Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/350

340 "No, I suppose not," replied Bell, gravely. "But if we 're going to live together all our lives, it 's a great pity we should not, especially if, as you say, I 'm going to be your chaperon."

"Oh, you motherly, grandmotherly old girl!" cried Susan, kissing her. "Don't you worry yourself; I won't do anything you don't want me to. I believe in caring what one's friends say."

"You sweet, dear Sue!" cried Bell, kissing her warmly in turn; "I know you won't."

From all which it is easy to see that Mrs. Thomas Lawton's chaperonage of Miss Susan Sweetser would not be a very rigid one.

Susan's phrase, "What friends I please," had not been a random one. For more than a year her intimacy with Professor Balloure had been such as to give rise to some ill-natured comment in the town, and to no little anxiety in the minds of her friends. Edward Balloure had been professor of belles-lettres in one of our large colleges in his youth, but marrying early a woman of fortune, he had at once relinquished his professorship, and had ever since led a life of indolent leisure, dabbling in literature in an idle fashion, now and then throwing off a creditable pamphlet or paper, but for the most part doing nothing except enjoy himself. He was a handsome man and a brilliant talker; everybody liked him; nobody loved him, not even his wife, who had soon found out that he had married her for her money and not from affection. This knowledge,