growing close
below flung its cool shadow across them. Looking out beneath the roof
of greenery they could see the wooded slope of the mountain cutting
against a sky of cloudless blue, while the stir of the city came up to
them faintly. Weston had already, at one time or another, spent
several pleasant hours on that balcony. They had been speaking of
nothing in particular, when at length Ida turned to him.

"Have you ever heard anything further from Scarthwaite?" she asked.

Weston fumbled in his pocket.

"I had a letter only a few days ago."

He took it out and handed it to her, with a little smile which he
could not help, though he rather blamed himself for indulging in it.

"As you know the place and met my sister, you may enjoy reading it.
Julia's unusually communicative. It almost seems as if I were a person
of some consequence to them now."

Ida took the letter, and her face hardened as she read. Then she
looked at him with a suggestive straightening of her brows.

"Isn't that only natural? You have found a mine," she said.

"The same idea occurred to me," laughed Weston; "but, after all,
perhaps I shouldn't have shown you the letter. It wasn't quite the
thing."

"Still, you felt just a little hurt, and that I could respect a
confidence?"

Ida looked at him as if she expected an answer, and it occurred to
Weston that she was very alluring in her long white dress, though the
same thought had been uppermost in his mind for the last half-hour.

"Yes," he admitted, "I suppose that was it."

He could have answered more explicitly, but he felt that it would not
be safe, for it seemed very probable that if he once gave his feelings
rein they would run away with him; and this attitude, as the girl
naturally had noticed on other occasions, tended to make their
conversation somewhat difficult.

"What are you going to do about one very tactfully-worded suggestion?"
she asked.

"You mean the hint that I should make a few shares in the Grenfell
Consolidated over to my English relatives? After all, considering
everything, it's not an unnatural request. I shall endeavor to fall in
with it."

Ida's face did not soften. The man was her lover, for, though he had
not declared himself, she was quite aware of that, and she was his
partisan and very jealous of his credit. It was difficult to forgive
those who had injured him, and these people in England had shown him
scant consideration, and had spoken of him slight