h! no; quite well."

"You are so silent, and you sat there in such a dreary way, I feared
something was the matter."

He made an effort to rouse himself and shake off the oppression--the
heavy, heavy weight which had lain on his soul all day.

"I am only stupid," he replied, with an attempt at playfulness. "I have
been forced to talk so incessantly to those people, that I have no ideas
left."

"I am sure conversation with people in general doesn't consume one's
ideas," she said, with a lightness which appeared forced like his own.

"How long does Mrs. Harrington stay?" he asked.

"Only till to-morrow. You don't like her, I fancy?"

"There is too much of her in every way," he said, peevishly; "she
dresses too much, talks too much--she tires one."

"That is very cruel and ungrateful; the lady confided to me only a
little while ago that she had a profound admiration for you, and was
dying to get up a flirtation, if I did not mind."

"Don't repeat such nonsense," he said, almost rudely, "you know how I
hate it. I think either the married man or woman who flirts, deserves to
be as severely punished as if he or she had committed an actual crime."

"I am afraid you would condemn the greater part of our acquaintance,"
she said. "After all, with most women it arises only from
thoughtlessness."

"Thoughtlessness!" he repeated satirically. "I can only say that the
woman who endangers her husband's peace from want of thought, is more
culpable than a person who does wrong knowingly, urged on by
recklessness or passion."

"I have never thought about it," said Elizabeth vaguely; "it may be so."

She was playing with her bracelets again; the action reminded him of the
lost trinket. He did not speak, but a restrained burst of passion broke
over his face, which might have changed a plan she was revolving in her
mind, had she seen or understood it.

It was too late!

That moment Elsie came dancing into the room, her thin evening dress
floating around her like a summer cloud, her fair hair wreathed with
flowers, and everything about her so pure and ethereal, that it seemed
almost as if she must breathe some more joyous air than the
pain-freighted atmosphere which weighed so heavily on others. She was
holding her hands behind her, and ran towards them in her childish way,
exclaiming:

"I have found something! Who'll give a reward? Won't you both be
glad--guess what it is!"

Mellen's face had brightened a little at her