masterful good humor,
here took the form of a neurotic fatalism. She shook her head with
superstitious resignation.

"Didn't I tell you, John, that I always had a dread of something
coming"--

"But if it comes in the shape of a shy young lad, I see nothing
singularly portentous in it. They have not met since they were quite
small; their tastes have changed; if they don't quarrel and fight they
may be equally bored with each other. Yet until then, in one way or
another, Clarence will occupy the young lady's vacant caprice, and
her school friend, Mary Rogers, will be here, you know, to divide
his attentions, and," added Peyton, with mock solemnity, "preserve the
interest of strict propriety. Shall I break it to her,--or will you?"

"No,--yes," hesitated Mrs. Peyton; "perhaps I had better."

"Very well, I leave his character in your hands; only don't prejudice
her into a romantic fancy for him." And Judge Peyton lounged smilingly
away.

Then two little tears forced themselves from Mrs. Peyton's eyes. Again
she saw that prospect of uninterrupted companionship with Susy, upon
which each successive year she had built so many maternal hopes and
confidences, fade away before her. She dreaded the coming of Susy's
school friend, who shared her daughter's present thoughts and intimacy,
although she had herself invited her in a more desperate dread of the
child's abstracted, discontented eyes; she dreaded the advent of the boy
who had shared Susy's early life before she knew her; she dreaded the
ordeal of breaking the news and perhaps seeing that pretty animation
spring into her eyes, which she had begun to believe no solicitude or
tenderness of her own ever again awakened,--and yet she dreaded still
more that her husband should see it too. For the love of this recreated
woman, although not entirely materialized with her changed fibre, had
nevertheless become a coarser selfishness fostered by her loneliness and
limited experience. The maternal yearning left unsatisfied by the loss
of her first-born had never been filled by Susy's thoughtless acceptance
of it; she had been led astray by the child's easy transference of
dependence and the forgetfulness of youth, and was only now dimly
conscious of finding herself face to face with an alien nature.

She started to her feet and followed the direction that Susy had taken.
For a moment she had to front the afternoon trade wind which chilled her
as it swept the plain beyond the gat