hieved there; things of which she disapproved
entirely, and thought "unworthy of a gentleman": and who can blame
her for thinking so?

She had at first written to him long letters of remonstrance and
good advice; which he gave up answering, after a while. And when
they met in society, her manner had grown chill and distant and
severe.

He hadn't seen or heard of his aunt Caroline for three or four
years; but at the sudden sight of her a wave of tender childish
remembrance swept over him, and his heart beat quite warmly to her:
affliction is a solvent of many things, and first-cousin to
forgiveness.

She passed without looking his way, and he jumped up and followed
her, and said:

"Oh, Aunt Caroline! won't you even speak to me?"

She started violently, and turned round, and cried: "Oh, Barty,
Barty, where have you been all these years?" and seized both his
hands, and shook all over.

"Oh, Barty--my beloved little Barty--take me somewhere where we can
sit down and talk. I've been thinking of you very much, Barty--I've
lost my poor son--he died last Christmas! I was afraid you had
forgotten my existence! I was thinking of you the very moment you
spoke!"

The maid left them, and she took his arm and they found a seat.

She put up her veil and looked at him: there was a great likeness
between them in spite of the difference of age. She had been his
father's favorite sister (some ten years younger than Lord
Runswick); and she was very handsome still, though about fifty-five.

"Oh, Barty, my darling--how things have gone wrong between us! Is it
_all_ my doing? Oh, I hope not!..." And she kissed him.

"How like, how like! And you're getting a little black and bulgy
under the eyes--especially the left one--and so did _he_, at just
about your age! And how thin you are!"

"I don't think anything need ever go wrong between us again, Aunt
Caroline! I am a very altered person, and a very unlucky one!"

"Tell me, dear!"

And he told her all his story, from the fatal quarrel with her
brother Lord Archibald--and the true history of that quarrel; and
all that had happened since: he had nothing to keep back.

She frequently wept a little, for truth was in every tone of his
voice; and when it came to the story of his lost eye, she wept very
much indeed. And his need of affection, of female affection
especially, and of kinship, was so immense that he clung to this
most kind and loving woman as if she'd been his mother co