e remembered, too, and as often as the mail
came in, bringing her no letter, she sighed involuntarily to think
she was forgotten. Not forgotten, Maude, no, not forgotten, and when
one afternoon, five weeks after James' departure J.C. stood at her
side, he had good reason for turning his eyes away from her truthful
glance, for he knew of a secret wrong done to her that day. There
had come to him that morning a letter from James, containing a note
for Maude, and the request that he would hand it to her.

"I should have written to her sooner," James wrote, "but mother's
illness and an unusual amount of business prevented me from doing
so. 'Better late than never,' is, however, a good motto at times,
and I intrust the letter to you, because I would save her from any
gossip which an open correspondence with me might create."

For James De Vere to write to a young girl was an unheard-of
circumstance, and the sight of that note aroused in J.C.'s bosom a
feeling of jealousy lest the prize he now knew he coveted should be
taken from him. No one but himself should write to Maude Remington,
for she was his, or rather she should be his. The contents of that
note might be of the most ordinary kind, but for some reason
undefinable to himself he would rather she should not see it yet,
and though it cost him a struggle to deal thus falsely with both, he
resolved to keep it from her until she had promised to be his wife.
He never dreamed it possible that she could tell him no, he had been
so flattered and admired by the city belles; and the only point
which troubled him was what his fashionable friends would say when
in place of the Nellie whose name had been so long associated with
his, he brought to them a Maude fresh from the rural districts, with
naught in her disposition save goodness, purity, and truth. They
would be surprised, he knew, but she was worth a thousand of them
all, and then with a glow of pride he thought how his tender love
and care would shield her from all unkind remarks, and how he would
make himself worthy of such a treasure.

This was the nobler, better part of J.C.'s nature, but anon a more
sordid feeling crept in, and he blushed to find himself wondering
how large her fortune really was! No one knew, save the lawyers and
the trustee to whose care it had been committed, and since he had
become interested in her he dared not question them lest they should
accuse him of mercenary motives. Was it as large as Ne