Page:Watch and Ward (Boston, Houghton, Osgood and Company, 1878).djvu/123

120 said, however, to have prospered. Miss Sands talked with a certain gracious zeal which was not unallied, I imagine, to a desire to efface the trace of that superb blush I have attempted to chronicle. Roger brooded and wondered; and Mrs. Middleton, fancying that things were not going well, expressed her displeasure by abusing every one who was mentioned. She took heart again for the moment when, on the young lady's carriage being announced, the latter, turning in farewell to Roger, asked him if he ever came to New York. "When you are next there," she said, "you must make a point of coming to see me. You will have something to tell me."

After she had gone Roger demanded of Mrs. Middleton whether she had imparted to Miss Sands her scheme for their common felicity. "Never mind what I said or did not say," she replied. "She knows enough not to be taken unawares. And now tell me—" But Roger would tell her nothing. He made his escape, and as he walked home in the frosty starlight, his face wore a smile of the most shameless elation. He had gone up in the market. Nora might do worse! There stood that beautiful woman knocking at his door.

A few evenings after this Roger called upon Hubert. Not immediately, but on what may be called the second line of conversation, Hubert asked him what news he had from Nora. Roger replied by reading her letter aloud. For some moments after he had finished Hubert was silent. "'One grows more in a month in this wonderful Rome,'" he said at last, quoting, "'than in a year at home.'"

"Grow, grow, grow, and Heaven speed it!" said Roger.