r some casual remark and departing
with the impression that Miss Lennox was very timid and shy. After he
was gone, Mrs. Cameron continued, "It is not like us to bruit our
affairs abroad, and were my daughter ten times engaged, the world would
be none the wiser. I doubt if even Katy suspects what I have admitted;
but knowing how fascinating Mark can be, and that just at present he
seems to be pleased with you, I have acted as I should wish a friend to
act toward my own child. Were it not that you are one of our family, I
might not have interfered, and I trust you not to repeat even to Katy
what I have said."

Helen nodded assent, while in her heart was a wild tumult of
feelings--flattered pride, disappointment, indignation and mortification
all struggling for the mastery---mortification to feel that she who had
quietly ignored such a passion as love when connected with herself, had,
nevertheless, been pleased with the attentions of one who was only
amusing himself with her, as a child amuses itself with some new toy
soon to be thrown aside--indignation at him for vexing Juno at her
expense--disappointment that he should care for such as Juno, and
flattered pride that Mrs. Cameron should include her in "our family."
Helen had as few weak points as most young ladies, but she was not free
from them all, and the fact that Mrs. Cameron had taken her into a
confidence which even Katy did not share, was soothing to her ruffled
spirits, particularly as after that confidence Mrs. Cameron was
excessively gracious to her, introducing her to many whom she did not
know before, and paying her numberless little attentions, which made
Juno stare, while the clearer-seeing Bell arched her eyebrows, and
wondered for what Helen was to be made a catspaw by her clever mother.
Whatever it was, it did not appear, save as it showed itself in Helen's
slightly changed demeanor when Mark again sought her society, and tried
to bring back to her face the look he had left there. But something
evidently had come between them, and the young man racked his brain to
find the cause of this sudden indifference in one who had been pleased
with him only a short half hour before.

"It's that confounded waltzing which disgusted her," he said, "and no
wonder, for if ever a man looks like an idiot, it is when he is kicking
up his heels to the sound of a viol, and wheeling around some woman
whose skirts sweep everything within the circle of a rod, and whose face