“The very prospect transfigures you, Bertie.  I am glad you are so courageous.”

“Were you courageous when you clung to your ropes on the sea-tossed raft!  No, Miriam! that was instinct—­nothing more; and I, too, have very strong intuitions of self-preservation.  Heaven grant that they may be successful!  Let us pray.”

And, with moving lips and down-drawn lids, from beneath which the large tears stole one by one, like crystal globes, this suffering spirit communed with its God, silently.

So best, I felt!  Bertie was only a lip-deep scoffer.  Her heart was open to conviction yet, and, when the time came, I believed that the seed sown in old days would germinate and bear good harvest.  All was chaos now!

Shall I keep on with Bertie, now that the theme has possession of me, and go back to the others when she is finally dismissed?  I think this will be wisest, especially as my space is small, and mood concentrative rather than erratic.

Let us pass over, then, five eventful years, during which the sorrows and changes I have spoken of had taken place, and Wentworth had fixed his home in the vicinity of San Francisco.

I had heard of Bertie in the interval as a successful debutante as a reader of Shakespeare, and had received her sparse and sparkling letters confirming report, truly “angel visits, few and far between.”

At last one came announcing her intention of visiting California professionally, and sojourning beneath my roof while in San Francisco.  It was to be a stay of several weeks.

She was accompanied and sometimes assisted by Mr. and Mrs. Mortimer, professional readers both—­the last distinguished more for grace and beauty, even though now on the wane of life, than she ever had been for talent, but eminently fitted, both by education and character, for a guide and companion.

An English maid, as perfect as an automaton in her training and regularity, accompanied Bertie, to whom were confided all details of dress, all keys and jewels, with entire confidence and safety.  An elaborate doll seemed the red-and-white and stupidly-staring Euphemia.  Yet was she adroit, obedient, and expert, just to move in the groove of her requirements.

I have spoken only of her accessories; but now for Bertie herself.

“Is she not magnificent?” was my exclamation when alone with my husband on the night of her arrival, after our guest, with her sparkling face and conversation, her superb toilet and bearing, her graceful, nymph-like walk, had retired to her chamber, attended by the mechanical “Miss Euphemia.”

The Mortimers, with their children and servants, remained at the principal hotel.

“The very word for her,” he replied; “only that and nothing more.”

“Wardour!”

“Well, love!”

“How little enthusiasm you possess about the beautiful!  Now, if there were question of a new railroad-bridge, the vocabulary would have been exhausted.”