The Happiest Time of Their Lives. Alice Duer Miller

for her. She pushed a chair near her fire for her mother, and herself remained standing, with her glass of milk in her hand.

      "Mama," she said suddenly, "I suppose I'm what you'd call engaged."

      "O Mathilde! not to that boy who was here to-day?"

      "Why not to him?"

      "I know nothing about him."

      "I don't know very much myself. Yes, it's Pete Wayne. Pierson his name is, but every one calls him Pete. How strange it was that I did not even know his first name when you asked me!"

      A single ray pierced Mrs. Farron's depression: Vincent had known, Vincent's infallibility was confirmed. She did not know what to say. She sat looking sadly, obliquely at the floor like a person who has been aggrieved. She was wondering whether she should be to her daughter a comrade or a ruler, a confederate or a policeman. Of course in all probability the thing would be better stopped. But could this be accomplished by immediate action, or could she invite confidences and yet commit herself to nothing?

      She raised her eyes.

      "I do not approve of youthful marriages," she said.

      "O Mama! And you were only eighteen yourself."

      "That is why."

      Mathilde was frightened not only by the intense bitterness of her mother's tone, but also by the obvious fact that she was face to face with the explanation of the separation of her parents. She had been only nine years old at the time. She had loved her father, had found him a better playfellow than her mother, had wept bitterly at parting with him, and had missed him. And then gradually her mother, who had before seemed like a beautiful, but remote, princess, had begun to make of her an intimate and grown-up friend, to consult her and read with her and arrange happinesses in her life, to win, to, if the truth must be told, reconquer her. Perhaps even Adelaide would not have succeeded so easily in effacing Severance's image had not he himself so quickly remarried. Mathilde went several times to stay with the new household after Adelaide in secret, tearful conference with her father had been forced to consent.

      To Mathilde these visits had been an unacknowledged torture. She never knew quite what to mention and what to leave untouched. There was always a constraint between the three of them. Her father, when alone with her, would question her, with strange, eager pauses, as to how her mother looked. Her mother's successor, whom she could not really like, would question her more searchingly, more embarrassingly, with an ill-concealed note of jealousy in every word. Even at twelve years Mathilde was shocked by the strain of hatred in her father's new wife, who seemed to reproach her for fashion and fineness and fastidiousness, qualities of which the girl was utterly unaware. She could have loved her little half-brother when he appeared upon the scene, but Mrs. Severance did not encourage the bond, and gradually Mathilde's visits to her father ceased.

      As a child she had been curious about the reasons for the parting, but as she grew older it had seemed mere loyalty to accept the fact without asking why; she had perhaps not wanted to know why. But now, she saw, she was to hear.

      "Mathilde, do you still love your father?"

      "I think I do, Mama. I feel very sorry for him."

      "Why?"

      "I don't know why. I dare say he is happy."

      "I dare say he is, poor Joe." Adelaide paused. "Well, my dear, that was the reason of our parting. One can pity a son or a brother, but not a husband. Weakness kills love. A woman cannot be the leader, the guide, and keep any romance. O Mathilde, I never want you to feel the humiliation of finding yourself stronger than the man you love. That is why I left your father, and my justification is his present happiness. This inferior little person he has married, she does as well. Any one would have done as well."

      Mathilde was puzzled by her mother's evident conviction that the explanation was complete. She asked after a moment:

      "But what was it that made you think at first that you did love him, Mama?"

      "Just what makes you think you love this boy—youth, flattery, desire to love. He was magnificently handsome, your father. I saw him admired by other men, apparently a master; I was too young to judge, my dear. You shan't be allowed to make that mistake; you shall have time to consider."

      Mathilde smiled.

      "I don't want time," she said.

      "I did not know I did."

      "I don't think I feel about love as you do," said the girl, slowly.

      "Every woman does."

      Mathilde shook her head.

      "It's just Pete as he is that I love. I don't care which of us leads."

      "But you will."

      The girl had not yet reached a point where she could describe the very essence of her passion; she had to let this go. After a moment she said:

      "I see now why you chose Mr. Farron."

      "You mean you have never seen before?"

      "Not so clearly."

      Mrs. Farron bit her lips. To have missed understanding this seemed a sufficient proof of immaturity. She rose.

      "Well, my darling," she said in a tone of extreme reasonableness, "we shall decide nothing to-night. I know nothing against Mr. Wayne. He may be just the right person. We must see more of him. Do you know anything about his family?"

      Mathilde shook her head. "He lives alone with his mother. His father is dead. She's very good and interested in drunkards."

      "In drunkards?" Mrs. Farron just shut her eyes a second.

      "She has a mission that reforms them."

      "Is that his profession, too?"

      "Oh, no. He's in Wall Street—quite a good firm. O Mama, don't sigh like that! We know we can't be married at once. We are reasonable. You think not, because this has all happened so suddenly; but great things do happen suddenly. We love each other. That's all I wanted to tell you."

      "Love!" Adelaide looked at the little person before her, tried to recall the fading image of the young man, and then thought of the dominating figure in her own life. "My dear, you have no idea what love is."

      She took no notice of the queer, steady look the girl gave her in return. She went down-stairs. She had been gone more than an hour, and she knew that Vincent would have been long since asleep. He had, and prided himself on having, a great capacity for sleep. She tiptoed past his door, stole into her own room, and then, glancing in the direction of his, was startled to see that a light was burning. She went in; he was reading, and once again, as his eyes turned toward her, she thought she saw the same tragic appeal that she had felt that afternoon in his kiss. Trembling, she threw herself down beside him, clasping him to her.

      "O Vincent! oh, my dear!" she whispered, and began to cry. He did not ask her why she was crying; she wished that he would; his silence admitted that he knew of some adequate reason.

      "I feel that there is something wrong," she sobbed, "something terribly wrong."

      "Nothing could go wrong between you and me, my darling," he answered. His tone comforted, his touch was a comfort. Perhaps she was a coward, she said to herself, but she questioned him no further.