late as this,” 
 said she reproachfully, as she took off Doris’s mantle, and 
 felt that her mistress was shaking from head to foot. 
 “ There’s always rough characters about these sea-side 
 places,” she added consolingly, putting the lady’s pallor 
 down to the sight of a drunken sailor, without much con¬ 
 cern about probability. 
 
 “ Oh, I’m all right now, Whitaker!” said Doris reassur¬ 
 ingly. “ You can ring for dinner; I think I am hungry.” 
 
 She dined with a very good appetite, much to her own 
 surprise, and was rather shocked to find that, when the 
 table was cleared, and she took up a magazine with the 
 idea of hiding her mental disturbance from the waiter, in 
 whom she felt that something abnormal in her appearance 
 might excite vulgar curiosity, she became seriously inter¬ 
 ested in an article upon the Decay of Art in Italy. She 
 read it carefully from beginning to end, believing that by 
 so doing she was staving off distressing thoughts; but, 
 when she had finished it, and laid the book down with a 
 sigh preparatory to the rush of agonized feelings which 
 ought to have come, she was again astonished and at heart 
 a little humiliated to discover that the rush was once and 
 for all over. And she slept well that night, and woke to a 
 sad but peaceful morning. 
 
 She knew the worst—in fact, understood exactly where 
 she was, and could “ take her bearings.” She felt not one 
 scrap the less anxious for a reconciliation with her husband; 
 but she began to understand better what sort of thing that 
 reconciliation would be. It would not be the meekly ador¬ 
 ing welcome accorded to a king who has abdicated his 
 throne rather ignominiously under the pressure of circum¬ 
 stances and graciously returned when things have been 
 made comfortable for him again; but it would be rather 
 the indulgent reception of a misunderstood but too well- 
 treated prodigal son. And, after considering well the cir¬ 
 cumstances of the position, and dimly realizing the fact 
 that she was the stronger of the two, and would, therefore, 
 
Doris’s fortuxb. 
 
 137 
 
 hare to make the first and boldest step toward “ making it 
 up ” without any help from David, Doris made up her 
 mind to remain for the present in Brighton and watch the 
 course of events, with more than a faint hope that she 
 might take back her husband in triumph to town. 
 
 As Doris had reason to suspect, her rivaBs temperament 
 was a great source of strength to her own hopes. Mrs. 
 Hodson, a woman with infinite fascinating caprices, but 
 absolutely passionless, was bored and somewhat disgusted 
 by finding that the slave, on whose docility and ample sup¬ 
 ply of ready money she had counted to make the few 
 weeks of her husbands temporary desertion with all pro¬ 
 priety tolerable, had the audacity and coarseness to wish to 
 become her loyer. Too spoiled and willful to check herself 
 in the indulgence of any whim, however perilous to her 
 own reputation, or to the interests of her daughters, Mrs. 
 Hodson mistook her marble coldness for the most exalted 
 and irreproachable virtue; and in the bourgeois Bohemian- 
 ism of this little trip to Brighton, with her daughters to 
 play propriety, and David Glyn as the indispensable slave 
 to whose attentions she had become accustomed, she saw 
 nothing which could reasonably give rise to the faintest 
 breath of scandal. 
 
 And then, with the indelicacy of his sex, David Glyn had 
 sought, by an outburst of wild aud quite unexpected pas¬ 
 sion, to bring the carefully excluded taint of impropriety 
 over her already debt-disturbed paradise, reminding her 
 ungenerously that he had ruined all his hopes of happiness 
 for her, deserted his young wife, and that now nothing re¬ 
 mained to him but her love. Her husband—the husband 
 she hated—had left her; she had already compromised her¬ 
 self by bringing—allowing him—David—to come down 
 here and visit her. Her brother Eugene was going to take 
 the girls under his own care. David was sure he could get 
 a consulship abroad—he had interest; and then— 
 
 He was stopped, just as he was growing incoherent in his 
 outburst, by Mrs. Hodson, who had prudently waited to 
 hear the whole of the programme before cutting in to crush 
 him. They were both sitting on the seat behind the little 
 curiosity-shop on the pier, with their faces to the misty sea; 
 Doris had retreated long before this, without their having 
 heard her. Mrs. Hodson turned to interrupt David with a 
 face of stone. He had not known how steely those brilliant 
 
138 
 
 DORIS^ FORTUNE. 
 
 f ^ray eyes could look, how like a hasp that small thin* 
 ipped mouth could close. 
 
 “ Compromised myself!” she echoed slowly, fixing at 
 once on those words in his speech which particularly and 
 most intimately affected herself, casting as they did an un¬ 
 pardonable slur upon her position of Cassar^s wife. “ Com¬ 
 promised myself! Do you understand what you are saying, 
 Mr. Glyn?” 
 
 David made no answer—chilled in all the heat of the 
 passionate despair which had at last burst out after smol¬ 
 dering in his heart for the last two or three days, since Mrs. 
 Hodson, by alternating her caprices of fascinating liveliness 
 with caprices of unutterable, speechless melancholy, had 
 overthrown what little reasoning power his infatuation had 
 left him. 
 
 “As for your wife,” continued she pitilessly, after a 
 pause, “ I am certainly innocent of having done anything 
 to lead you to neglect her. She always seemed to me a 
 most charming person—I have always told you so. When 
 you came to me complaining that she was cold and unsym¬ 
 pathetic, I comforted you; I did no more. Yet now you 
 turn round and accuse me of sowing dissension between 
 you and her. How just! How like a man!” 
 
 Mrs. Hodson said this with as much spiteful emphasis as 
 if her whole life had been spent in a losing struggle with 
 the viler sex, instead of the placid receiving of tribute from 
 them. 
 
 David tried to stammer out something like a proud apol¬ 
 ogy; but he was wounded, shattered; there was a dull hum¬ 
 ming sound in his ears, through which the tones of his own 
 voice seemed strange and far-off to him. He rose abruptly, 
 and led Mrs. Hodson, without asking if she wished to go, 
 back to her daughters. Weak and culpable as his conduct 
 had been, his suffering that evening, as he went back to 
 his lodgings alone and without comfort, was the beginning 
 of an ample punishment. 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 On* the afternoon following the day of her talk with 
 Nellie and Ethel Hodson on the old chain pier, Doris, who 
 lived in the constant expectation, half fear, half hope, of 
 some chance meeting with her husband, went again to the 
 
DORIS'S FORTUM. 139 
 
 seat where she had met the girls, to keep the appointment 
 she had made with them. But they were not there; and, 
 although Doris waited more than an hour in the hope of 
 their appearing, she was obliged at last to return to her 
 hotel without having seen them. Soon afterward, how¬ 
 ever, she received a note, sent by hand, from Nellie, 
 apologizing for their non-appearance. Their uncle, the 
 autocratic Uncle Eugene, who was not accustomed to inter¬ 
 fere with his relatives* affairs, but who, when he did so, 
 had the reputation of acting to some purpose, had suddenly 
 swooped down upon his sister and nieces that morning at 
 breakfast-time, and made all independent action impossi¬ 
 ble. 
 
 Doris read these tidings with much excitement; on this 
 decisive step of “ Uncle Eugene's " depended more than 
 the fortunes of those three women-creatures in whom he 
 was interested. She could do nothing; she dared not try 
 to see David yet; she must wait. 
 
 The next morning came another note from Nellie, sent 
 by post from Guildford, where their uncle lived; he had 
 packed them all up, so to speak, and carried them off to 
 his castle, without much resistance, so Nellie intimated, on 
 her mother's part, and to the great delight of the girls. 
 There was no allusion to David in the body of the letter; 
 but there was the following short 
 
 “ P.S.—We have seen nobody but my uncle since yester¬ 
 day evening, when we went home from the chain pier after 
 meeting you." 
 
 Where, then, was David? Dared she go to his lodging 
 and learn whether he was still there? Doris had not the 
 courage to take this step until late in the afternoon, when 
 she received a note from her trustee to say that the remit¬ 
 tance sent to Mr. David Glyn at the address given had been 
 returned by him. 
 
 Doris's heart seemed to leap up, and then to sink to 
 deeper despair than she had yet felt. For, after gladness to 
 learn that David was not mean enough to accept the money 
 which her yearning impulse to hold some communication 
 with him had prompted her to have sent, came the misera¬ 
 ble fear that his refusal implied his determination that the 
 separation between them should be final. 
 
 She could contain herself no longer. She had scarcely 
 read the short, poto through, when she almost ran to hef 
 
140 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 bedroom to prepare for the walk to her husband’s lodging; 
 but, when she got there, she managed by an effort to asic 
 quite calmly, when the door was opened, whether Mr. Glyn 
 was at home. 
 
 54 He left yesterday, ma’am,” said the servant. 
 
 “ Thank you,” said Doris quietly. Then, on the point 
 of turning away, she stopped to ask in a tremulous voice, 
 iS Did he leave any addressdor—for letters?” 
 
 “ No, ma’am—at least, not with me.” 
 
 Doris could not stay to learn whether any one else in the 
 house was better informed; she walked back, ready to cry 
 like a child. She even formed the clear intention of indulg¬ 
 ing in a flood of tears as a relief to her feelings, if not a 
 way out of her difficulties; but it was frustrated by the 
 most unwelcome sight of two visitors waiting for her in the 
 sitting-room. They sprung up like clock-work toys on 
 her entrance, and surrounded her, shaking her hands 
 vigorously, and talking both together in a foolish chatter¬ 
 ing manner which is wrongly supposed to be peculiar to the 
 weaker sex. They proved, on inspection, to be Gussie 
 Melton and Charlie rapillon, the latter of whom, being 
 great in matters of tact, managed to stave off the awk¬ 
 wardness of the surprise-meeting by his ready flow of wit. 
 But the result of more emotion on Doris’s previous excite¬ 
 ment was not to be staved off; with one hand held by each 
 of the young men, she began crying helplessly. Gussie, 
 who was violently emotional himself, had sympathetic 
 moisture in his own eyes immediately. But Charlie, whose 
 heart-strings were tougher, and who was invaluable as a 
 comforter, as he could always be kind without becoming 
 so much overwhelmed as to lose his airy presence of mind, 
 administered philosophical consolation vague enough to be 
 applied to any misfortune, from the breakage of a pane of 
 glass to the death of a parent. The end of this was that 
 Doris began to laugh hysterically, and Charlie, hailing this 
 new symptom as triumphant success to his attempts, led 
 her to a seat and threw off all semblance of grief. 
 
 44 There—now you’re all right again, and we can talk!” 
 he said cheerfully, coming at once to his favorite employ¬ 
 ment. 
 
 “What—what brought you here? Why did you come 
 down?” asked Doris plaintively, checking her sobs and try' 
 mg to follow his lead of exuberant liveliness. 
 
DOBIs's POBTUHE. 
 
 141 
 
 “ Oh, er—we—we—Mrs. Edgcombe sent me down to 
 ask you to bring her some Tidman's sea-salt—I believe it's 
 made here!” answered Charlie, in a tone of inflexible con¬ 
 viction. 
 
 “ Oh! And what did you come for?” said she to Gussie, 
 who, being a long way behind his companion in readiness, 
 was still standing rather sheepishly where the others had 
 left him. 
 
 “ Oh, I—I came to look after Charlie!” he answered 
 
 guiltily. 
 
 “ Well, you will both dine with me this evening, won't 
 you?” said Doris, rising, and crossing the room to the door. 
 “ And you must contrive to amuse yourselves without quar¬ 
 reling while I take off my hat.” 
 
 When she returned, all traces of tears were gone from 
 her face; and, having brought with her to Brighton noth¬ 
 ing but somber black gowns, she had sent Whitaker for 
 some bright flowers to relieve her funereal appearance in 
 deference to Charlie's taste; and he showed his appreciation 
 of her action by an outburst of admiring affection as she 
 came in. 
 
 “ There—now you look like my old, beautiful sweet¬ 
 heart!” said he, beaming on her complacently as he stroked 
 his mustache with vehemence, to work off his feelings. 
 “ And now you shall hear Gussie's news; he has some news 
 
 for you.” 
 
 “ Oh, after dinner—it will do after dinner!” objected 
 Gussie hastily and rather bashfully. 
 
 And, as the waiters came in at that moment to lay the 
 cloth, Doris had to stifle whatever curiosity she might feel 
 until the meal was over, and dessert left them by them¬ 
 selves again. Then Charlie began to grow mischievous and 
 Gussie nervous, until, as the only alternative to having his 
 news told for him with embellishments such as he did not 
 care to hear, the latter blurted it out himself without much 
 attempt at introduction. 
 
 46 This is what Papillon is driving at,” he said, with a 
 scornful look at his friend. “ I—I am going to be married 
 to Hilda Warren.” 
 
 It was a surprise certainly, and, alas for humanity, rather 
 a painful one to Doris! She had never entertained any 
 sentimental feeling for Gussie; but at this time, when she 
 
DORIS’S RORTUHE. 
 
 142 
 
 was stranded in the world, very badly off for affection, the 
 belief in his constant and chivalrous devotion had a certain 
 soothing quality which had caused her, while paying more 
 attention to her other visitor than to him, to feel an un¬ 
 acknowledged consolation in his appearance at her time of 
 trial much stronger than any afforded by Charlie’s lively 
 chatter. So that the sudden discovery of the rapidity with 
 which passion founded on nothing stronger than sentiment 
 can change its object was a shock to her. She congratu¬ 
 lated him nevertheless warmly—more warmly of course, 
 after the first mcment’s astonishment, than she would have 
 done if the announcement had not hurt her somewhat. < 
 Hilda was a dear girl, the most warm-hearted, the most 
 honest of all girls she had ever known. Doris said this, 
 and meant it most sincerely, adding that Gussie was the 
 luckiest man she knew to have secured her; but, for all 
 that, there was a lurking aggrieved feeling in her heart, a 
 wish that she had not known the news quite so soon, that 
 she had not learned it quite so abruptly. 
 
 It seemed to her strange that Charlie Papillon, whose 
 flirtation with Hilda had been known to be as serious as 
 Charlie ever allowed his flirtations to be, should not only 
 have the sang-froid to listen to Doris’s congratulations 
 with warm interest, but to take quite a gleeful view of his 
 lady-love’s speedy consolation for his own defection. He 
 wanted to know when they would be married, w r here they 
 proposed to live, and a hundred other things not usually 
 decided off-hand in the first week of an engagement. 
 Gussie began to get irritated and Doris to laugh at him. - 
 
 “ Have you then already settled the exact number of 
 months out of every year that you propose to spend in 
 town and the color of the furniture of every room in the 
 house? You have been so busily teasing Gussie that you 
 forget you are open to just the same fire yourself. I haven’t 
 seen you since your engagement, Charlie, to congratulate 
 you; but I do so now most heartily. ” 
 
 Exactly as he would have dropped from an animated and 
 interesting discussion with a girl about Irving’s acting to a 
 dry and disagreeable discourse with his tailor about “ that 
 little account,” Charlie from bright and excited became 
 uninterested and off-hand in manner. 
 
 “ Thanks!” said he. “ Oh, yes, she’s a very nic3 girl! 
 Have you ever met her?” 
 
DOBIS^S FOBTTJNE. 143 
 
 u I think so—once, at Mrs. Dryden's. She wore pink, 
 if I remember.” 
 
 u Oh, yes, and a horrible fan that didn't match! Yes, 
 that was the fortunate one." 
 
 “ Well, and have you already settled every detail of your 
 future existence that you feel called upon to express sur¬ 
 prise that Gussie and Hilda have not done so?” 
 
 “ Oh, no! Miss Harrington settles everything; she likes 
 settling. She'll settle me, I expect—at least, I only mean, 
 of course, that under her auspices—an excellent expression, 
 by the way—I shall settle down.” 
 
 There was a short silence, Gussie saying nothing because 
 what he would have liked to remark would have been too 
 strong to be civil, and Doris because she was wondering 
 how, with the example before his eyes of David's marriage 
 with a rich woman he did not greatly care for, Charlie 
 could boldly take a similar step himself. Charlie of course 
 broke the silence himself. 
 
 “ Shall we go for a walk, Doris? Do let us go for a 
 walk! It's quite early, and it isn't a bit cold; and then we 
 can lose Gussie, and go away by ourselves, and I'll give 
 you that lock of hair I promised you. It isn't a very big 
 lock, because my hair's coming off, and so I can't spare 
 much; but then it's all the more precious, you know, be¬ 
 cause the supply is limited.'' 
 
 So Doris was prevailed upon to get ready for a walk on 
 the cliff; and then, whether by his not unerring instinct or 
 by private arrangement with Charlie, Gussie did, when they 
 came to a knot of people, drop behind and get to all intents 
 lost for a time, leaving Doris and the chatterbox Papillon 
 together. * And, having assured himself that they were 
 alone, Charlie suffered his flow of what he called conversa¬ 
 tion to slacken, and finally to cease when they got far 
 enough up the cliff to be out of the throng of people. Doris 
 made no remark on Gussie's defection, and suffered herself 
 to be led to the railing that protected the promenade, hav¬ 
 ing a presentiment that these preliminaries were to lead to 
 something. Charlie could never be silent, or almost silent, 
 for three minutes at a time without some altogether grav& 
 and portentous object in view. When, however, he fixed 
 his round blue eyes upon her and began to speak, there was 
 no particular expression on his face to denote that he was 
 
144 
 
 BORISES FORTUK& 
 
 about to discourse of anything more interesting than the 
 seals at the aquarium. 
 
 “ I say, Doris,” he began colloquially, “ you don't mean 
 to stay here any longer by yourself, do you?” 
 
 “Why not?” asked Doris, in a serious and tremulous 
 voice. 
 
 “ Well, you know, it looks so odd!” 
 
 “It is an odd circumstance that brings me here—at 
 least, it seems odd to me. ” 
 
 “ Yes; but you know your staying here can't do any good. 
 And, on the other hand, perhaps, if you were to meet him, 
 it would be very unpleasant for both of you just now; and 
 he, being off his head as it were just now, and bothered 
 and worried, he might—well, there's no saying how he 
 might take it.” 
 
 “ Indeed it is very hard upon him that he should be liable 
 to the annoyance of meeting his wife!” said Doris, with ris¬ 
 ing spirit. 
 
 “ No, no; of course he’s to blame; he has done very 
 wrong, and he deserves anything you could say to him. 
 But, Doris, David is really—I must say it—such a good old 
 fellow, so kind, so—so—well, such a good-hearted fellow, 
 that—that I can't bear to think he should be uncomfortable 
 and unhappy. I know I have no right to advise you, and 
 you may blow me up as much as you like; but I am sure 
 you, who are so good yourself, wouldn't like a scandal, and 
 people to talk, but would rather forgive and make it up 
 again. 'Well, if you would go back quietly to town, it 
 would all come right, and David would come back like the 
 lost sheep and the Prodigal Son, and then you could blow 
 him up, and it would be all over, and you could live happy 
 ever after. There now—wouldn't that be best?” 
 
 Doris listened to this not very scholarly discourse with the 
 tears running down her cheeks. After a moment's pause, 
 she said rather bitterly— 
 
 “Your advice is thrown away, as there is nothing left 
 for me to do but to go back to town. David has left 
 Brighton, and I don't know where he is.” 
 
 Charlie was evidently relieved; he had dreaded the conse¬ 
 quences of a meeting unwelcome to the man, having a very 
 strong feeling that nothing was so likely to determine 
 David to “ bolt for it.” As it was, with the fear of im¬ 
 mediate friction removed, he trusted much to the healing 
 
Doris's fortune. 
 
 143 
 
 influence of time, the caprice of Mrs. Hodson, and the nat¬ 
 ural goodness of two hearts which had unaccountably shown 
 so little disposition to beat together. Charlie did not feel 
 that he could afford the “ extra " of sentiment in his own 
 marriage; but a woman with seven thousand a year can 
 afford what she pleases, and, as for David, why, how any 
 woman could be married to him and not be ready to make 
 any sacrifices necessary to his convenience, Charlie, who 
 was as loyal to his male friends as he was irresponsible in 
 his dealings with the inferior sex, could not understand. 
 
 The object of his tete-a We, and indeed of his visit to 
 Brighton, being thus attained, Charlie turned back with 
 Doris; and they soon rejoined Gussie, who was found enjoy¬ 
 ing a cigar and evidently waiting for them, though he pro¬ 
 fessed that he had lost sight of them by accident and that 
 he had been hunting for them ever since. 
 
 They were all rather subdued as they walked back to the 
 Queen's, where they said good-bye, as the young men had 
 to return to town early the next morning. 
 
 On the following afternoon Doris returned to London. 
 She called upon her grandmother in the evening, and was 
 much relieved on discovering that the old lady did not at¬ 
 tempt to take her to task for her escapade; she had even 
 the self-restraint to abstain from any reference to David, 
 so that the visit passed off quite tranquilly. 
 
 Doris lived through the next few days in a dream-like, 
 objectless manner, always hoping for some tidings, but 
 almost despairing of the penitent return Charlie and Mrs. 
 Edgcombe seemed to expect. At last tidings came. 
 
 She had been back in her own home a week when Charlie 
 •Papillon called upon her late one afternoon, and greeted 
 her with a subdued excitement whkh made her draw back, 
 look anxiously into his face, and whisper— 
 
 “ What is it? You have heard something!" 
 
 “ Go and put your things on, Doris," he answered mys¬ 
 teriously, and not without triumph. “ Remember, it was 
 I who found him." 
 
 He would not tell her anything more then; but, as they 
 drove along a few minutes later in the direction of the city, 
 he doled out, bit by bit, jealously, proudly, the intelligence 
 he had for her—how, on hearing a messenger had been 
 sent to David's office in Somerset House, asking if there 
 were any letters for Mr. Glyn, he had waylaid that boy, and 
 
146 
 
 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 bribed him to disclose Mr. Glyn’s hiding-place, which 
 
 { proved to be a city lodging-house; how he had further; 
 earned that Mr. Glyn was ill, upon the receipt of which 1 
 tidings he had at once resolved not to waste time by going; 
 to investigate for himself, but to take Doris with him. 
 
 “ He is ill then?” Doris said, in a low voice, when he 
 had finished his recital. 
 
 “ Oh, don’t be alarmed about that, Doris! Providence 
 has only sent him a little touch of indisposition to make 
 him more amenable to good influences,” said Charlie, who 
 was getting hilarious in the belief that all would come right 
 at last. 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Doris was very silent during the drive, and Charlie had 
 tact enough to restrain his glib tongue, seeing that his 
 companion was not in the mood to appreciate his conversa¬ 
 tion as she ought. Although her thoughts during the last 
 ten days had run on little else than a hoped-for meeting 
 with her husband, and she had pictured to herself a variety 
 of ways in which a reconciliation might come about, now 
 that the moment was so near she tried in vain to decide on 
 the words she ought to use, the attitude she ought to take, 
 to bring David, penitent and loving, to her arms. She 
 had half resolved at last to be very calm, very quiet, to be¬ 
 have as nearly as possible as if nothing had happened to 
 divide them, this being the line of conduct she believed the 
 least likely to offend his delicate susceptibility. 
 
 It struck her, with the clearness of mental vision which 
 often comes to us at a time of high excitement, as strange 
 that she, certainly the innocent, certainly the injured party, 
 should be the one to have to come humbly, with downcast 
 meek eyes and knees ready to bend in supplication or in 
 thankfulness, according to the mood in which the offending 
 party should deign to receive her. , She had had no love- 
 affairs of her own, nor had she studied deeply those of 
 other people, or she might have learned something from the 
 
 f )rostrate, ridiculous meekness in courtship of many a man- 
 y young fellow who means to have it all his own way in 
 marriage, and who, with more or less modification, suc¬ 
 ceeds. Too strong and too modest to have any craving for 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 147 
 
 rule, she did not yet fully understand the weakness of the 
 nature to which she had innocently looked for guid$,nc0* 
 did not understand that in events of importance she would 
 always have to take the initiative in a more or less veiled 
 manner, or risk disaster to both of them. It was dark 
 when the brougham stopped, too dark for Doris to see, 
 even if she had been in a humor to notice, the appearance 
 of the house the door of which was slowly opened after 
 Charlie Papillon's second ring. 
 
 Doris was led into the house, up the dark staircase, to 
 the second floor, and into a large room where the gas had 
 not yet been lighted. 
 
 “ Who's that?” asked Davids voice, hoarse and broken 
 —not like the gentle tones which had been half tho secret 
 of his popularity. 
 
 “ It’s only some friends come to see you, sir,” answered 
 the landlady reassuringly. “ Here—where's the matches? 
 I'll light the gas in one minute, ma'am, and then you'll 
 be able to see for yourself how ill the poor gentleman looks. 
 I'm thankful indeed to find he has friends to look after 
 him, for he seems real lorn and lone-like.” 
 
 The woman, who seemed to be from the country and not 
 yet smoke-dried into the more common form of bloodless 
 and blood-sucking London landladyhood, lighted two burn¬ 
 ers of the dusty chandelier, and revealed a pitiful sight 
 enough. On the faded green sofa with its back to one of 
 the windows sat David, pale, hollow-eyed, haggard and un¬ 
 shaven. He had raised his head from an uneasy resting- 
 place of musty cushions on their entrance; and now, as the 
 unwelcome light fell upon his dazed and staring eyes, he 
 got up unsteadily and, advancing a step, tried, with an En¬ 
 glishman's instinctive wish to avoid a scene, above all, be¬ 
 fore witnesses, to say, “ How do you do?" and that he was 
 glad to see them. 
 
 But the sight of her husband, a horror-struck glance at 
 the miserable surroundings, had put all Doris's prepared 
 speeches and rules of conduct to flight. The tears were in 
 her eyes, her voice had in its ring the new-found tenderness 
 of a young mother, as she took one of his hands, and, with 
 a firm and gentle touch on his right shoulder, persuaded 
 him to resume his seat. He looked into her face in a heavy 
 surprised way, without seeming able to draw any logical 
 deduction from the unexpected nature of the action. 
 
148 
 
 D0EIS*S POETUKE. 
 
 u He will be all right now/* she said, turning to the 
 landlady with a tearfully smiling face; “I am going to 
 take him home.** 
 
 The woman was human enough to look rather crest-fallen 
 at the prospect of losing her lodger so soon. Doris, with 
 the undue contempt of those who have known none but 
 sorrows of sentiment for those who are forced to consider 
 such sorrows a luxury, decided that she was mercenary; 
 giving her purse to Charlie, she intimated in a whisper that 
 lie was to pay her well. So her embassador obediently 
 beckoned the landlady out of the room, leaving the hus¬ 
 band and wife alone together. Both felt embarrassed at 
 once. Doris’s heart was bursting with loving forgiveness; 
 David was shy, ashamed, physically and mentally unfit for 
 any further shock, as she, more sensitive to his feelings, 
 more clear-sighted than she had formerly been, distinctly 
 felt. He broke away from the touch of her hand, and 
 walked to the fire-place, where a fire was burning. But he 
 shivered as he stood before it, and leaned against the mantel¬ 
 piece, with his head on his hand. 
 
 “ There is a draught from this window,** she said, after 
 a pause, glancing at the rattling panes behind the sofa. 
 
 “ Yes/* said he; “ but my head aches; and it was cool 
 there.** 
 
 He was grateful to her for going straight to common¬ 
 place, not heedless either of the new tenderness in her 
 voice; he became on the instant less afraid of her; and, as 
 she said nothing more, he turned his head slowly just far 
 enough to be able to glance furtively at her. But, rapid 
 as the look was, it could not escape the notice of her stead¬ 
 fast loving eyes. Doris came nearer to him, slowly, se¬ 
 ductively, as one does to a timid animal one wishes to tame. 
 
 “ You are feverish I think/* she said gently; “ you have 
 caught cold. Yes, your hands are cold, and **—she drew 
 off her glove, and put her right hand caressingly on his 
 forehead, so that he did not know what was coming until 
 he was half in her embrace —“ and your head is hot. You 
 are not well at all; you will have to submit to be nutsed 
 for a day or two, I feel sure.** 
 
 She tried to speak quite lightly, not yet sure what emo¬ 
 tion a too-ready display of eagerness to have him back 
 might awake in him; but. her voice, gentle, loving, not en¬ 
 tirely steady, was so eloquent that no passionate harangue 
 
DOKXS’s FOBTUim 
 
 14! 
 
 could have touched him more with sensations of shame and 
 self-contempt and a new conviction of the extent to which 
 he had misjudged his wife’s nature. 
 
 “ Thank you—it is nothing—you are much too good to 
 me/’ he said restlessly; and then, with an uneasy con¬ 
 sciousness that his last words summed up the whole situa¬ 
 tion, he turned away from the fire-place just as Charlie re¬ 
 entered the room. 
 
 “ Come along, old Davy! Here—where’s your overcoat? 
 You mustn’t go out without it this weather. Mrs. Glyn, I 
 must trouble you to do your husband’s packing, as I am 
 employed in packing up your husband.’’ 
 
 And, as Doris bustled about the room, filling in a ran¬ 
 dom and unmethodical manner David’s small portmanteau 
 with newspapers of the day before, slippers, the pen-wiper 
 belonging to the room, and everything else that her hands 
 fell upon, Charlie on his side kept up the commotion with 
 a volubility of childish talk which left their prisoner no 
 chance of protest, and covered beautifully the awkwardness 
 of the situation. The drive home, with Charlie squeezed 
 into the uncomfortable little front seat of the brougham, 
 was managed with equal success, the actual home-coming 
 with even more, as the indefatigable Papillon, intelligently 
 seconded by Doris, almost succeeded in giving the curious 
 and suspicious servants the impression that their master’s 
 absence had been of a more commonplace and less interest¬ 
 ing nature than they had believed. 
 
 But, when Charlie, after staying to a dinner at which he 
 did all the eating and all the talking, and spending an hour 
 in the drawing-room which only bis presence saved from 
 being awkward, saw that the time had come wdien David’s 
 evident fatigue made it impossible for him to help the un¬ 
 happy couple longer, and when he had wrung both their 
 hands with a sincerity which touched Doris’s heart and hurt 
 her fingers, the airy philosopher bade them good-night and 
 took his departure. David, with an extra burst of friend¬ 
 ship, or with a cowardly fear of being at last left helplessly 
 alone with his wife, rushed out after him into the hall, and 
 thence on to the door-step, regardless of a duet of warning 
 from Charlie on the pavement and Doris at the drawing¬ 
 room door. 
 
 Then David came back; and, as the front door closed, 
 Doris slipped into the drawing-room again with excited ap* 
 
ISO 
 
 DORISES FORTE HE. 
 
 prehension of the scene which must follow. But it did 
 not. David merely opened the door, and, saying sweetly, 
 “ Good-night, dear. Fm so tired that I think Fll go to 
 bed. A long night may do my head good,” he disappeared 
 again before she had had time to take more than a step 
 toward the door as she said, “ Oh, good-night, dear!” 
 
 The next moment she heard him going upstairs. 
 
 Doris was dismayed. She had meant to make his return 
 easy for him, and she had succeeded so far as to make it 
 too easy. She had meant to pave the way for a reconcilia¬ 
 tion, an explanation, and an apology, no matter how 
 sketchy, how quickly accepted and hushed up by the ready! 
 affection she was so willing to bestow; she felt that some 
 advance on the part of her husband was only her due after 
 all the sacrifices she had made to her own pride, all the 
 pain he had, without fault of hers, made her suffer. And 
 now, instead, he seemed to be taking advantage of her long- 
 suffering patience to slip into the old, cold, empty reserve, 
 and perhaps the old estrangement. Doris could have cried 
 with mortification, with longing, with bitter disappoint¬ 
 ment. For she loved her husband and yearned for him in 
 his weakness, in his fault, far more than she had done in 
 the old days when he stood immaculate on a pedestal, out 
 of reach of her sympathy and of her understanding. How¬ 
 ever, to have got him back at all—got back at least the 
 cold, passive shell which she knew to contain something 
 living, breathing, human, suffering—was something; and 
 she conquered her impulse to tears, and, after a lonely hour 
 spent by the embers of the fire till all the house was still, 
 she went upstairs to bed. 
 
 David was asleep, so she thought. But, when, some 
 minutes after she had placed her head on her pillow very 
 softly, for fear of disturbing him, she imitated the regular 
 breathing of sleep herself to see whether it was true that 
 his mind was composed enough to let him rest so soon, she 
 presently heard him move and felt the sofc touch of his 
 lips upon her face. The touch was magnetic, and thrilled 
 her; for in the soft, faint-hearted kiss she felt, not passion¬ 
 ate affection indeed, but self-reproach, gratitude, penitence 
 •—a dozen feelings which showed that the road was smoothed 
 for her march, which she might well flatter herself would 
 in time be a triumphant one. So she at length fell asleep 
 with hope in her heart. 
 
DORISES FORTUNE. 
 
 151 
 
 The next three days and nights passed evenly, with no 
 outward eventfulness at all. A third person would have 
 been acute if he had perceived any difference in their gen¬ 
 eral conduct or their behavior toward each other from that 
 of their old life before the late disaster. 
 
 David went to his office as usual; true he returned earlier 
 than before, but he was not particularly entertaining or live¬ 
 ly; and it was only little by little that his wife was begin¬ 
 ning, by persistent and unvarying sweetness more assured 
 than of old, to cure him of a habit of shrinking away from 
 her which had taken the place of his former lifeless passiv¬ 
 ity in her presence. Even this sign of a change she accept- * 
 ed hopefully; that he should feel a sense of shyness in hei 
 presence was infinitely better than that he should feel noth¬ 
 ing at all; and she had succeeded at last in passing quite a 
 cheerful evening with him in which she had had the tri¬ 
 umph, by force of her own rising spirits, of making him 
 quite animated, when the next morning a chill was cast 
 over her new hopes by the arrival of two letters, both con¬ 
 taining tidings of her always-unmentioned rival. 
 
 One was a letter directed to her husband in Mrs. Hod- 
 son^s handwriting; the postmark was Richmond—Doris 
 was curious enough to ascertain that, as she took the letter 
 in her hand, before her husband came down, and felt a vio¬ 
 lent wish to tear it up and throw it into the fire. However, 
 she replaced it at the top of the pile, and, forgetful of her 
 own letters, prepared to watch his face when his eyes 
 should fail upon it. This happened of course as soon as he 
 came into the room. He became first red, then white, and 
 glanced at his wife, whose eyes fell after the first agonized 
 look she had ventured to take at his face. He said nothing 
 about the letter, and, turning over the whole pile as if care¬ 
 lessly, opened and read the rest; but, as Doris noticed, he 
 left that one unread, and she dared not ask him why. 
 After breakfast however, which was short, and during which 
 the talk was like their old talks, intermittent and con¬ 
 strained, he gathered up all his letters, Mrs. Hodson's 
 amongst them, and disappeared into the library. 
 
 She started up, longing to follow him, feeling that now 
 at last she must have that scene, that climax to her pent-up 
 feelings, for which her feminine nature had long been 
 yearning. Prudence got the better of her again, and told 
 her she must not risk her patient work by a premature en- 
 
152 DORIS'S FORTUNE. 
 
 gagement. Resolutely she took up the letters to which sh« 
 had been till now too deeply occupied to attend. The first 
 she opened was from her grandmother. It told her how 
 thankful she was to hear that her dear Doris was on the 
 road to being happy at last, as Charlie Papillon had, in a 
 very kind-hearted manner, been good enough to come and 
 inform her. She added that she found she had formerly 
 underrated both that young gentleman's feelings and sense, 
 though he still talked of his own fiancee with insufficient 
 propriety of diction. Mrs. Edgcombe and he had j udged it 
 best to leave the reunited couple to themselves for a few 
 days; but she herself only needed a word from Doris to 
 come and witness their new-found happiness. Then came 
 a few lines which made Doris's heart quake with pain; Mrs. 
 Edgcombe had just learned that Mrs. Hodson and her 
 husband had patched up a reconciliation, and were back 
 again at Richmond, after a composition with the latter's 
 creditors, with the help of his brother-in-law. The old lady 
 hoped, however, that Doris would not be so indiscreet as to 
 injure'her own chance of happiness by consenting to counte¬ 
 nance a renewal of her husband's acquaintance with either 
 husband or wife. 
 
 Doris laid the letter down in her lap, and looked out at 
 the gray day with a face in which doubt was turning slowly 
 to resolution. At last she rose; she had borne suspense 
 long enough; she must have certainty, of whatever kind it 
 might be. She took up the letter, went to her husband's 
 study, and knocked at th^ door. 
 
 “ Come in," said David. 
 
 As she entered, he raised his head from the table at which 
 he wa3 writing. He looked animated, and smiled at her. 
 But she did not smile back. With a grave, solemn face, 
 and glancing anxiously at the paper before him, she handed 
 him her letter. 
 
 “ I have just received this from grandmamma. Please 
 read it," said she, in a cold, almost despairing voice. 
 
 He took it from her and read it carefully. Then he 
 handed her a letter of his own, saying— 
 
 “ I have just received this. Read it." 
 
 It was the letter from Mrs. Hodson. Surmounting a re¬ 
 pugnance which made her turn scarlet as she touched the 
 paper, Doris took it, and read an invitation, in her old 
 charming style, with all the fascinating liveliness and play 
 
 * > 
 
Boris’s fortune. 
 
 153 
 
 ful tone of command which made every written word ring 
 in the ears as if it were being spoken by the writer, to a 
 musical evening at the Lawns, to which David was to be 
 sure to bring the charming wife he did not half appreciate 
 as he ought. 
 
 Doris gave it back without a word, but with a look in 
 which she could not hide disgust. 
 
 “ And this is my answer/'’ said David, who had been fin¬ 
 ishing his note as she read. 
 
 But Dorises hand trembled now as she held it out without 
 a look at him. It was a very short note: 
 
 “ Mrs. Hodsom. 
 
 “ Dear Madame, —My wife and I join in thanking you 
 for your very kind invitation. It is only one more instance of 
 the kind concern you and Mr. Hodson have always taken in 
 our mutual happiness. You will be pleased to learn how¬ 
 ever that, chiefly through your kind agency, I have learned 
 a lesson toward appreciating her better, which makes it im¬ 
 possible for me to spare even so much of her society as a 
 visit together to the Lawns would give to others than my¬ 
 self. Forgive my selfishness, and believe me to remain, 
 madarne, 
 
 “ Yours very truly, 
 
 “ David Glyk.” 
 
 Doris began to cry; so her husband gently took the note 
 away from her, lest her tears should spoil it, folded it, put 
 it into an envelope, and wrote the direction. His wife mean¬ 
 while tried to repress her sobs and dried her eyes. 
 
 Then David got up, drew her to him with the firm warm 
 clasp she had yearned for so long, and kissed the nape of 
 her neck fervently, repeatedly, without at first speaking. 
 
 “ What are you crying for?” he whispered at last. 
 “ Are you sorry I’ve found out that I’ve been a fool and a 
 brute—sorry that you have conquered my own shame— 
 sorry that I love you?” 
 
 “ Oh, David!” was all she had to say to him. 
 
 But he sat again in his chair, and drew her to his knees, 
 and, utterly conquered, excited by her passionate reception 
 of his tardy confession, he poured out incoherent words into 
 her sympathetic ears—words which, broken as they were, 
 no understanding except hers could have interpreted as the 
 
154 
 
 DORIS S FORTUFTE. 
 
 history of his fear of her coldness, weak yielding to a show 
 of sympathy, his struggles, remorse, despair, and peni¬ 
 tence. 
 
 Doris would not hear much, even if the man had been 
 eloquent enough to tell much. But a pause, a broken 
 word, a look, told her sympathetic heart more than she 
 wanted to know; the barrier between the two natures was 
 broken down forever. The world would go on as before for 
 them; they would err again, they would suffer again; but 
 the error would not be of the one toward the other, and the 
 suffering time might bring them they would bear together. 
 
 TBs mm. 
 
 
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 33 The White Scalper. 10 
 
 84 The Missouri Outlaws. 10 
 
 35 The Prairie Flower.10 
 
 86 The Indian Scout. 10 
 
 87 The Bee-Hunter. 10 
 
 88 Stoneheart. 10 
 
 89 The Rebel Chief.10 
 
 40 The Last of the Aucas.... 10 
 
 41 The Buccaneer Chief. 10 
 
 42 The Queen of the Savan¬ 
 
 nah. 10 
 
 43 The Red River Half-Breed 10 
 
 44 The Treasure of Pearls... 10 
 
 45 The Trappers of Arkansas 10 
 
 46 Stronghand. 10 
 
 47 The Smuggler Hero. 10 
 
 Capt. L. C. Carleton. 
 
 1 The Man of Death.10 
 
 8 Eagle Eyes, the Scout. 10 
 
 4 The Trapper’s Retreat.... 10 
 
 7 The Wild Man of the 
 
 Woods. (Illustrated)... 10 
 Captain Clewline. 
 
 14 The Boy Whalers. 10 
 
 48 The Island Demon. 10 
 
 Halsey Page. 
 
 2 Dasha way Charley. (Illus¬ 
 trated). 10 
 
 5 Dasha.way Charley's Sec¬ 
 
 ond Term at Rauleigh. 
 (Illustrated). 10 
 
 6 Dasha way Charley’s Last 
 
 Term at Ranleigh. (Il¬ 
 lustrated >. 10 
 
 9 Dashaway Charley on the 
 
 Plains. (Illustrated)_ 10 
 
 10 The Young Pioneers. (Il¬ 
 lustrated). 10 
 
 Samuel W. Pearce. 
 
 12 The Boy Yachtsman. (Il¬ 
 
 lustrated). 10 
 
 49 Bound to Win. 10 
 
 50 The Bov Detective’s Tri¬ 
 
 umph . 10 
 
 W. E, Westlake. 
 
 13 Doings at School and at 
 
 Sea. (Illustrated). 10 
 
 15 The Bovs and Girls of Sil¬ 
 
 ver Creek Academy.... 10 
 
 16 Fun, Love, and Adventure 
 
 on Land and Water..,. 10 
 
 17 Among the Reds: or, Fred 
 
 and Bert Beyond the 
 
 Rocky Mountains.10 
 
 18 The Red Star...... 10 
 
 Miscellaneous. 
 
 11 The Yankee Champion.... 10 
 
 The foregoing books are for sale by all newsdealers, or will be 
 sent by mail, postage prepaid, on receipt of the prioe, by the pub¬ 
 lishers. Address 
 
 OEORGK MMRO S SOUS, 
 
 Munro’s Publishing* House, 
 
 17 to $7 Vandwater St., New Torfee 
 
 <S>, Q Bos 2781) 
 
THE OLD SLEUTH LIBRARY. 
 
 S 
 
 THE “OLD SLEUTH” LIBRARY. 
 
 A Series of the Most Thrilling Detective Stories Ever Published. 
 
 Issued Quarterly. Price 5 Cents Each. 
 
 1 Old Sleuth, the Detective.. 5 
 
 2 The King of the Detectives. 5 
 
 8 Oid Sleuth's Triumph. 5 
 
 4 Under a Million Disguises.. 5 
 
 5 Night Scenes in Mew York. 5 
 
 6 Old Electricity, the Light¬ 
 
 ning Detective.5 
 
 7 The Shadow Detective. 5 
 
 3 Red-Light Will, the River 
 
 Detective. 5 
 
 9 Iron Burgess, the Govern¬ 
 
 ment Detective. 5 
 
 10 The Brigands of New York. 5 
 
 11 Tracked by a Ventriloquist. 5 
 
 12 The Twin Shadowers. 5 
 
 13 The French Detective. 5 
 
 14 Billy Wayne, the St. Louis 
 
 Detective.5 
 
 15 The New York Detective... 5 
 
 16 O’Neil McDarragh, the De¬ 
 
 tective. 5 
 
 17 Old Sleuth in Harness Again 5 
 
 18 The Lady Detective. 5 
 
 19 The Yankee Detective. 5 
 
 20 The Fastest Boy in New 
 
 York .. 5 
 
 21 Black Raven, the Georgia 
 
 Detective. 5 
 
 22 Night-Hawk, the Mounted 
 
 Detective. 5 
 
 23 The Gypsy Detective. 5 
 
 24 The Mysteries and Miseries 
 
 of New' York. 5 
 
 25 Old Terrible. 5 
 
 26 The Smugglers of New York 
 
 Bay. 5 
 
 27 Manfred, the Magic Trick 
 
 Detective.5 
 
 28 Mura, the Western Lady 
 
 . Detective. 5 
 
 29 Mons. Armand; or, The 
 
 French Detective in New r 
 York. 5 
 
 30 Lady Kate, the Dashing Fe¬ 
 
 male Detective.5 
 
 31 Hamud. the Detective. 5 
 
 32 The Giant Detective in 
 
 France.5 
 
 33 The American Detective in 
 
 Russia. 5 
 
 34 The Dutch Detective.5 
 
 35 Old Puritan, the Old-Time 
 
 Yankee Detective. 
 
 36 Manfred’s Quest. 
 
 37 Tom Thumb; or. The Won¬ 
 
 derful Boy Detective_ 
 
 38 Old Ironsides Abroad. 
 
 39 Little Black Tom; or, The 
 
 Adventures of a Mis¬ 
 chievous Darky. 
 
 40 Old Ironsides Among the 
 
 Cowb< >ys. 
 
 41 Black Tom in Search of a 
 
 Father: or, The Further 
 Adventures of a Mis¬ 
 chievous Darkly. 
 
 42 Bonanza Bardie; or, The 
 
 Treasure of the Rockies. 
 
 43 Old Transform, the Secret 
 
 Special Detective. 
 
 44 The King of the Shadowers. 
 
 45 Gasparoni, the Italian De¬ 
 
 tective. .. 
 
 46 Old Sleuth's Luck. 
 
 47 The Irish Detective. 
 
 4S Dow n in a Coal Mine. 
 
 49 Faithful Mike, the Irish 
 
 Hero. 
 
 50 Silver Tom, the Detective.. 
 
 51 The Duke of New York_ 
 
 52 Jack Gameway; or. A West¬ 
 
 ern Boy in New York_ 
 
 53 All Round New York. 
 
 54 Old Ironsides in New r York. 
 
 55 Jack Ripple and His Talk¬ 
 
 ing Dog.. 
 
 56 Bill}' Joyce, the Govern¬ 
 
 ment Detective. 
 
 57 Badger and His Shadow... 
 
 58 Darral, the Detective. 
 
 59 Old Sleuth, Badger & Co... 
 
 60 Old Phenomenal. 
 
 61 A Golden Curse. 
 
 62 The Mysterious Murder.... 
 
 63 Monte-Cristo Ben. 
 
 64 The Bowery Detective. 
 
 65 The Boy Detective. 
 
 66 Detective Thrash. 
 
 67 Ebeon, the Detective..* 
 
 68 Old Ironsides at His Best.. 
 
 69 Archie the Wonder. 
 
 70 The Red Detective. 
 
 The foregoing books are for sale by all new sdealers, or will be 
 sent by mail, postage prepaid, on receipt of 6 cents each, or 5 for 
 96 cents, by the publishers. Address 
 
 George Munro’s Sons, Munro’s Publishing House, 
 
 (P. O. B#x 2781.) 17 to 27 Vandewater St., New York# 
 
 otc*ototcto. etotototutotetctc* or ot c* c* ©« «* c* o* c* c* c* etc* ot ot ot c* etc* ct c* 
 
6 GEORGE MUNRO’S SONS' PUBLICATIONS, 
 
 ATTRACTIVE HAND-BOOKS. 
 
 The Art of Housekeeping. By 
 Mrs. Mary Stuart Smith.. 25 
 
 The New York Fashion Bazar 
 
 Model Letter-Writer and 
 Lovers’ Oracle.25 
 
 The New York Fashion Bazar 
 Book of the Toilet.25 
 
 The New York Fashion Bazar 
 Book of Etiquette.25 
 
 Munro’s Star Recitations. 
 Compiled and Edited by 
 Mrs. Mary E. Bryan.25 
 
 Good Form: A Book of Every 
 Day Etiquette. By Mrs. 
 Armstrong.25 
 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS BOOKS. 
 
 Juliet Corson’s New Family 
 Cook Book. By Miss J u- 
 liet Corson.$1.00 
 
 New Tabernacle Sermons. 
 
 By the Rev. T. De Witt 
 Talmage.$1.00 
 
 Alice’s Adventures in Won¬ 
 derland. By Lewis Car- 
 roll . 50 
 
 Through the Looking-Glass 
 and What Alice Found 
 There. By Lewis Carroll. 50 
 
 The Shadow Detective. By 
 “Old Sleuth”.50 
 
 Blood is Thicker than Water: 
 
 A Few Days Among Our 
 Southern Brethren. By 
 Henry M. Field, D.D ....0 25 
 
 A Practical Guide to the Ac¬ 
 quisition of the Spanish 
 Language. By Lucien 
 Oudin, A.M.25 
 
 Cutting-Out and Dressmak¬ 
 ing. From the French of 
 MUe. E. Grand'homme... 25 
 
 Confessions of an Imp. By 
 “Old Sleuth”.25 
 
 Hunters’ Yarns. A Collection 
 of Wild and Amusing Ad¬ 
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 Munro’s French Series. Nos. 
 
 2 and 3 - Practical Guides 
 to the French Language. 
 
 By Lucien Oudin, A M... 25 
 
 Munro’s German Series. A 
 Method of Learning Ger¬ 
 man on a New and Easy 
 Plan. By Edward Cha- 
 mier. Two volumes—each 25 
 
 Munro’s Dialogues and Speakers. 
 
 No. 1—The Funny Fel¬ 
 low’s Dialogues.10 
 
 No. 2—The Clemence and 
 
 Donkey Dialogues.10 
 
 No. 3—Mrs Smith s Board¬ 
 ers’ Dialogues. 10 
 
 No. 4—Schoolboys’ Comic 
 
 Dialogues. 10 
 
 No. 1—Vot I Know ’Bout 
 Gruel Societies Speaker 10 
 No. 2—The John B. Go-off 
 
 Comic Speaker. 10 
 
 No. 3—My Boy Vilhelm’s 
 Speaker. 10 
 
 Kitchen Lessons for Young 
 Housekeepers. By Annie 
 H. Jerome.10 
 
 Letter-Writing Made Easy... 10 
 
 The foregoing books are for sale by all newsdealers, or will be 
 sent by mail, postage prepaid, on receipt of the price, by the pub¬ 
 lishers. Address 
 
 GEORGE MVJNRO’S SONS, 
 
 Munro’s Publishing House, 
 fP. O. Box 2781) 17 to 27 Vande water St., New Yer& 
 
Munro’s Library of Popular Novels. 
 
 S 2 
 
 1 A Yellow Aster. “ Iota.” 
 
 8 Esther Waters. George Moore. 
 
 3 The Man in Black. Stanley J. Wey- 
 
 rnan. 
 
 4 Dodo. E. F. Benson. 
 
 5 Ships that Pass in the Night. Bea¬ 
 
 trice Harraden. 
 
 6 A Rogue’s Life. Wilkie Collins. 
 
 I 7 The Duchess. “The Duchess.” 
 
 8 Called Back. Hugh Conway. 
 
 9 A Wicked Girl. Mary Cecil Hay. 
 
 10 Back to the Old Home. Mary Cecil 
 
 Hay. 
 
 II Wedded and Parted. Charlotte M. 
 
 Brae me. 
 
 12 The Bag of Diamonds. George 
 
 Manville Fenn. 
 
 13 The Octoroon*. Miss M. E. Bradden. 
 
 14 A Study in Scarlet. A. Conan 
 
 Doyle. 
 
 15 Forging the Fetters. Mrs. Alexan¬ 
 
 der. 
 
 16 My Lady’s Money. Wilkie Collins. 
 
 17 The Shadow of a Sin. Charlotte 
 
 M. Braeme. 
 
 18 The Cricket on the Hearth. Char¬ 
 
 les Dickens 
 
 19 The Squire’s Darling. Charlotte M. 
 
 Braeme. 
 
 20 Singleheart and Doubleface. Char¬ 
 
 les Reade. 
 
 21 Lady Grace. Mrs. Henry Wood. 
 
 22 Maid, Wife or Widow? Mrs. Alex¬ 
 
 ander. 
 
 23 Black Beauty. Anna Sewell. 
 
 24 Ideala. Sarah Grand, author of 
 “ The Heavenly Twins.” 
 
 25 Camille. Alexander Dumas. 
 
 6 Her Last Throw. “ The Duchess. ” 
 
 27 Three Men in a Boat. J. K. Jerome. 
 
 28 The Honorable Mrs. Vereker. “The 
 
 Duchess.” 
 
 29 The House of the Wolf. Stanley J. 
 
 Weyinan. 
 
 30 Charlotte Temple. Mrs. Rowson. 
 
 31 The Shattered Idol. Charlotte M. 
 
 Braeme. 
 
 32 Derrick Vaughan—Novelist. Edna 
 
 LyaU. 
 
 33 The Mystery of No. 13. Helen B. 
 
 Mathers. 
 
 34 He Went for a Soldier. John 
 
 Strange Winter. 
 
 35 The Haunted Chamber. “ The 
 
 Duchess.” 
 
 36 Cleverly Won. Hawley Smart. 
 
 87 Doris’s Fortune. Florence Warden. 
 
 88 Diuna Forget. J. S. Winter, 
 
 39 The Earl’s Error. Charlotte M. 
 
 Braeme. 
 
 40 A Golden Heart. Charlotte M. 
 
 Braeme. 
 
 41 Her Only Sin. Charlotte M.Braeme. 
 
 42 The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fel¬ 
 
 low. Jerome K. Jerome. 
 
 43 In Durance Vile. “The Duchess.” 
 
 44 A Little Rebel. “ The Duchess.” 
 
 45 A Little Irish Girl. “ The Duchess.” 
 
 46 Loys, Lord Berresford. “The 
 
 Duchess. ' 
 
 47 The Moment After. Robert Bu¬ 
 
 chanan. 
 
 48 A Marriage at Sea. W. Clark Rus¬ 
 
 sell. 
 
 49 A Mad Love. Author of “Lover 
 
 and Lord.” 
 
 50 The Other Man’s Wife. John 
 
 Strange Winter. 
 
 51 On Her Wedding Morn. Charlotte 
 
 M. Braeme. 
 
 52 Stage-Land. Jerome K. Jerome. 
 
 53 Struck Down. Hawley Smart. 
 
 54 A Star and a Heart. Florence 
 
 Marry at. 
 
 55 Sweet is True Love. “The Duch¬ 
 
 ess.” 
 
 56 The Two Orphans. D’Ennery. 
 
 57 A Troublesome Girl. “ The Duch¬ 
 
 ess.” 
 
 58 Two Generations. Count Lyof Tol¬ 
 
 stoi. 
 
 59 At the Green Dragon. Beatrice 
 
 Harraden, author of “ Ships that 
 Pass in the Night.” 
 
 60 Singularly Deluded. Sarah Grand. 
 
 61 The Hired Bahy Marie Corelli. 
 
 62 The Tour of the World in 80 Days. 
 
 Jules Verne. 
 
 63 Little Pilgrim, A. Mrs. Oliphant. 
 
 64 By the Gate of the Sea. D. Chris¬ 
 
 tie Murray\ 
 
 65 Maiden Fair, A. Charles Gibbon. 
 
 06 The Romance of a Poor Young 
 
 Man. Octave Feuillet. 
 
 67 The Red Eric. R. M. Ballantyne. 
 
 68 The Fire Brigade. R.M. Ballantyne. 
 
 69 Erling the Bold. R. M. Ballantyne. 
 
 70 Rose Fleming. Dora Russell. 
 
 71 Reveries of a Bachelor. Ik. Mar¬ 
 
 vel. 
 
 72 Under the Red Flag. Miss M. E. 
 
 Braddon. 
 
 73 The Little School-master Mark. J. 
 
 H. Shorthouse. 
 
 74 Mrs. Carr's Companion. M. G. 
 
 Wightwick. 
 
 75 Diamond Cut Diamond. T. Adolph¬ 
 
 us Trollope. 
 
 76 Monica, and A Rose Distill’d. “The 
 
 Duchess.” 
 
 77 Afternoon, and other scotches. 
 
 “ Ouida.” 
 
 78 Master Humphrey’s Clock. Charles 
 
 Dickens. 
 
 (Continued on next pagre.) 
 
 ■ - 
 
 mi 
 
Munro's Library of Popular Novels 
 
 70 The Witching Hour, and other stor¬ 
 ies. 44 The Duchess.” 
 
 80 A Great Heiress R. E. Francillon. 
 
 81 “That Last Rehearsal,” and other 
 
 stories. 4 * The Duchess.” 
 
 82 Uncle Jack. Walter Besant. 
 
 83 The Romantic Adventures of a Milk¬ 
 
 maid. Thomas Hardy. 
 
 84 A Glorious Fortune. Walter Be¬ 
 
 sant. 
 
 85 She Loved Him! Annie Thomas. 
 
 86 One False, Both Fair. John B. 
 
 Harwood. 
 
 87 Promises of Marriage. Emile Ga- 
 
 boriau. 
 
 88 Love Finds the Way, and other 
 
 stories. W. Besant and J. Rice. 
 
 89 The Captain’s Daughter. From the 
 
 Russian of Pushkin. 
 
 96 For Himself Alone. T. W. Speight. 
 
 91 The Ducie Diamonds. C. Blather- 
 
 wick. 
 
 92 The Starling. Norman Macleod, 
 
 D.D. 
 
 93 Captain Norton’s Diary, and A Mo¬ 
 
 ment of Madness. Florence 
 Marryat. 
 
 94 Her Gentle Deeds. Sarah Tytler. 
 
 95 Moonshine and Marguerites. “ The 
 
 Duchess.” 
 
 96 No Thoroughfare. Wilkie Collins 
 
 and Charles Dickens. 
 
 97 The Haunted Man. Charles Dickens 
 
 98 Fortune’s Wheel. 44 The Duchess.” 
 
 99 Love's Random Shot. Wilkie Col 
 
 lins. 
 
 100 An April Day. Philippa Prittie 
 
 Jephson. 
 
 101 Little Make-Believe. B. L. Far jeon. 
 
 102 Round the Galley Fire. W. Clark 
 
 Russell. 
 
 103 The New Abelard. Robert Bu¬ 
 
 chanan. 
 
 104 Old Contrairy, and other stories. 
 
 Florence Marryat. 
 
 105 Dita. Lady Majendie. 
 
 1 06 The Midnight Sun. Fredrika Bre- 
 | mer. 
 
 107 Valerie’s Fate. Mrs. Alexander. 
 
 108 At the World’s Mercy. F. Warden. 
 
 109 The Rosery Folk. G. Manville 
 
 Fenn. 
 
 110 44 So Near, and Yet So Far!” Ali¬ 
 
 son. 
 
 111 A Husband’s Story. 
 
 112 The Fisher Village. Anne Beale. 
 
 113 An Old Man’s Love. Anthony 
 
 Trollope. 
 
 114 John Bull and His Island. Max 
 
 OVRell. 
 
 115 The Picture, and Jack of All 
 
 Trades. Charles Reade. 
 
 (Continued on i 
 
 116 The Ghost of Charlotte Cray, and 
 
 other stories. Florence Marryat. 
 
 117 Readiana: Comments on Current 
 
 Events. Charles Reade, 
 
 118 Lady Clare; or, The Master of tit© 
 
 Forges. Georges Ohnet. 
 
 119 Love and Money; or, a Perilous 
 
 Secret. Charles Reade. 
 
 120 Miss Tommy. Miss Mulock. 
 
 121 The House on the Marsh. F. War¬ 
 
 den. 
 
 122 The Daughter of the Stars, and 
 
 other tales. Hugh Conway. 
 
 123 A Sinless Secret. “Rita.’'’ 
 
 124 The Amazon. Carl Vosmaer. 
 
 125 Beyond Recall. Adeline Sergeant. 
 
 126 Pi6douche, a French Detective. 
 
 F. Du Boisgobey. 
 
 127 The Water-Babies. Rev. Charles 
 
 Kingsley. 
 
 128 The Southern Star; or, The Dia¬ 
 
 mond Field. Jules Verne. 
 
 129 Eyre's Acquittal. Helen B. Ma¬ 
 
 thers. 
 
 130 Miss Milne and I. Author of “A 
 
 Yellow Aster.” 
 
 131 Vashti and Esther. By the writer 
 
 of “ Belle's Letters.” 
 
 132 Beyond the City. A. Conan Doyle. 
 
 133 A Scandal in Bohemia. A. Conan 
 
 Doyle. 
 
 134 The Sign of the Four. A. Conan 
 
 Doyle. 
 
 135 The Heir of Linne. Robert Bu¬ 
 
 chanan. 
 
 136 Treasure Island. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 137 The Stickit Minister. S. R. Crock¬ 
 
 ett. 
 
 138 The Suicide Club. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 139 The Merry Men. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 140 Prince Otto. Robert Louis Ste¬ 
 
 venson. 
 
 141 The Misadventures of John Nich¬ 
 
 olson, Robert Louis Stevenson. 
 
 142 An Inland Vo 3 T age. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 143 The Silverado Squatters. Robert 
 
 Louis Stevenson. 
 
 144 The Master of Ballantrae. Robert 
 
 Louis Stevenson. \ 
 
 146 She’s All the 'World to Me. Hall 
 
 Caine. 
 
 147 My Wonderful Wife! Marie Corelli 
 
 148 A Change of Air. Anthony Hope. 
 
 149 The Dynamiters. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 150 Pole on Whist. 
 
 151 The Dolly Dialogues. Anthony 
 
 Hope. 
 
 I page of Cover.) 
 
 # 
 
-s-—-------- 
 
 Mnnro’s Library of Popular Novels. 
 
 LATEST ISSUES. 
 
 152 The Rock or the Rye. T. C. De 
 
 Leon. 
 
 153 Auld Lieht Idylls. James M. Barrie 
 
 154 A Window in Thrums. James M. 
 
 Barrie. 
 
 155 When a Man’s Single. James M. 
 
 Barrie. 
 
 156 The Peril of Oliver Sargent. Ed¬ 
 
 gar Janes Bliss. 
 
 157 My Lady Nicotine. James M. Bar¬ 
 
 rie. 
 
 158 Better Dead. James M. Barrie. 
 
 159 The Story of an African Farm 
 
 Ralph Iron (Olive Schreiner). 
 
 160 Dreams. Ralph Iron (Olive Schrei¬ 
 
 ner). 
 
 161 Kidnapped. Robert Louis Steven¬ 
 
 son. 
 
 162 The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll 
 
 and Mr. Hyde. Robert Louis 
 Stevenson. 
 
 163 The Mystery of Cloomber. A. 
 
 Conan Doyle. 
 
 164 Love Letters of a Worldly Woman. 
 
 Mrs. W. K. Clifford. 
 
 165 The Pavilion on the Links. Rob- 
 
 ert Louis Stevenson. 
 
 166 Addie’s Husband. The author of 
 
 “ Love and Lands.” 
 
 167 The Captain of the “Pole-Star.” 
 
 A. Conan Doyle. 
 
 168 The Picture of Dorian Gray. Os¬ 
 
 car Wilde. 
 
 169 L’Abbe Constantin. Ludovic Hal- 
 
 evy. 
 
 170 Sport Royal. Anthony Hope. 
 
 171 Poems by Oscar Wilde. 
 
 172 Dream Life. By Ik. Marvel. 
 
 173 Tales of Mean Streets. Arthur 
 
 Morrison. 
 
 174 The Dark House. G. Manville 
 
 Fenn. 
 
 175 The Rabbi's Spell. Stuart C. Cum- 
 • berland. 
 
 176 Lord Lisle’s Daughter. Charlotte 
 
 M Braeme. 
 
 177 The Master of the Mine. Robert 
 
 Buchanan. 
 
 178 King Solomon’s Mines. H. Rider 
 
 Haggard. 
 
 179 Jet: Her Face or Her Fortune? 
 
 Mrs. Annie Edwards. 
 
 180 Matt: A Tale of a Caravan. Rob¬ 
 
 ert Buchanan. 
 
 181 Sippho. Alphonse Daudet. 
 
 182 The Tinted Venus. F. Anstey. 
 
 183 A Man of Mark. Anthony Hope. 
 
 184 The Secret of Goresthorpe Grange. 
 
 A. Conan Doyle. 
 
 184 A Case of Identity. A. Conan 
 
 Doyle. 
 
 185 My Friend the Murderer. A. Co¬ 
 
 nan Doyle. 
 
 186 Diary of a Pilgrimage. Jerome 
 
 K. Jerome. 
 
 187 Madame Sans Gene. Edmond Le- 
 
 pelletier. 
 
 188 The Mystery of Sasassa Valley. 
 
 A. Conan Doyle. 
 
 189 The Silver Hatchet. A. Conan 
 
 Doyle. 
 
 190 Mine Own People. Rudyard Kip¬ 
 
 ling. 
 
 191 The Courting of Dinah Shadd. 
 
 Rudyard Kipling. 
 
 192 Maivva’s Revenge. H. Rider Hag¬ 
 
 gard. 
 
 193 Mr. Meeson’s Will. H. Rider Hag¬ 
 
 gard. 
 
 194 The Sunreon of Gaster Fell. A. 
 
 Conan Doyle. 
 
 195 Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush. 
 
 Ian Maclaren. 
 
 196 The Bottle Imp. Robert Louis 
 
 Stevenson. 
 
 These works are for sale by all newsdealers, or will be sent by mail on 
 receipt of 10 cents per copv. or any three copies for 25 cents. Address 
 
 GEORGE MTJNRO’S SONS, Munro’s Publishing House, 
 
 (P. O. Box 2781.) 17 to 27 Vandewater Street, New York. 
 
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