"I remember another thing--that papa used to say I was just like my mother, and should grow up like her," resumed Ellen. "It seems ages ago. Perhaps when I see him I shall find that my memory has given me an ideal father, and that he is quite different from what I have pictured him." "You know none of your Scotch relatives, Ellen?" "None." "Or where they live?" "No." "Why does not Mr. Adair come home?" "I don't know. He has been thinking of it for some years; and that's why I am with Mrs. Cumberland instead of going out to him again. I am sure he must have a very high opinion of Mrs. Cumberland," added Ellen, after a pause. "His letters prove it. And he often mentions her late husband as his dear friend and chaplain. I will show you some of his letters, if you like. Would you care to see them? I keep all papa's letters." Arthur Bohun's face lighted up at the proposition. "Yes," he said with animation. "Yes. As many as you please." She crossed the room to her desk, took out three or four letters indiscriminately from a bundle lying there, and brought them to him. He detained the pretty hands as well as the letters, and took some impassioned kisses from the blushing face, turned up unconsciously to his. Sweeter kisses than Arthur Bohun would ever impress upon any other face in afterlife. Ellen had almost learned not to shrink from them in her maiden modesty; he vowed to her that they were now his best right and privilege. But the letters told him nothing. They were evidently a gentleman's letters; but of the writer's position or family they said not a word. Arthur returned them with a half-sigh: it was of no use, he thought, to trouble himself any more about the matter. After all, his own father and Mr. Adair had been close friends in India, and that was a sort of guarantee that all must be right. This decided, he delivered himself up to his ideal happiness: and the wedding day was finally settled. This afternoon, when they were pacing the beach, unobservant of the little clouds rising in the west, was the marriage eve. It is the last day they need thus walk together as mere formal acquaintances: for at that little church whose spire is not a stone's-throw away, they will tomorrow be made man and wife. A strange light sits on Arthur Bohun's cheek; the light of intense happiness. The day and the hour are drawing near to its realization: and not so much as a thought has crossed his mind that any untoward fate can arise to mar it.