Page:The Atlantic Monthly Volume 2.djvu/664

656  engineers has had place to an alarming extent. Let us hope that the old professional pride, and, better still, a love of truth and honesty for their own sake, may yet triumph, and place real engineers high above the dead level to which ignorance and pretence and venality have degraded the profession.

girl whose suggestion had brought about this change in her father's household, introducing anxiety and tears and pain where these were almost strangers, was not exceeding joyous in view of what she had done. But she was resolved and calm. It was everything to her, that night when she lay down to rest, to know that the same roof that covered her was also spread above the prisoner, and all the joys of youth passed into forgetfulness as she thought and vowed to herself concerning the future.

It seemed, perhaps, a state of things involving no consequences, this sympathy that Elizabeth had shared with the gardener Sandy, when the prisoner's eyes gazed on them from his window, or turned towards them while he walked in the garden; but Sandy said to himself, when she told him that they were to have Laval's place in the prison, "It took her!"—neither did it seem incredible to him when she assured him that the new house was like home. He honestly believed that with the child—child he considered her—all things were possible.

What he had lacked and missed so long that the restoration had a charm of novelty about it, added to its own excellency, was now the prisoner's portion. Good manners, kind and courteous voices, greeted eyes and ears once more. As in the days of Joan Laval, a woman was now sometimes in attendance on the prisoner. But in not one particular did Pauline Montier resemble Joan Laval. She called herself a soldier's wife, and was exact and brave accordingly. She was thoughtful of her husband's charge, and when she paused in her efforts for his comfort and content, it was because she had exhausted the means within her reach, but not her wit in devising.

The effect was soon manifest. The prisoner received this care and sympathy as he might have received the ministration of angels. The attendance was almost entirely confined to Montier and his wife, but now and then Elizabeth also could serve him. She served him with her heart, with unobtrusive zeal that was exhaustless as the zeal of love. Unobserved, she watched, as well as waited on him; and oh, how jealous and impatient of time and authority did she become! Her pity knew no limit; it beamed from her eyes, spoke through her voice, was unceasing in activity. He was to her a romance terrible and sweet, a romance that had more abundant fascination than the world could show beside.

She went up to his room one morning, carrying his breakfast. Her father had been ordered to the barracks, and her mother was not well; the service therefore fell upon her.

The prisoner did not seem to heed her when she entered; at least, he gave no sign, until she approached him, and even then was not the first to speak. Going to the window, her eyes followed his to the garden below.

"It looks well this morning," she said, pleasantly.

"Yes,—but I have seen prettier," he answered.

"Where?" she asked, so quickly that