Page:Terminations (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1895).djvu/54

42 every one was counting on it, the dear princess most of all. If he was well enough he was to read them something absolutely fresh, and it was on that particular prospect the princess had set her heart. She was so fond of genius in any walk of life, and she was so used to it, and understood it so well; she was the greatest of Mr. Paraday's admirers, she devoured every thing he wrote. And then he read like an angel. Mrs. Wimbush reminded me that he had again and again given her, Mrs. Wimbush, the privilege of listening to him.

I looked at her a moment. "What has he read to you?" I crudely enquired.

For a moment too she met my eyes, and for the fraction of a moment she hesitated and colored. "Oh, all sorts of things!"

I wondered whether this were an imperfect recollection or only a perfect fib, and she quite understood my unuttered comment on her perception of such things. But if she could forget Neil Paraday's beauties she could of course forget my rudeness, and three days later she invited me, by telegraph, to join the party at Prestidge. This time she might indeed have had a story about what I had given up to be near the master. I addressed from that fine residence several communications to a young lady in London, a young lady whom, I confess, I quitted with reluctance, and whom the reminder of what she herself could give up was required to make me quit at all. It adds to the gratitude I owe her on other grounds that she