ow. I have some cold roast beef, bread and butter, and a pie, left
from yesterday."

"Oh, heavens! what a bill of fare; but let us have it, for I am
famishing."

"Before you get even that, my dear, you must help about a little.
Here, spread the cloth, and cut the bread; I will do the rest."

"Spread the cloth, and cut the bread! I don't know how!"

"Learn," said May, half diverted, half angry with the selfish one, as
she handed her the tablecloth, which was put on one-sided, while the
bread was cut in _chunks_. When May came in from the pantry, a
butler's room as it used to be in the time of the old marquis, Helen
was crying over a bleeding finger, which she had cut in her awkward
attempts to slice the bread.

"This is a bad business," said May, binding it up. "Helen, I really
feel very sorry for you. You will have so many disheartening trials in
your new way of life; but keep a brave heart--I will learn you all that
I know, if you are only willing."

"Thank you, May, that is very nice. I don't care much about learning
such low pursuits; but give me something to eat," was her polite reply.

May crossed herself when she sat down, and asked the blessing of God on
the food she was to partake of. Helen fell to, without a thought of
anything but the cravings of hunger. They conversed cheerfully
together; and while Helen rallied her cousin on her long absence. May
thought, more than once, with sad forebodings, of her encounter with
her uncle down town that morning. But she determined to keep her own
secrets; for she well knew that if he discovered it, he would forbid
her exertions in behalf of old Mabel, her visits, and be perhaps
furiously angry at the traffic she was carrying on with Mrs. Tabb.

CHAPTER V.

PAST AND PRESENT.

The day waned; and that soft, silent hour, which the Scotch so
beautifully call the "_gloaming_" was over the earth. Subdued shadows
crept in through the windows, and mingled with the red glow which the
fire-light diffused throughout the room, and together they formed a
phantasmagoria, which seemed to ebb and flow like a noiseless tide. And
with the shadows, memories of the past floated in, and knocked with their
spirit-hands softly and gently against the portals of those two hearts
which life's tempest had thrown together. Helen wept.

"Do you remember your mother, dear Helen?" asked May, while she folded
her hand in her own.

"No and yes. If it is a memory, it is so