“My child, what makes you moan and weep so bitterly.”

“Oh, because I am so miserable; because I have lost my best friend; my only friend; my guardian.  He has gone—­gone! and I did not see him.”  With a stifled cry her face went down again.

The matron had never seen her so unnerved before, and wondered at the vehemence of her grief, but knew her nature too well to attempt consolation.  Beulah lifted the box and retired to her own room, followed by Charon.  Securing the door, she put the case on the table and looked at it wistfully.  Were her conjectures, her hopes, correct?  She raised the lid and unwrapped the frame, and there was the noble head of her guardian.  She hung the portrait on a hook just above her desk, and then stood, with streaming eyes, looking up at it.  It had been painted a few weeks after his marriage, and represented him in the full morning of manhood, ere his heart was embittered and his clear brow overshadowed.  The artist had suffered a ray of sunshine to fall on the brown hair that rippled round his white temples with careless grace.  There was no mustache to shade the sculptured lips, and they seemed about to part in one of those rare, fascinating smiles which Beulah had often watched for in vain.  The matchless eyes looked down at her, with brooding tenderness in their hazel depths, and now seemed to question her uncontrollable grief.  Yet she had pained him; had in part caused his exile from the home of his youth, and added another sorrow to those which now veiled that peerless face in gloom.  He had placed his happiness in her hands; had asked her to be his wife.  She looked at the portrait, and shuddered and moaned.  She loved him above all others; loved him as a child adores its father; but how could she, who had so reverenced him, consent to become his wife?  Besides, she could not believe he loved her.  He liked her; pitied her isolation and orphanage; felt the need of her society, and wanted her always in his home.  But she could not realize that he, who so worshiped beauty, could possibly love her.  It was all like a hideous dream which morning would dispel; but there was the reality, and there was Charon looking steadily up at the portrait he was at no loss to recognize.

“Oh, if I could have seen him once more!  If he had parted with me in kindness, it would not be so intolerable.  But to remember his stern, sad face, as last I saw it; oh, how can I bear it I To have it haunting me through life, like a horrible specter; no friendly words to cherish; no final message; all gloom and anger.  Oh, how shall I bear it!” And she fell on Charon’s neck and wept bitterly.

CHAPTER XXXIII.