He stared at her a moment in ludicrous solemnity, then burst into a loud laugh.

The poor woman picked up the table, and wiped up the milk. While she was doing this, he rose, reeled towards a rough couch of pinewood, and in a few minutes was asleep-breathing like a man seized with apoplexy.

Then she sat down, and dropping both hands into her lap, fell into a dull lethargy of despair. She looked several years older than she had done in the morning; all the colour that reviving hope and fresh air had given her was swept away.

Bernard walked in and found his mother sitting there helpless and hopeless. He also saw the man she loved so dearly lying on the couch in his besotted slumber. He paused at the door and took in the scene with a glance full of surprise and pain. After months of good behaviour the old besetting sin had conquered.

Mrs. Keane saw sorrow and scorn in her son's eyes, and shrank away with a shiver. He noted that, and going up to her, said, with the tenderness of a great love in his voice,

'Don't be so troubled, mother; it may never happen again.'

She gave him a look of piteous gratitude, and her tears began to flow like rain; the softness of his tone had thawed the ice at her heart. Bernard let her cry in peace, and, going up to the couch, he placed a cushion under the man's head, seeing which the woman began to sob.

There, he is better now; let him sleep it off, mother. It's not so bad after all. Go to bed, and to-morrow it will be all right.'

She got up wearily, and went into a little back room, sighing a faint good-night.

Bernard went up a few steps to

a garret under the roof, and lay on his humble bed, watching the moon as she rose higher and higher in the sky, flooding his mean dwelling with a silvery radiance beautiful as the happiness which was keeping him awake.

Had he really ever loved before? Could any previous experience be compared to the glory that seemed to crown his existence now? Had his passion for Ursula been anything like it? Was it not pity and an ardent worship of beauty, to which his art made him peculiarly susceptible, rather than the utter devotion he felt towards Ethel Seymour? In his deep desire to respect the dead, he had given an idea of perfect love for his wife which the facts did not entirely carry out. How lovely Ethel had looked in her fresh indignant surprise that so vital a secret should have existed! With what heavenly sweetness she had forgiven him! Not in words, for he had rather been permitted to read the uplifting of her eyes, and in a hundred ways he had felt that her love was stronger than her pride. He believed, as he lay in that still moonlight, that he loved Ethel as he had never loved woman in his life. That other passion had been of earth, this had the holiness of eternity in it. He scarcely thought of the girl's beauty, for her very identity was swallowed up in his own being, and she seemed to have become a part of his very life. In his delicious dreaming, Bernard forgot the trouble that had fallen on his own household; but when the daylight broke, and through the thin flooring he heard the suppressed sobs of a woman in such grief that she had not closed her eyes that night, it went to his heart like a reproach. How could he, how dared he, dream of perfect happiness when his mother suffered so sorely?

When Bernard went down-stairs, Mrs. Keane was busy at her household work, looking white and haggard, as if the man-still outstretched on the couch-was dead rather than degraded.

The mother and son sat down to breakfast together in silence; the door firmly closed that their disgrace might be shut out from the neighbours.

No single morsel crossed the woman's pale lips. Even there,

amongst those rough coarse workmen of the quarry, the demon of drink had made her a social pariah. Even there, in that wild uncivilised life, she hung her head, while her heart sank in shame.

'My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? Why art Thou so far from helping me?' These were the piteous words that ran through her brain.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

OLD FRIENDS.

IT was a rough and motley crowd that had assembled at the corner of a narrow street just outside a Lager-bier saloon in Haarlem.

Like a second Orpheus, a boy, who extracted lovely sounds from a time-blackened violin, had attracted that crowd, in the midst of which a slight girlish figure could be seen, a child with big blue eyes and fair waving hair, who, with down-cast lids and flushing cheeks and a tiny basket in her hand, flitted here and there for 'alms.'

Poor little Nell! The idea of al fresco concerts, which were to have rendered Lennard rich and famous, had fallen to the ground from the first moment of treading American soil. The Yankees, too acute to part with dollars, scarcely

bestowed cents on the fragile boy, whose wonderful genius excited their astonishment. Weary and footsore, the trio, who had set forth on their Transatlantic journey full of hope, wandered from street to street in New York, and finally reached the very outskirts of the city.

Not a dollar's worth of cents,' Nell whispered disconsolately to little Weston, who stood meekly behind, reduced to half his normal size by a paucity of food. sha'n't be able to buy Lennard his supper, and he looks so hungry, father! the child cried piteously.

'We

'Try another round,' answered the old man, in a shaky voice. He too was hungry.

She obeyed him. Again with downcast eyes-for Nell was ashamed to beg-she went amongst the crowd, holding out the basket deprecatingly, and, as the round was nearly completed, a dollar note fluttered in.

The child forgot her shyness and her shame, and raised her pretty blue eyes to see who the generous giver of so munificent a sum was.

The basket nearly dropped from her hand, and smiles and dimples broke all over her little wan face.

'O Mr. Bernard,' she cried, 'wherever have you dropped from?" She stopped short, coloured, and murmured nervously, 'But perhaps a gentleman like you would not care to be seen speaking to beggars like us.'

'Not care to speak to you, Nell !' and Bernard patted her heartily on the back. Not care to recognise old friends even under new phases of life! I am not quite such a ruffian. Where's your father? I have been listening to Lennard. How well he plays!'

'And how ill he looks! O Mr. Bernard, I am so glad you have found us! You may help us to earn something to make Lennard

strong again. Of course he is not starved,' she went on, with an attempt at hiding the straits they were in; but he can't eat cheap things.'

'I can get him a splendid whisky smash,' said a man, who overheard her.

Nell made a wry face and waved her hand impatiently; but little Weston pressed forward with eager

ness.

'I-I will take the smash,' he mumbled, rubbing his hands together gleefully.

'Father,' whispered Nell, I am ashamed of you!'

'Well, well; no matter, I can do without it,' said the little man, retreating almost with tears in his eyes; but it's hard-mighty hard!' 'Never mind, father, here's Mr. Bernard; he's nicer than whisky smash!'

She left the two together, and I went to a wooden bench outside the Lager-bier saloon, on which Lennard was half lying.

Are you very hungry?' she asked him, as tenderly as a mother.

'No, not so much, only so tired! Shall we never, never find her, Nell?' 'By and by. Have patience,

dear.'

thing strange had come over him. He shivered from head to foot, and dropped his broad white lids over his eyes, as if to shut everything out of sight. Something made him shrink and recoil from Bernard Keane's handsome face.

'Lennard, don't you see-don't you hear?' cried Nell anxiously. He tried to rise with an effort, and smiled a sickly smile.

'I am not very well, and that makes me feel strange; but I am glad to see you, Mr. Keane,' he said gently as Bernard advanced towards him.

'Where is father? where is he?' cried Nell, alert in an instant. She turned round just in time to see the little man place an empty glass on a table near the door of the saloon, and surreptitiously wipe his lips with the back of his hand.

'Come here, father!' she called imperatively. 'Lennard is not well.'

'Not well-not well!' exclaimed little Weston, bustling up in dismay. 'Wants a whisky smash, that's what he wants.'

'Lennard was always delicate,' Bernard remarked, looking compassionately at the boy. I hope the air here will benefit him; it's healthier than in New York itself.'

Lennard smiled again, and cast a wistful glance at Nell, who crept towards him and bent her head to his.

'Ask him if he has met her.' She nodded her head and turned to Bernard.

'I was so taken aback, I forgot everything. Where can we find

Mrs. Keane ?'

'Not far off; some fifteen miles from this.'

'Fifteen miles; that is a long distance. Oh, if we had wings!' she replied.

You need not pray for wings, little one,' Bernard said, laughing. 'I have got a trap here; get in all

of you, and we'll go and have supper with my mother.'

Lennard got up quickly from his bench, tucked the violin-case under his arm, and put on his cap.

In which direction shall we go?' he asked.

'There!'

'It looks beautiful out yonder,' he cried. I am quite ready.'

A curious inspiration seemed to have seized on the boy. His eyes shone like diamonds, his cheeks became vividly red, and no coral was ever brighter than the lips through which his breath panted hot and fast. Bernard lifted Lennard into the trap-an American conveyance yclept a rockawaywhich resembled a square box on four wheels with a protruding cover in front for the driver. Into the vehicle little Weston and Nell were carefully stowed away as well, besides sundry bags and the two violins. Bernard whipped up the horse, which, though aged and purblind, possessed trotting capacities, and, after a long but pleasant drive through the green country, they halted before a shanty.

Nell sprang out of the vehicle and threw herself on her knees before Mrs. Keane, who stood transfixed with amazement at her unexpected visitors.

'O ma'am, I have found you, I have found you!' the child cried, big drops of delight glistening in her eyes, and, seizing the woman's thin hands, she kissed them fervently.

Mrs. Keane was greatly affected. She raised the little creature in her arms and embraced her over and over again.

'Nell, Nell, it seems like a miracle to see you here!'

'O ma'am, we have been searching for you ever so long, and could not get a sight of you in any street in New York. America is so wide

and long, and stretches off and off. Never mind; we are here now, Lennard and I, to say nothing of father.'

'And are you come to stay with me, Nell?' Mrs. Keane asked kindly.

'Till Lennard gets better, ma'am, if you will let us. Lennard is ill. I am afraid he is getting worse, for he grows so beautiful, it makes my heart sick.'

Here the boy came in.

Mrs. Keane was so struck by the ethereal beauty of his face that she remained motionless, gazing upon him as if an angel had alighted on her path.

Nell took him by the hand in her matronly protecting fashion, and led him up.

'You don't know Lennard again, ma'am, but he remembers you and loves you dearly, don't you, Lennard ?'

'Yes,' answered the boy sweetly, 'I remember you well-as well as I remember mother!'

Mrs. Keane clasped his hand.

The palms were hot and dry ; the slender fingers so fragile that it seemed as if the slightest touch would bend or break them.

'You are not well,' she said, with a voice full of pity that went to his sensitive heart.

'Yes, ma'am, I am well now. It seems just as if I had got home at last!'

And Lennard let his lids droop, sighing with content.

'And so it shall be your home as long as you like; but you must be hungry,' Mrs. Keane said, marking the thin pinched look on his chiselled features.

'He is hungry, ma'am,' Nell broke in, with a bright blush at her own hardihood.

'There are some birds in the house, Nell. Suppose you try your skill at cooking them. The kitchen is there;' and Mrs. Keane pointed

to a mite of a room, very little larger than an ordinary cupboard.

Nell took to her work at once, and very soon brought in her dish.

'There, ma'am,' she said, 'the supper is ready! And oh, dear me, how beautiful it is to feel at home again!' she burst out merrily, as she fluttered about like a honeybee among rose thickets.

She placed a chair at the head of the table, and gave Mrs. Keane a gentle patronising pat on the shoulder as she made her sit in it. Then she put Lennard and her father in their places, and unmindful of her own young healthy appetite, which for many a day had not been satisfied, prepared to wait.

The next morning Lennard, feeling better from the rest and quietude which an idea of home had given him, wandered off to the river, plucking the locust flowers, and pausing to watch the gorgeousplumaged fire-birds hopping from branch to branch, as he went: there were blue birds too-creatures of the loveliest azure imaginable; and katydids that had kept him awake in the night with their strange monotonous voice. Over his shoulder-like a minstrel boy of oldhis violin was slung by a ribbon. Thus with the flowers and birds he loved, and the violin which was his dearest friend, the boy strolled along, breathing the unwonted clearness and brightness of the air with languid pleasure, and feeling almost strong and well.

On the brink of the river stood a clump of maple trees, over which a wild vine had tangled and netted itself, lifting its graceful stems in the sunshine and sweeping downwards in rich leafage. At the foot of these trees a rough rustic seat was placed, and seating himself, Lennard began to play. At first the west wind, as it whispered and sighed along the nodding grass, was not fainter than the sounds he

drew. The murmur of the stream and the hum of summer insects swelled into harmony with his music, and he played dreamily on. By degrees the strains swelled louder and more sustained. The air thrilled with their sweetness, and the very birds in the trees above appeared to listen with their heads on one side, till the inspiration seized them, and they began to sing in chorus. Jubilant with enthusiasm, the boy's face grew heavenly in its spiritual beauty; a smile, sweet as a seraph's, parted his coral lips, his sapphire eyes were positively luminous, and his hands, delicate and white as a girl's, shook and quivered as they flitted over the magic strings. The sounds came with a liquid glow from under his touch, but it seemed to him as though an unseen brook was rippling into the river.

Wild strange fantasies occupied his soul until the morning shadows began to uplift themselves from the water, and the glorious sun crept in upon him through the trailing vine, making everything around more beautiful. Up the river bank a little way, sheltered by some flowering shrubs, a girl was gathering wild strawberries that grew in masses amongst the grass. As the first sound of the music reached her, Ethel Seymour stood motionless, her basket offruit hanging over her arm, her head bent to listen.

Presently she crept softly along through the emerald grass until she reached the group of maple trees, behind which she stood entranced, and wondering if it was magical music that she heard. The wind stirred the maple leaves, and peeping through them she saw a boy sitting on the rustic bench-a boy beautiful as anything Raphael ever painted. His cheek, dyed with vivid crimson, was resting against the violin from which his slender fingers drew such delicious sounds.