ce, sealed by an iron ornament
like a monumental tablet over dead ashes, had its functions superseded
by an air-tight drum in the corner, warmed at second-hand from the
dining-room below, and offered no attractive seclusion; the sofa against
the wall was immovable and formally repellent. He was obliged to draw
a chair beside the table, whose every curve seemed to facilitate his
wife's easy withdrawal from side-by-side familiarity.

"Demorest has been urging me very strongly to go to California, but, of
course, I spoke of you," he said, stealing his hand into his wife's lap,
and possessing himself of her fingers.

Mrs. Blandford slowly lifted her fingers enclosed in his clasping hand
and placed them in shameless publicity on the volume before her. This
implied desecration was too much for Blandford; he withdrew his hand.

"Does that man propose to go with you?" asked Mrs. Blandford, coldly.

"No; he's preoccupied with other matters that he wanted me to talk to
you about," said her husband, hesitatingly. "He is--"

"Because"--continued Mrs. Blandford in the same measured tone, "if he
does not add his own evil company to his advice, it is the best he has
ever given yet. I think he might have taken another day than the Lord's
to talk about it, but we must not despise the means nor the hour whence
the truth comes. Father wanted me to take some reasonable moment to
prepare you to consider it seriously, and I thought of talking to you
about it to-morrow. He thinks it would be a very judicious plan. Even
Deacon Truesdail--"

"Having sold his invoice of damaged sugar kettles for mining purposes,
is converted," said Blandford, goaded into momentary testiness by his
wife's unexpected acquiescence and a sudden recollection of Demorest's
prophecy. "You have changed your opinion, Joan, since last fall, when
you couldn't bear to think of my leaving you," he added reproachfully.

"I couldn't bear to think of your joining the mob of lawless and sinful
men who use that as an excuse for leaving their wives and families. As
for my own feelings, Edward, I have never allowed them to stand between
me and what I believed best for our home and your Christian welfare.
Though I have no cause to admire the influence that I find this man,
Demorest, still holds over you, I am willing to acquiesce, as you see,
in what he advises for your good. You can hardly reproach ME, Edward,
for worldly or selfish motives."

Blandford felt keenly the bitt