"Not convinced of what?"

" That you would not have been happier,
making your way abroad.  It was such a
prospect ! "

" Spoken like a man of business.  But life
has other phases than commerce.  I was
never meant to be a homeless seeker for fortune.
I crave more nourishment for heart
and mind.  As for riches and luxury, I want
none of them.  I never used to wish for
them : I never will ! "

His tone grew determined.  Agnes looked
up surprised, but more persuaded.

"And you are really happy here, and
thus ? "

" Happier than I could be anywhere else
in the wide world," he answered, with a
fervour that sent the colour to his cheek, the
light to his eyes.  His sister looked up into
his face, and was satisfied.

The table cleared, Agnes was soon at
work.  But before Leonard unclosed Shakespeare
to finish the Tempest, commenced the
previous evening, the girlish, busy tongue
began again on the fruitful theme with which
their evening talk had commenced.

"Brother, Miss Bellew invited me to go
and see her."

" Did she ? Very naturally."

" What sort of a house is it ? "

" Their villa is a perfect palace of taste and
luxury.  You were never in such a grand
house in your life, Agnes.  Mr. Bellew is one
of our merchant princes, you know.  He likes
magnificence, and his house— "

"It is about Mr. Bellew I want to know,
not his house.  Is he a nice man ?"

" Nice is such a young lady's word, I am
afraid of venturing in its way.  He is a
handsome old man, to begin with.  His face
expresses the qualities I have always found
in him— honour, integrity, straightforward
truthfulness, perseverance, pride, and inflexible,
inexorable will."

" I know what he is like, very well.  Is
Miss Bellew an only child ? "

" She has a brother ; a boy of fourteen ;
and two little sisters, born when her mother
died."

" And she is a mother to them ? "

"Almost," said Leonard, temperately.  "She
is very good — very loving and tender over
them.  Her mother left them in her charge.
She fulfils it sacredly."

" And they all love her dearly ? "

" I believe so : the little girls do, at least.
Master Alfred is, I should think, rather
difficult to deal with.  His father has spoiled
him ever since he was born."

" And neglects — or at least, thinks little of
his daughters ? "

" Not so fast.  Rosamond, Miss Bellew is
the very apple of her father's eye."

" Is she ?" said Agnes, thoughtfully.

Leonard opened his book, and began turning
over the pages.

"And her name is Rosamond," she pursued,
still musing, her work lying idle in her lap.
" Rosa mundi, Rose of the world."

" Even so," said Leonard, gently, " Rose of
the World."  He repeated the words softly,
dreamily, as he turned over more pages, and
finally settled his volume and himself for
reading.  Then his voice became cadenced to
a clear and equable music, as he began :

    There be some sports are painful ; but their labour
    Delight in them sets off.

CHAPTER THE SECOND.

A WEEK afterwards, Agnes went to spend
the day with Miss Bellew.  It was looked
forward to, thought about, counted upon.  It
proved one of those rare occasions when the
anticipated pleasure falls even short of its
reality.  At least, so Agnes thought; when, after
a long day that had seemed short, of talk and
music books and work, she and Miss Bellew
and the children sat at evening in the drawing-
room, with Mr. Beliew asleep in his
armchair.  The two little girls were at their
sister's feet, absorbed in a fairy tale.  Master
Alfred was equally well amused by some
boyish piece of science which his father had
brought him that evening.  Rosamond and
Agnes sat side by side on the sofa.  The
night was bleak ; rain falling, and gusts of
wind sobbing, which reached their ears even
in their curtained and cushioned splendour
of ease.

"My brother will be here soon," said
Agnes.

" Yes.  It is a wild night for him to come
so far."

'' O ! he does not mind wild weather.  He
even likes it.  At home, he often used to go
out in the midst of storm and wind, to help
the fishermen draw up their boats on the
shore.  Once he went out in a little boat
to save the people out of a wreck."

"Did he?"

A silence.  Curiously enough, this theme
of Leonard was a new one between the two
girls, although to one of them at least, of
ever-present interest.

" You must have loved your home very
much," said Miss Bellew presently.

" We did — especially Leonard.  He looked
as I never saw him look before nor since,
when we drove away from the gate of our
house, and through the village.  It was such
a happy home.  Perhaps, one day we may
yet have it again."

"You and your brother ? "

" Yes ; or Leonard, at least.  I know he
hopes for it, thinks of it, determines — "

But here Agnes stopped, suddenly conscious
how unwittingly confidential she
had become with her new friend.  She
looked up, and Rosamond's eyes met her
own.  Miss Bellew's was a face that looked
too proud for a woman's, until she smiled or
spoke ; then the curves of her mouth relaxed
into a graciousness that made her
whole countenance radiant and beautiful.