Under the dense foliage of the sleeping garden he pressed her hand to his
lips, and she, tremulous, let him have his way.--Bitter, bitter years lay
behind her. The physician had spoken only too truly. The hardest blows
of fate had brought her--the proud daughter of a noble father--to a
course of cruel humiliations. The life of a friendless though not
penniless relation, taken into a wealthy house out of charity, had proved
a thorny path to tread, but now-since the day before yesterday--all was
changed. Orion had come. His home and the city had held high festival
on his return, as at some gift of Fortune, in which she too had a goodly
share. He had met her, not as the dependent relative, but as a beautiful
and high-born woman. There was sunshine in his presence which warmed her
very heart, and made her raise her head once more like a flower that is
brought out under the open sky after long privation of light and air.
His bright spirit and gladness of life refreshed her heart and brain; the
respect he paid her revived her crushed self-confidence and filled her
soul with fervent gratitude. Ah! and how delightful it was to feel that
she might be grateful, devotedly grateful.--And then, then this evening
had been hers, the sweetest, most blessed that she had known for years.
He had reminded her of what she had almost forgotten: that she was still
young, that she was still lovely, that she had a right to be happy, to
enchant and be enchanted--perhaps even to love and to be loved.

Her hand was still conscious of his burning kiss as she entered the cool
room where the Lady Neforis sat awaiting the return of the party, turning
her spinning-wheel by the couch of her invalid husband who always went to
rest at late hours. It was with an overflowing heart that Paula raised
her uncle's hand to her lips--Orion's father, might she not say HER
Orion's?--Then she kissed her aunt--his mother, and it was long since she
had done so--as she and little Mary bid her good-night. Neforis accepted
the kiss coolly but with some surprise, and looked up enquiringly at the