she is!--was looking
sad and weary."

"Oh, aunt won't do anything, or take an interest in anything. She just
stays there. I've tried in vain to get her here. Do you know"--and she
turned upon the earl a look of the old playfulness--"she doesn't quite
approve of me."

"Oh," he replied, hesitating a little--"I think, Mrs. Henderson, that
her heart is bound up in you. It isn't for me to say that you haven't a
truer friend in the world."

"Yes, I know. If I'd only--" and she stopped, with a petulant look on
her fair face--"well, it doesn't matter. She is a dear soul."

"I--suppose," said the earl, rising, "we shall see you again on the
other side?"

"Perhaps," with a smile. Could anything be more commonplace than such a
parting? Good-by, I shall see you tomorrow or next year, or in the next
world. Hail and farewell! That is the common experience. But, oh, the
bitterness of it to many a soul!

It is quite possible that when the Earl of Chisholm said good-by, with
an air of finality, Margaret felt that another part of her life was
closed. He was not in any way an extraordinary person, he was not a very
rich peer, probably with his modesty and conscientiousness, and devotion
to the ordinary duties of his station, he would never attain high
rank in the government. Yet no one could be long with him without
apprehending that his life was on a high plane. It was with a little
irritation that Margaret recognized this, and remembered, with a twinge
of conscience, that it was upon that plane that her life once traveled.
The time had been when the more important thing to her was the world of
ideas, of books, of intellectual life, of passionate sympathy with the
fortunes of humanity, of deepest interest in all the new thoughts
struck out by the leaders who studied the profound problems of life and
destiny.

That peace of mind which is found only in the highest activity for
the noblest ends she once had, though she thought it then unrest and
striving--what Carmen, who was under no illusions about Henderson, or
Uncle Jerry, or the world of fashion, and had an intuitive perception of
cant that is sometimes denied to the children of light, called "taking
pleasure in the things of the mind." To do Margaret justice, there
entered into her reflections no thought of the title and position of the
Earl of Chisholm. They had never been alluring to her. If one could
take any satisfaction in this phase of her character, her worldiness was