“Not of myself could I do it,” Morris said; “but I trust in One who says:  ‘As thy day shall thy strength be,’ and He, you know, never fails.”

There was a fresh bond of sympathy now between Morris and Helen, and the latter needed no caution against repeating what she had discovered.  The secret was safe with her, and by dwelling on what “might have been” she forgot to think so much of what was, and so the first days after Katy’s departure were more tolerable than she had thought it possible for them to be.  At the close of the fourth there came a short note from Katy, who was still in Boston at the Revere, and perfectly happy, she said, going into ecstasies over her husband, the best in the world, and certainty the most generous and indulgent.  “Such beautiful things as I am having made,” she wrote, “when I already had more than I needed, and so I told him, but he only smiled a queer kind of smile as he said:  ’Very true; you do not need them.’  I wonder then why he gets me more.  Oh, I forgot to tell you how much I liked his cousin, Mrs. Harvey, who boards at the Revere, and whom Wilford consults about my dress.  I am somewhat afraid of her, too, she is so grand, but she pets me a great deal and laughs at my speeches.  Mr. Ray is here too, and I think him splendid.

“By the way, Helen, I heard him tell Wilford that you had one of the best shaped heads he ever saw, and that he thought you decidedly good looking.  I must tell you now of the only thing which troubles me in the least, and I shall get used to that, I suppose.  It is so strange Wilford never told me a word until she came, my waiting maid.  Think of that! little Katy Lennox with a waiting maid, who jabbers French half the time, for she speaks that language as well as her own, having been abroad with the family once before.  That is why they sent her to me; they knew her services would be invaluable in Paris.  Her name is Esther, and she came the day after we did and brought me such a beautiful mantilla from Wilford’s mother, and the loveliest dress.  Just the pattern was fifty dollars, she said.

“The steamer sails in three days, and I will write again before that time, sending it by Mr. Ray, who is to stop over one train at Linwood.  Wilford has just come in and says I have written enough for now, but I will tell you how he has bought me a diamond pin and earrings, which Esther, who knows the value of everything, says never cost less than five hundred dollars.

“Yours, loving, Katy Cameron.”

“Five hundred dollars!” and Aunt Betsy held up her hands in horror, while Helen sat a long time with the letter in her hand, cogitating upon its contents, and especially upon the part referring to herself, and what Mark Ray said of her.

Every human heart is susceptible of flattery, and Helen was not an entire exception.  Still with her ideas of city men she could not at once think favorably of Mark Ray, just for a few complimentary words which might or might not have been in earnest, and she found herself looking forward with nervous dread to the time when he would stop at Linwood, and of course call on her, as he would bring a letter from Katy.