ndow was open, and a flood of sunshine fell on her pale brown
hair, as it rested against the high arm of a chintz-covered sofa. Her
hand, small and childlike, though less round and soft than it had been
two years ago, caressed my cheek when I bent over her. She was well
again, she was blooming, but the bloom was paler and more delicate, and
there was a fragility in her appearance which was a new and disturbing
sign of diminished strength. Would she ever, even when cradled in
luxuries, recover her buoyant health, her sparkling vitality, I
wondered.

The old Bland house, with the two great sycamores growing beside it, was
for sale; and thinking to please Sally, I bought it without her
knowledge, filled, as it was, with the Bland and Fairfax furniture,
which had surrounded Miss Mitty and Miss Matoaca. On the day some eight
or nine months later that we moved into it the sycamores were budding,
and there were faint spring scents in the air.

"This is where you belong. This is home to you," I said as we stood on
the wide porch at the back, and looked down on the garden. "You will be
happy here, dearest."

"Oh, yes, I'll be happy here."

"It won't be so hard for you when I'm obliged to leave you alone. I'm
sorry I've had to be away so much of late. Have you been lonely?"

"I've taken up riding again. George has found me a new horse, a beauty.
To-morrow I shall follow the hounds with Bonny."

"Oh, be careful, Sally, promise me that you will be careful."

She turned with a laugh that sounded a little reckless.

"There's no pleasure in being careful, and I'm seeking pleasure," she
answered.

The next morning I went to New York for a couple of days, and when I
returned late one afternoon, I found Sally, in her riding habit, pouring
tea for Bonny Marshall and George Bolingbroke in the drawing-room.

I was very tired, my mind was engrossed in business, as it had been
engrossed since the day of the sale of the West Virginia and Wyanoke
Railroad, and I was about to pass upstairs to my dressing-room, when
George, catching sight of me, called to me to come in and exert my
powers of persuasion.

"I'm begging Sally to sell that horse, Beauchamp," he said. "She tried
to make him take a fence this afternoon and he balked and threw her. At
first we were frightened out of our wits, but she got up laughing and
insisted upon mounting him again on the spot."

"Of course you didn't let her," I retorted, with anger.

"Let her? Grea