Connecticut western news., 1874-01-30
THE STEP.MOTHER.

HE Sk SkEE"uUkHEh.
 The clear, vivid sunshine of Sep. tember day was shining, like sheaves of ieweled arrows, into Cecile Montpen- sier's spacious drawing, room.
 It was handsome apartment, fur nished in lilac and gold. Lilao is a " trying" color to most faces, however fair and youthful, but Cecile Montpen- sier knew that she could safely sur round herself with its soft, illusive glow.
 For Cecile's complexion, fair and del icate as Q pink iaponica, was perfection in it's waxen bloom, and her hair, deep brownish gold, waved into natural curls and ripples upon her transparent temples. Her eyes were the deep, linn pid violet, that almost verges on black, almond shaped, and with long thick lashes, and her mouth, red and melting, like dewy coral, had but one fault-it was almost too full, and scerlet
 Richmond Cheswick gazed down at the languid beauty with look of en- thusiastic admiration, which it was inn possible to misconstrue. How lovely she was, as she sat there, with his moth erless little one in her arms, shower ing kisses on Willie's golden hair, and lisping pretty caressing sentences of G baby-talk to the four. year-old child.
 "I do think he is the most beautiful creature ever saw in my life l" she ex- claimed, looking up into MT. Ches- wick's face, with the deep eyes all soft and sparkling, and the coral lips apart, just disclosing row of tiny pearls with in. "I love him so dearly P
 Ordinarily Richmond Cheswick was cool, composed sort of parsonage, as little inclined as any man to net sudden ly, and without deliberation-but we are all infatuated, at one period 'or an- other of our lives, and Cecile Montpen- sier's rare beauty would have maddened almost any one.
 "Cecile !' he exclaimed, suddenly, " do you love him well enough to be his mother2 Do you love me well enough to share life's lot with me For I feel that you have taken my heart captive, and I never can be happy with any one else ! Cecile, speak to me-do not keep me in suspense"
 The roses crep over Cecile's satin cheek in soft pink pillows of bloom, as she bent her head in charming confu- sion it would have taken wiser man than Richmond Cheswick, to know that this was the very consumation she had expected, and been maneuvering for, during the last six months.
 She had triumphed at last-and when he went away leading unconscious little Willie, who thought "papa stayed a long time," Miss Montpensier was Rich mond Cheswick's promised wife.
 "There, nurse, take the little fellow upstairs for his sleep," he said, as he sat down in the big easy chair opposite the glowing fire of anthracite coal, in his handsomely appointed library, and began to contemplate the new and dazzling future opening to his minds eye.
 What regal Mrs. "Cheswick" Cecile would make. His first wife, Willie's mother, true and loving as wife could be, but utterly ignorant of all those pol ished graces and acquired amenities that made Cecile so attractive. And when she lay upon her death bed, she had said to him:
 "Dear Richmond, if ever you should marry again"
 He had interrupted her with words of passionate protest-she held up her slender finger with plaintive, moon- light sort of smile.
 Hear me out, my husband. If ever you should marry again-and you are so young that I think it more than likely you will have only one favor to beg of you. Do not give Willie into step mothers care. Send him to my home in the fresh, pure country; my sister will gladly assume all the charge of him, and I shall rest more quietly in my grave. Will you but promise me this p
 Blinded with tears, Richmond Chcs- wick had promised, and so Janet had died calmly, with her little sleeping boy clasped closely to her breast.
 But now he was going deliberately to break this solemn compact with the dead.
 "I cannot spare the merry, loving little fellow" he thought. He is too close to my heart; if Willie were gone, half the sunshine would perish out of my daily life, and Cecile is so devotedly attached to him, also. If Janet could have known Cecile, she would never have wanted to send the boy away"
 And then, he thought, with thrill, very nearly approaching to disgust, how plain and homespun Hetty Bryan was the Hetty the old people had wanted him to marry, when poor Janet died. What contrast she was to royal Cecile Montpensier.
 Meanwhile, old Judge Montpensiel rubbed his wrinkled white hands, and chuckled gleefully.
 "It's good thing you've caught the rich widower at last, Cecile," he said in his fat, husky whisper. "We couldn't have stood it much longer-the funds were giving away dusedly fast. You have rather a genius for spending money, young lady it's well you're likely to have plenty of 1t for the future"
 So there was grand wedding II fashionable society, with show of satir and glimmer of pearls and orange bios soms, and an interminable train o bridesmaids, and Richmand Cheswicl maryied Cecile Montpensier in a grea kaleidoscopic church, and took her tc the home where blue-eyed Janet, fol eighteen short months, had fanciet herself in an earthly paradise. And al that autumn, Mrs. Richmond Oheswicl moved n "bri0ht Oarticnlar star