Indeed, he drifted so far this evening, that there is no knowing how sad a story this of mine might have been, if the fates had not been kinder to pretty Georgie Esmond than they are to the generality of people. Surely it must have been because she deserved something better than the fortune of a disappointed woman, that chance interposed in her behalf before she went to sleep that night.

She had enjoyed herself very much during Hector’s visit. She had sung her sweetest songs, and had been in the brightest of good spirits. Indeed, she had been very happy, and perhaps had felt her innocent, warm heart stirred a little, once or twice, by the young man’s tender speeches, though she was very far from being in the frame of mind to analyze the reasons for her gentle pleasure.

When her visitor had taken his departure, she came to the colonel’s arm-chair, and possibly feeling somewhat conscience-stricken, because she had left “papa” to his own resources 89 for so long a time, she applied herself to the task of petting him in her most seductive manner.

“You are very quiet, papa,” she said, settling herself upon a footstool, at his side. “I hope you are not going to have the gout again, darling. Mamma, what shall we do with him, if he insists on having the gout, when I am going to Pen’yllan? I shall have to stay at home, and so will Lisbeth. He cannot possibly dispense with us, when he has the gout.”

“But I am not going to have the gout,” protested the colonel, stoutly. “I am quite well, my dear; but the fact is—the fact is, I was thinking of a discovery I made this evening—a discovery about Anstruthers.”

“Hector?” exclaimed Georgie, half-unconsciously, and then turned her bright eyes upon the shining fender.

“Yes,” proceeded Colonel Esmond. “Hector himself. I believe I have found out what has changed him so—so deucedly, not to put too fine a point upon it—during the last four or five years. You remember what a frank, warm-hearted lad he was, at three-and-twenty, Jennie?” to Mrs. Esmond.

“Papa,” interposed Georgie, “do you really think he has changed for the worse? In his heart, I mean.” 90

“He has not changed for the better,” answered the colonel. “But his heart is all right, my dear.”

“I am sure,” said Georgie, a little piteously. “I am sure he is good at heart.”

“Of course he is,” said the colonel. “But he has altered very much, in many respects. And Jennie, my dear, I have discovered that the trouble was the one you hinted at, in the beginning. There was a woman in the case. A woman who treated him shamefully.”

“She must have been very heartless,” said Georgie. “Poor Hector!”

The colonel warmed up.

“She was shamefully heartless, she was disgracefully, unnaturally heartless! Such cold-blooded, selfish cruelty would have been unnatural in a mature woman, and she was nothing more than a school-girl, a mere child. I congratulate myself that I did not learn her name. The man who told me the story had not heard it. If I knew it, and should ever chance to meet her, by George!” with virtuous indignation, “I don’t see how a man of honor could remain in the same room with such a woman.”

And then he poured out what he had heard of the story, and an unpleasant enough sound it had, when related with all the additional 91 coloring confidential report had given it. It was bad enough to begin with, but it was worse for having passed through the hands of the men who had gathered it together, by scraps, and odds, and ends, and joined it as they thought best.

“And the worst of it is,” ended Colonel Esmond, “that he has not lived it down, as he fancies he has done. At least there are those who think so. It is said the girl is here in town now, and though they are not friends, Anstruthers cannot keep away from her altogether, and is always most savage and reckless when he has seen her.”

“Poor fellow!” said Georgie, in a low, quiet voice. “Poor Hector!”

But she did not look up at any one, as she spoke. Indeed she had not looked up, even once, during the time in which this unpleasant story had been told.

Having heard it, she confronted it very sensibly. When, indeed, was she not sweet and sensible? While she listened, a hundred past incidents rushed back upon her. She remembered things she had heard Hector say, and things she had seen him do; she remem............