A Fountain Sealed

, darlin

first of all I want to help you to bear it by telling you at once that you

what strength I have, firmly, for you, and tell you all that you will want to hear

st a case of the sword wearing out the scabbard. A case of, 'Yes, uphill to the very end.' I know that you did not guess how fragile the scabbard had become, and you must not reproach yourself, darling, for that either. We are hardly masters of the intuitions that warn us of these things. Death teaches us so much, and, beside him, looking at his quiet face, so wonderful in its

' Union. It was bitterly cold and though I begged him to be selfish for once and take a cab, he wouldn't-you remember his Spartan contempt of costly comforts-and I can see him now, going down the steps, smiling, shaking his head, waving his hand, and saying with that half-sad, half-quizzical, smile of his, 'Plenty of people who need bread a good deal more than I need cabs, little daughter.' So, in the icy wind, he walked to the cable-car, with its over-heated atmosphere. He got back late, only in time to dress for dinner. Several interesting men came

. I needed help, mother, for it was like having my heart torn from me to see him go. He was very calm and brave, though I am sure he knew, and once, when I sat beside him, just put out his hand to mine and said: 'Don't grieve overmuch, little daughter; I trust you to turn all your sorrow to noble uses.' He spoke only once of you, dear mother, but then it was to say: 'Tell her-I forgive. Tell

will write again. Eddy goes to you directly after the funeral. If you need me, cable for me at once. I have many ties and many claims here, but I will leave them all to spend the winter with you, if you need me. For you may

ps, with youth's over-severity,-all that is gone now. I only feel our human weakness, our human need, our human sorrow. Remember, darling, that our very faults, our very mistakes, are the things that may help us to grow higher.

OGE

wn, were the points around which the room had so delightfully arranged itself. It was a room a trifle overcrowded, but one wouldn't have wanted anything taken away, the graceful confusion, on a background of almost austere order, gave the happiest sense of adaptability to a variety of human needs and whims. Mrs. Upton had finished her own tea, but the flame still burned in waiting under the silver urn; books and reviews la

ggested nothing less than a widow plunged in remorseful grief. Her eyes, indeed, were thoughtful, her lips, as she read her daughter's communication, grave, but there was much discrepancy between her own aspect and the letter's tone, and, letting it drop at last, she seemed herself aware of it, sighing, glancing about her at the Chinese porcelain, the tea-

severity for herself, and, long ago, she had ceased to feel any for poor Everard. They had been greatly mistaken in fancying themselves made for each other, two creatures could hardly have been less so; but Everard had been a good man and she,-she was a harmless woman. Both of them had meant well. Of course Everard had always, and for everything, meant a great deal more than she, in the sense of an intentional shaping of courses. She had always owned that, had always given his intentions full credit; only, what he had meant had bored her-she could not find it in herself now to fix on

her to second her assurance, that boarding-school was the proper place to form it. Eddy was also at school, and Mrs. Upton, with the alternative of flight or an unbroken tête-à-tête with her husband before her, chose the former. There was no breach, no crash; any such disturbances had taken place long before; she simply slid away, and her prolonged absences seemed symbols of fundamental and long recognized divisions. She came home for the children's holidays; built, indeed, the little house among the Vermont hills, so

ng, was the fact, and she felt herself now to be looking it hard in the face, that Imogen had always, obviously, emphatically, been fondest of her father. It had been from the child's earliest days, this more than fondness, this placid partizanship. In looking back it seemed to her that Imogen had always disapproved of her, had always shown her disapproval, gently, even tenderly, but with a sad firmness. Her liberation from her husband's standard was all very well; she cared nothing for Imogen's standard either, in so far as it was an echo, a reflection; only, for her daughter not to care for her, to disapprove of her, to be willing that

ndnesses, her sympathy and sweetness, were, in a manner, outposts about an inner citadel and one might for years remain, hospitably entertained, yet kept at a distance. But the stars, when they did form, were very fixed. Of such were the two friends who now came in eager for tea, after their nipping drive: Mrs. Pakenham, English, mother of a large family, wife of a hard-worked M.P. and landowner; energetically interested in hunting, philanthropy, books and people; slender and vigorous, with a delicate, emaciated face, weather-beaten to a pale, crisp red, her eyes as blue as porc

hy homes, and through all the catastrophes and achievements of their lives they had kept in close touch with each other. Mrs. Wake's glances, now, were fond, but slightly quizzical, perhaps slightly critical. They took in her frien

heard, t

from I

bereavement; the cables had supplied all essential information. Her quiet

hild is wel

esn't speak much of hers

recent date, had not known Mr. U

her, of course,

th and Julia Halliwell, of course, must have helped her through it all. She says that

went last year to Boston. You remember old

t this Jack I'

ear, devote

I in

kind of young man,

rred th

ke, "Eddy will be here

og

e will come over at

will live with you her

her devotee," said Mrs

her. "No, I shall go to

or some oth

le, that will be best, for the present. Of course it's a pity to have to shut up your home, just as you are so nicely installed

at that I must do

it Mrs. Pakenham's eyes met Mrs. Wake's in a long interchange. Mrs. Upton, in the

this silent acquiescence and silent skepticism, "that

r now; my preferences as to a home would na

ly take up all the thr

all t

like that?" Mrs.

s. Upton rather

Isn't she very self-reliant? Hasn't he

of color was evident, and Mrs. Pakenham, leaning impulsively forward, put he

n did not look at her friend, tho

you can even regret, then. It's well, altogether well, th

uch-entangled veil she had removed, "that a daugh

nerous theories-"not well for us poor mothers, perhaps, who fin

r," Mrs. Wake rejoined. "

n more harmed

yes remained fixed on the fire. "How can she have been har

a good

that she's

hink that she

tical; but Valerie Upton quietly drew aside her res

oesn't suffer; she judges. It's very har

ham cried, a little shocked at the other's rut

mogen and her father were there. The relation was never normal. Now that poor Everard is gone, the necessary arti

ce, of detachment from youth's self-absorption, of the observer's kindly, yet ironic, insight. Her figure was supple; her nut-brown hair, splendidly folded at the back of her head, was hardly touched with white; her quickly glancing, deliberately pausing, eyes were as clear, as pensive, as a child's; with almost a child's candor of surprise in the upturning of their lashes. A brunette duskiness in the rose of lips and cheeks, in the black brows, in the fruit-like softness of outline, was like a veil drawn across and dimming the fairness that paled to a pearly white at throat and temples. Her upper lip was ever so faintly shadowed with a brunette penciling of down, and three grains de beauté, like t

lence, and it was Mrs. Pakenham who voiced at last the thought u

h, you mean, or

ot

at once it will only be because he thinks that now h

Pakenham mused, "but one can't help it, having seen it all; having se

prudish to own to it just now-with poor Everard hardly in his grave. But that's the comfort of bei

to greater comfort with a still more crude, "It will be perfect, you

really don't know

fond of him,-it's just that that she has take

one does know that, one can't know more-he least o

ow that she's free

-exc

strong, as true; and if he isn't very clever, Valerie is far too clever hersel

t that she d

e husband-and she need have no self-reproach about him, either-finally out of the way; a reve

ns me a little. Valerie has, you see, made a mess of it. She has, you see, spoiled her life, in that aspect of it. To mend it now, so completely, to start fresh at-how o

consciences, running after your motives as if you were ferrets in a rat-hole. If all you have to say against it is that it

uiesce, yet still to ha

. Imogen has to

young person. It would be a little too much if the daughter sp

and his friends may well have thought him a misused husband; Imogen does, I'm sure. She has, perhaps, a r

your own convictions. It was all his fault,-one only has to

ault. He couldn't he

preparatory to her departure; and, summing up her cheerful convictions, she added: "I'm sorry for the poor man, of course; but, after all, he seems to have do