“Put on your bonnet and come down to the side gate.  It is too warm for you to walk home.”

Without waiting for her answer, he descended the steps, and she was soon seated beside him in the buggy.  The short ride was silent, and, on reaching home, Beulah would have gone, immediately to her room, but the doctor called her into the study and, as he rang the bell, said gently: 

“You look very much exhausted; rest here, while I order a glass of wine.”

It was speedily brought, and, having iced it, he held it to her white lips.  She drank the contents, and her head sank on the sofa cushions.  The fever of excitement was over, a feeling of lassitude stole over her, and she soon lost all consciousness in a heavy sleep.  The sun was just setting as she awakened from her slumber, and, sitting up, she soon recalled the events of the day.  The evening breeze, laden with perfume, stole in refreshingly through the blinds, and, as the sunset pageant faded, and darkness crept on, she remained on the sofa, pondering her future course.  The lamp and her guardian made their appearance at the same moment, and, throwing himself down in one corner of the sofa, the latter asked:  “How are you since your nap?  A trifle less ghastly, I see.”

“Much better, thank you, sir.  My head is quite clear again.”

“Clear enough to make out a foreign letter?” He took one from his pocket and put it in her hand.

An anxious look flitted across her face, and she glanced rapidly over the contents, then crumpled the sheet nervously in her fingers.

“What is the matter now?”

“He is coming home.  They will all be here in November.”  She spoke as if bitterly chagrined and disappointed.

“Most people would consider that joyful news,” said the doctor quietly.

“What! after spending more than five years (one of them in traveling), to come back without having acquired a profession and settle down into a mere walking ledger!  To have princely advantages at his command, and yet throw them madly to the winds and be content to plod along the road of mercantile life, without one spark of ambition, when his mental endowments would justify his aspiring to the most exalted political stations in the land.”

Her voice trembled from intensity of feeling.

“Take care how you disparage mercantile pursuits; some of the most masterly minds of the age were nurtured in the midst of ledgers.”

“And I honor and reverence all such far more than their colleagues whose wisdom was culled in classic academic halls; for the former, struggling amid adverse circumstances, made good their claim to an exalted place in the temple of Fame.  But necessity forced them to purely mercantile pursuits.  Eugene’s case is by no means analogous; situated as he is, he could be just what he chose.  I honor all men who do their duty nobly and truly in the positions fate has assigned them; but, sir, you know there are