“Perhaps he has deserved them, Mr. Lane.  I know what your opinion of him was, and I think you guessed mine.  He has won the chief battle of life,—­victory over himself.  Ever since I have known you, you have inspired my respect as a strong, resolute man.  In resolving upon what you would do instinctively Mr. Strahan has had such a struggle that he has touched my sympathies.  One cannot help feeling differently toward different friends, you know.  Were I in trouble, I should feel that I could lean upon you.  To encourage and sustain would always be my first impulse with Mr. Strahan.  Are you content?”

“I should try to be, had I your colors also.”

“Oh, I only gave him a rose.  Do you want one?”

“Certainly.”

“Well, now you are even,” she said, laughing, and handing him one of those she wore.

He looked at it thoughtfully for a moment, and then said, quietly:  “Some would despise this kind of thing as the merest sentiment.  With others it would influence the sternest action and the supreme moments of life.”

CHAPTER X.

Willard Merwyn.

During her drives Marian had often passed the entrance to one of the finest old places in the vicinity, and, although aware that the family was absent in Europe, she had observed that the fact made no difference in the scrupulous care of that portion of the grounds which was visible.  The vista from the road, however, was soon lost among the boles and branches of immense overshadowing oaks.  Even to the passer-by an impression of seclusion and exclusion was given, and Marian at last noted that no reference was made to the family in the social exchanges of her little drawing-room.  The dwelling to which the rather stiff and stately entrance led was not visible from the car-windows as she passed to and from the city, so abrupt was the intervening bluff, but upon one occasion from the deck of a steamboat she had caught glimpses through the trees of a large and substantial brick edifice.

Before Strahan had disappeared for a time, as we have related, her slight curiosity had so far asserted itself that she had asked for information concerning the people who left their beautiful home untenanted in June.

“I fancy I can tell you more about them than most people in this vicinity, but that is not so very much.  The place adjoins ours, and as a boy I fished and hunted with Willard Merwyn a good deal.  Mrs. Merwyn is a widow and a Southern-bred woman.  A Northern man of large wealth married her, and then she took her revenge on the rest of the North by having as little to do with it as possible.  She was said to own a large property in the South,—­plantation, negroes, and all that.  The place on the Hudson belonged to the Merwyn side of the house, and the family have only spent a few summers here and have been exclusive and unpopular.  My mother made