The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1877-06-27

hn0weSt, and Arthur Ashton Is lean
lag over the piano, looking into her mag
&c Il eyes with an Xpression-well
which would mean a good deal with some
men, but which is merely a graceful
courtesy, Margaret tries to believe, witt
Arthur Ashton. She has been at ALE
gan a fortnight now, and has found
l. ah Fourier almost as constant an in
mate of the house as herself. But then,
as Arthur said, the girls are mad about
her; ana there certainly Is an enchant-
ment somewhere in her glowing face be
fore which few are able to stand, Ger
tainly thou would'st love me !" she sings,
and Margaret knows that the words
would sound cold and passionless from
her own lips IN comparison. Is it Won
derful that there should be response in
Arthur Ashton ewes:
The song is ended, and Margaret
Fenwick's fiancee strolls after the singer
/ into the conservatory.
''IfI were you Margaret, [ should go
after them, really" says Arthur's eldest
sister, half laughing. Leah would
| firt with the footman, l believe, if there
was nobody else in the way. 1t WAS just
the same when poor Charlie was at
home.
Margaret tries to smile, and to keep
her wistful eyes turned away from the
conservatory door, but she cannot help
specializing IA little as to the difference
between s'poor Charlie" and his brother.
AS to Leah, herself, she can hardly form
a calm rational opinion, SO different Is
this Leah from the girl with the wild
eyes, whose poor uncertain fingers she
had helped to find their old familiar
places on the piano at Horewood five
years ago. She feels rather than knows
that the past is not all a blank in Miss
Fourier's brain, but no word of recogni-
ton has passed between the girls, and it
is plain at any rate that nothing of that
dreadful episode in Leah's life is suspect
ed by the Ashtons To Margaret her
self, as she looks on the others proud,
imperious beauty, it seems as if her re-
membrance could be nothing buta dream;
and yet it is almost a pain to her to think
that so much of her pity in those bygone
days was wasted.
Ten minutes--a quarter of an hour,
goes slowly by, and Leah saunters back
into the drawing-room, with spray of
maidenhair in the her hands, and the
passion of her song still half slumbering
in those deep, mysterious eyes. "Alr.
Ashton is going to be kind enough to see
me home" She remarks generally for
everybody's information, and Margaret
feels the same sudden chill that had
come to her the night before for the
first time, when her lover had underta
ken the same surely unnecessary duty.
1t is almost a relief to her to remember
that this is her last evening with the Ash
tons, and that next day Arthur is to take
her back TO the city. Leah Fourier may
take all the footmen in the country into
the conservatory with her then, if she
chooses.
Nevertheless, the chill comes back to
her heart more unmistakably than ever
next night, for Leah Fourier, and the
conservatory, and Arthur Ashton are all
left behind. He found that he could
take another weeks holiday, he told her,
and she could not be selfish enough to
propose that he should spend two days
in travelling, merely for the sake of tax
ing her home So their goodbye was
said at the little railway station, but
something fell out of his pocket as he
was taking her ticket, AMI she could not
help seeing that it was bit Of maid
enhair fern. 1t was a pity that It's hould
be crushed under n strangers foot
before he could recover it-but then
there was more in the conservatory.
Four, five days without letter, during
which time the chill never leaves her
heart, and then there comes what she
has been looking for. He asks her, if
she is good enough, unselfsh enough,
to forgive him; and adds, of course, that
he can never forgive himself. Marga
ret knows now what answer he made to
LEANS song, and wonders if there is any
thing left for her in the world, or if it is
all made up of such questions and such
replies Then she remembers that her
father had said that there were one hun
dred and fifty thousand reasons why ne
one should envy Leah Fourier.
Well, Leah is his, body and soul, rea
sons and all, If he chooses to take her !;
and Margaret wonders whether the first |
will make up to him for all the others.
Would he choose, if he knew of the cor
ridor at Horewood, and had seen the lips
he loved coying themselves with sweet |
meats that soft compassionate hands |
thrust by stealth within their reach ? She |
puts away thought from her with a shud
der calling upon God not to tempt her to
come between him and his happiness.
If it can all be hidden from him, it |
would be a sin in her, of ali women in
the world to say a word which might dash /
the cup from his lips. She would drink /
her own cup instead, and try to sweeten
it by the thought that the man she loved |
was happy with the girl for whom she had |
once felt so divine pity.
The months go quickly enough by, now
that Margaret no longer counts how
many there are between the seed and
the blossom of her happiness, and she
knows that Arthur Ashton must have
brought his bride back with him by this
time to his city home. Does she
sing ''If Thou Knowest" to him now,
Margaret wonders, or does each know
the depth and intensity of the others
love by heart and find it sufficient? Mar
garet shoulders as she remembers that
there is still a secret hidden from Arthur
Ashton in LEANS mysterious eyes-a Sc
cret which she alone can read, and would
give half her life to be able to forget
Would it ever happen that he should
come to her and curse her for having
hidden it from him to revenge herself
That she is revenged, God knows how
Margaret sees the first time
she holds Arthur Aston's hand in hers
again He has written to ask her if he
may come to her and satisfy himself of
and her love is dead enough
in her heart for her to be able to tell
him eyes" She has even ceased to won
der at the dreariness of her own life, and
is vaguely conscious, as he takes her
hand, of the same great pity for him and
the woman who had supplanted her, that
filed her heart as she went down the