Her face, though faded, still bore the unmistakable stamp of distinction.  Calm, gray eyes and a strong mouth and chin recalled Norman’s face.  The daintiest of caps rested on her gray hair like a crown, and several little ringlets about her ears gave the charm of quaintness to the patrician face.  Her voice was deep and musical.  When she first spoke it was gracious rather than cordial; but after the inspective look she had given him it softened, and from this time Keith felt her warmth.

The easy, cordial, almost confidential manner in which she soon began to talk to him made Keith feel as if they had been friends always, and in a moment, in response to a question from her, he was giving quite frankly his impression of the big city:  of its brilliance, its movement, its rush, that keyed up the nerves like the sweep of a swift torrent.

“It almost takes my breath away,” he said.  “I feel as if I were on the brink of a torrent and had an irresistible desire to jump into it and swim against it.”

She looked at the young man in silence for a moment, enjoying his sparkling eyes, and then her face grew grave.

“Yes, it is interesting to get the impression made on a fresh young mind.  But so many are dashed to pieces, it appears to me of late to be a maelstrom that engulfs everything in its resistless and terrible sweep.  Fortune, health, peace, reputation, all are caught and swept away; but the worst is its heartlessness—­and its emptiness.”

She sighed so deeply that the young man wondered what sorrow could touch her, intrenched and enthroned in that beautiful mansion, surrounded by all that wealth and taste and affection could give.  Years afterwards, that picture of the old-time gentlewoman in her luxurious home came back to him.

Just then a cheery voice was heard calling outside: 

“Cousin?—­cousin?—­Matildy Carroll, where are you?”

It was the voice of an old lady, and yet it had something in it familiar to Keith.

Mrs. Wentworth rose, smiling.

“Here I am in the drawing-room,” she said, raising her voice the least bit.  “It is my cousin, a dear old friend and schoolmate,” she explained to Keith.  “Here I am.  Come in here.”  She advanced to the door, stretching out her hand to some one who was coming down the stair.

“Oh, dear, this great, grand house will be the death of me yet!” exclaimed the other lady, as she slowly descended.

“Why, it is not any bigger than yours,” protested Mrs. Wentworth.

“It’s twice as large, and, besides, I was born in that and learned all its ups and downs and passages and corners when I was a child, just as I learned the alphabet.  But this house!  It is as full of devious ways and pitfalls as the way in ‘Pilgrim’s Progress,’ and I would never learn it any more than I could the multiplication table.  Why, that second-floor suite you have given me is just like six-times-nine.  When you