The flames touched the portrait, and with a cry Eugene Mallard hastily drew it back.

"No, no—a thousand times no!" It would be as easy to burn the living, beating heart in his bosom.

While he had the strength, he hurried to his writing-desk, placed it in a pigeon-hole, shut down the lid, and turned the key. Then he buried his face in his hands.

He ruminated upon the strangeness of the position he was placed in. Both of these young girls loved him, while he loved but one of them, and the one whom he loved so deeply could never be anything in this world to him. He wondered in what way he had offended Heaven that such a fate should be meted out to him.

At that moment quite a thrilling scene was transpiring at the railway station of the little Virginia town.

The New York Express, which had just steamed in, stood before it, and from one of the drawing-room cars there stepped a handsome man dressed in the height of fashion.

He sauntered into the waiting-room, looking about him as though in search of the ticket-agent.

A woman entered the depot at that moment carrying a little child in her arms. She recognized the man at a single glance.

"Why, Mr. Royal Ainsley!" she cried, "is this indeed you returning to your old home?"

[183]

Turning hastily around at the mention of his name, he beheld Mrs. Lester standing before him.

"Yes; I have returned like a bad penny, Mrs. Lester," he said, with a light, flippant laugh. "But, judging from the expression on your face, you are not glad to see me."

"I have not said so," she answered.

"Sit down, Mrs. Lester," he said, flinging himself down on one of the benches. "I should like to inquire of you about the women-folk of the village."

The woman sat down beside him, in obedience to his request.

"There is very little to tell," she answered; "everything in our village moves on about the same, year in and year out. Nothing of importance has taken place, except the marriage of your cousin, Eugene Mallard."

"Ha! ha! ha! So my fastidious cousin has changed his name from Royal Ainsley to that of Eugene Mallard to please his uncle, has he? Well, I read of it in one of the New York papers, but I scarcely credited it. Between you and me, Mrs. Lester, that was a mighty mean piece of work—the old fool leaving his entire fortune to him, and cutting me off without a cent."

"Every one knows that you were warned of what was to come unless you mended your ways," answered the woman.

"Bah! I never thought for a moment that the old fool would keep his word," retorted the other. "But you say that my cousin is wedded. That is indeed news to me. Whom did he wed—Vivian Deane?"

"Oh, no," she answered, "not Miss Deane. Every one in the village prophesied that he wouldn't wed her, although she was so infatuated with him."

"I suppose she is an heiress," said Ainsley, savagely knocking the ashes off his cigar. "It's easy enough to marry another fortune if you have one already."

"I don't know if she is an heiress," returned Mrs. Lester; "but she's a real lady. Any one can see that. But I fear that he is in great danger of losing her. She is[184] now very low with brain fever, and it is doubtful whether she will live."

"Humph!" he muttered. "My visit here is most inopportune then. I wanted to see my cousin, and strike him for the loan of a few thousand dollars. He won't be in very good humor now to accede to my request. I think I'll keep shady and wait a fortnight before seeing him. But who is this?" he cried, looking at the child she carried in her arms. "I understood that your baby died."

"So it did," replied Mrs. Lester. "This is the little foundling whom we are about to adopt. My husband brought it to me from a foundling asylum."

"Well, I do declare!" said Ainsley. "That's quite a risky operation, taking a little waif into your home, when you don't know its parents."

"But I do know its mother," she answered. "I wrote and found out all about its mother. She was a young girl who was taken ill in the streets. A poor family permitted her to be brought into their house, and there her babe was born. The young mother was so ill............