eared from her manner, she forgot herself,--her recent self that
was so strange to her,--and over and over again he looked far into the
clear depths of her golden eyes.

More than once he glanced at Dallas to see if he showed any disrelish of
this talk, carried on in his presence in a foreign tongue; but he was
evidently not concerned about it in the least. He smoked his eternal
cigarettes, and answered in monosyllables the remarks that Miller was
making. He did not look bored, for that expression implies a capability
of being interested; and that he seemed not to possess, at least so far
as Noel's experience went, and Miller's confirmed it.

III.

Noel had been at home a month. He had opened his law office and gone
hard to work, and his friends complained that they saw but little of
him. He had learned from the Dallases, before parting with them at the
wharf, that they were expecting to go to housekeeping in his own city,
and he had asked them to send him their address when they were
established.

So far, it had not come, and he was beginning to fear he had lost sight
of them when one day he met them on the street. She, at least, was glad
to see him, and when she gave the address and asked him to call, the
husband, in his dull way, echoed the invitation.

The next evening he went to the house, which was in an unfashionable
quarter, but very charming, tasteful and homelike. As he sat down in the
pretty drawing-room some living objects caught his eye, and to his great
amusement he saw that the rug in front of the open fire was occupied by
a picturesque group composed of a Maltese cat and four kittens. The
mother, who was an unusually large and imposing specimen of her kind,
was seated very erect, her front feet straight before her, evidently
making an effort to enjoy a nap, which her offspring were engaged in
thwarting, after the most vigorous fashion. They were all exactly alike,
distinguishable only by the ribbons--blue, green, yellow and red--which
ornamented their necks and were tied in bows under their chins. The
mother had a garland composed of these four colors around her neck, upon
which hung a little silver bell. Noel had been watching this pretty
sight, with a fascinated gaze, and was so preoccupied with their gambols
that he failed to hear a soft footstep approaching, and did not turn to
look until Mrs. Dallas was standing quite near him, holding out her
hand.

She was dressed in a gown of a pec