Slowly he went down, and leaning over the balustrade to watch the vanishing figure, the withered azaleas slipped from her hair, and floated like a snowflake down, down to the lower hall.

Fearful of discovery she shrank back, but not before he had seen the drifting flowers, and one swift upward glance showed him the blanched suffering face pale as a summer cloud, retreating from observation.  Stooping, he snatched the bruised wilted petals that seemed a fit symbol of the drooping flower he was leaving behind him, kissed them tenderly, and thrust them into his bosom.

The blessed assurance so long desired seemed nestling in their perfumed corollas making all his future fragrant; and how little she dreamed of the precious message they breathed from her heart to his!

“What could he do indeed?  A weak white girl
Held all his heartstrings in her small white hand;
His hopes, and power, and majesty were hers,
And not his own.”

CHAPTER XXXI.

“No, mother; no.  Not less, but more beautiful; not so pale as when you hang over me at the convent, baptizing me with hot, fast dripping tears.  Now a delicate flush like the pink of an apple bloom overspreads your cheeks; and your eyes, once so sad, eyes which I remember as shimmering stars, burning always on the brink of clouds, and magnified and misty through a soft veil of April rain, are brighter, happier eyes than those I have so fondly dreamed of.  Oh, mother! mother!  Draw me close, hold me tight.  Earth has no peace so holy as the blessed rest in a mother’s clasping arms.  After the long winter of separation, it is so sweet to bask in your presence, thawing like a numb dormouse in the sunshine of May.  I knew I should find joy in the reunion, but how deep, how full, anticipation failed to paint; and only the blessed reality has taught me.”

On the carpet at her mother’s feet, with her head in her mother’s lap and her arms folded around her waist, Regina had thrown herself, feasting her eyes with the beauty of the face smiling down upon her.  It was the second day after her arrival in Paris, and hour after hour she had poured into eagerly listening ears the recital of her life at the quiet parsonage, at the stately mansion on Fifth Avenue; and yet the endless stream of talk flowed on, and neither mother nor child took cognizance of the flight of time.

Of her past the girl withheld only the acknowledgment of her profound interest in Mr. Palma, and when questioned concerning his opposition to her engagement with Mr. Lindsay she had briefly announced her belief that he was hastening the preparations for his marriage with Mrs. Carew.  Of him she spoke only in quiet terms of respect and gratitude, and her mother never suspected the spasm of pain that the bare mention of his name aroused.

Thus far no allusion had been hazarded to the long-veiled mystery of her parentage, and Mrs. Orme wondered at the exceeding delicacy with which her daughter avoided every reference that might have been construed into an inquiry.  As the soft motherly hand passed caressingly over the forehead resting so contentedly on her knee, Regina continued: