n under that
influence, and it was partly a conviction of this that had drawn him
towards her as something genuine and real. It occurred to him now for
the first time, as he looked around upon that compromise of their two
lives in this chilly artificial home, that it was only natural that she
would prefer the more truthful austerities of her mother's house. Had
she detected the sham, and did she despise him for it?

These were questions which seemed to bring another self-accusing doubt
in his own mind, although, without his being conscious of it, they had
been really the outcome of that doubt. He could not help dwelling on the
singular human interest she had taken in Demorest's love affair, and
the utterly unexpected emotion she had shown. He had never seen her as
charmingly illogical, capricious, and bewitchingly feminine. Had he not
made a radical mistake in not giving her a frequent provocation for this
innocent emotion--in fact, in not taking her out into a world of broader
sympathies and experiences? What a household they might have had--if
necessary in some other town--away from those cramped prejudices and
limitations! What friends she might have been with Dick and his other
worldly acquaintances; what social pleasures--guiltless amusements
for her pure mind--in theatres, parties, and concerts! Would she have
objected to them?--had he ever seriously proposed them to her? No! if
she had objected there would have been time enough to have made this
present compromise; she would have at least respected and understood his
sacrifice--and his friends.

Even the artificial externals of his household had never before so
visibly impressed him. Now that she was no longer in the room it did not
even bear a trace of her habitation, it certainly bore no suggestion of
his own. Why had he bought that hideous horsehair furniture? To remind
her of the old provincial heirlooms of her father's sitting-room. Did
it remind her of it? The stiff and stony emptiness of this room had
been fashioned upon the decorous respectability of his own father's
parlor--in which his father, who usually spent his slippered leisure
in the family sitting-room, never entered except on visits from the
minister. It had chilled his own youthful soul--why had he perpetuated
it here?

He could only answer these questions by moodily wandering about the
house, and regretting he had not gone with her. After a vain attempt to
establish social and domestic rela