The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1882-03-17

l thought, George, you and he were
friends"
George turned away with an excla-
nation that sounded like "Confound
him." and Lucy returned to the house,
serenely smiling under her broad
brimmed hat.
The drawing-room was empty, but In
little snuggery beyond, which her aunt
called her boudoir, there was muffled
hum of voices, and Lucy smiled more
comically than ever las she went up
stairs to change her dress for dinner.
Both George Leslie and Mr.. Mark Beau
clere were to dine ut "The Nest" and
Lucy, brimful of mischief, resolved to
tease George thoroughly before she put
him out of his misery.
So she donned fresh muslin gown,
and fastened crimson rose in her hair,
and then went down and took her seat
near the drawing room window, which
commanded the entrance to the front
garden, and with very demure smile
awaited the course of events.
Presently she was joined by her aunt,
looking gravely important, and bristling
all over with a secret. Miss Hester was
a tall, slender, keen-eyed, thin-lipped
lady of as near 40 as possible, with
smooth dark hair, regular features, and
stately, not to say commanding, pres
ence she had very beautiful white
hands, and she used them good deal
in majestic way. When dinner was
announced it was by wave of them she
signifed to her niece that she meant to
proceed at once to the dining-room.
Lucy followed her with suppressed
amusement beaming from every feature
of her face. She guessed pretty accu-
rately what her aunt's secret was,
though, till Miss Hester opened the
subject, she would not breathe even a
hint of it. AS the dinner progressed in
impressive silence, she found herself
wondering why George did not come.
Later on, as she sat at the piano i'll the
twilight, and played over her favorite
songs, singing snatches OF them, wander
ing almlessly from "Auld Lang Syne
to the LASS of Richmond HILL" and
then to "Home, Sweet Home" she lit
tie thought who was listening to her on
the other side of the lilac tree that
shaded the drawing-room window.
There, in safe obscurity. George Leslie
listened, till he heard the piano closed
with just the suspicion of q bang, and
saw Lucy's slight white-robed figure
cross the room and approach the open
window, then he stole away noiselessly
with something between a sob and q
sigh. There was even suspicious and
humiliating moisture in the poor fell
lows eyes as he hurried across the
fields in the direction of the railway
station.
"She's treated me very badly-but,
for all that, hope she may be happy.
Heaven bless her!" he said, as he caught
a glimpse of 1.-THE Nest" as the train
shrieked past.
Then he shrank back into his corner
and gave himself up to the bitterest re-
Election. He found it difficult to realize
that he was rejected; yet Beauclere had
told him distinctly that he had proposed
to Miss Armstrong that afternoon, and
had been accepted. There was no fur
ther reason for his staying at Westwater;
and he was going to ask his uncle, of the
firm of Leslie & Longhampton, to send
him on confidential mission to the ex-
treme end of the earth, where they were
oupPpott w oO puolhCoo. OcOlBt
not be philosophical enough to look at
happiness Through another mans
eyes," so he determined to get complete.
ly out of the way of Mark Beauclere; and
he could not even summon up courage
to congratulate Lucy or say good-by;
but he wrote her a nice little letter, in
which good deal of real feeling Was
hidden under some stiff, formal phrases,
and through it all peeped very sore,
bruised, affronted, but still faithful,
love.
Lucy laughed at it first, and then
cried over it, then wiped her eyes, and
wrote an explanatory and affectionate
reply; but, alas! George was gone on
the confidential mission. His letter said
that he was on the eve of starting for
China, AMI bore the Southampton post
mark. He said he might be absent for
years, or forever. To poor Lucy, in the
first dismay of her discovery that George
was really gone, it seemed the same
thing.