“Very well then, dear, don’t talk now,” she replied, not in the least noticing his impatience of manner; “when you are rested, and have had your tea, will be time enough.”

They were soon in the old house, and Clarence looked round with a smile of pleasure on the room where he had spent so many happy hours.  Good Aunt Ada would not let him talk, but compelled him to remain quiet until he had rested himself, and eaten his evening meal.

He had altered considerably in the lapse of years, there was but little left to remind one of the slight, melancholy-looking boy, that once stood a heavy-hearted little stranger in the same room, in days gone by.  His face was without a particle of red to relieve its uniform paleness; his eyes, large, dark, and languishing, were half hidden by unusually long lashes; his forehead broad, and surmounted with clustering raven hair; a glossy moustache covered his lip, and softened down its fulness; on the whole, he was strikingly handsome, and none would pass him without a second look.

Tea over, Miss Ada insisted that he should lie down upon the sofa again, whilst she, sat by and bathed his head.  “Have you seen your sister lately?” she asked.

“No, Aunt Ada,” he answered, hesitatingly, whilst a look of annoyance darkened his face for a moment; “I have not been to visit her since last fall—­almost a year.”

“Oh!  Clarence, how can you remain so long away?” said she, reproachfully.

“Well, I can’t go there with any comfort or pleasure,” he answered, apologetically; “I can’t go there; each year as I visit the place, their ways seem more strange and irksome to me.  Whilst enjoying her company, I must of course come in familiar contact with those by whom she is surrounded.  Sustaining the position that I do—­passing as I am for a white man—­I am obliged to be very circumspect, and have often been compelled to give her pain by avoiding many of her dearest friends when I have encountered them in public places, because of their complexion.  I feel mean and cowardly whilst I’m doing it; but it is necessary—­I can’t be white and coloured at the same time; the two don’t mingle, and I must consequently be one or the other.  My education, habits, and ideas, all unfit me for associating with the latter; and I live in constant dread that something may occur to bring me out with the former.  I don’t avoid coloured people, because I esteem them my inferiors in refinement, education, or intelligence; but because they are subjected to degradations that I shall be compelled to share by too freely associating with them.”

“It is a pity,” continued he, with a sigh, “that I was not suffered to grow up with them, then I should have learnt to bear their burthens, and in the course of time might have walked over my path of life, bearing the load almost unconsciously.  Now it would crush me, I know.  It was a great mistake to place me in my present false position,” concluded he, bitterly; “it has cursed me.  Only a day ago I had a letter from Em, reproaching me for my coldness; yet, God help me!  What am I to do!”