protect her from the influence of such books as paint poor action in
noble color. For a time also she was stinted in her natural nourishment:
her husband had ordered a grand piano from London for her, but it had
not yet arrived; and the first touch she laid on the tall
spinster-looking one that had stood in the drawing-room for fifty years,
with red silk wrinkles radiating from a gilt center, had made her
shriek. If only Paul would buy a yellow gig, like his friend Dr. May of
Broughill, and take her with him on his rounds! Or if she had a friend
or two to go and see when he was out!--friends like what Helen or even
Dorothy might have been: she was not going to be hand-in-glove with any
body that didn't like her Paul! She missed church too--not the prayers,
much; but she did like hearing what she counted a good sermon, that is,
a lively one. Her husband wanted her to take up some science, but if he
had considered that, with all her gift in music, she expressed an utter
indifference to thorough bass, he would hardly have been so foolish.

CHAPTER XXX.

THE PONY-CARRIAGE.

One Saturday morning the doctor was called to a place a good many miles
distant, and Juliet was left with the prospect of being longer alone
than usual. She felt it almost sultry although so late in the season,
and could not rest in the house. She pretended to herself she had some
shopping to do in Pine Street, but it was rather a longing for air and
motion that sent her out. Also, certain thoughts which she did not like,
had of late been coming more frequently, and she found it easier to
avoid them in the street. They were not such as troubled her from being
hard to think out. Properly speaking, she _thought_ less now than ever.
She often said nice things, but they were mostly the mere gracious
movements of a nature sweet, playful, trusting, fond of all beautiful
things, and quick to see artistic relation where her perception reached.

As she turned the corner of Mr. Drew's shop, the house-door opened, and
a lady came out. It was Mr. Drew's lodger. Juliet knew nothing about
her, and was not aware that she had ever seen her; but the lady started
as if she recognized her. To that kind of thing Juliet was accustomed,
for her style of beauty was any thing but common. The lady's regard
however was so fixed that it drew hers, and as their eyes met, Juliet
felt something, almost a physical pain, shoot through her heart. She
could not understand it