“Mrs. Warde, permit me to name to you my young friend, Miss Palmer here, who has not had the privilege of being presented to you before,” said the commodore with somewhat stilted politeness to a tall, dark, haggard-looking woman, with great black eyes, who sat opposite to Em., and who was richly dressed in black velvet, lace and bugles, and whom Em. immediately recognized as the lady who had fainted at the sight of herself in the upper hall. Em. arose from her chair and bent her head. Mrs. Warde stared and returned the salutation with a slight and haughty nod. That was all. They were as much strangers as before the introduction. The dinner went on; other people spoke to Em. from time to time, but Mrs. Warde scarcely noticed her at all, or only by a furtive, nervous glance. As soon as the dinner was over the family party adjourned to the drawing-room—with one exception, that of Ronald Bruce—who sulkily absented himself from the domestic circle that night. The old commodore, seated in his soft-cushioned, big arm-chair, made a point of talking to Em. until he fell fast asleep. The ladies of the house gathered around a large center-table that stood under a lighted chandelier, and before the ruddy open fire of hickory logs, where, having few intellectual resources, they busied themselves with crochet and gossip. Em., having no taste for either of these pursuits, sat apart, near the sleeping old man, and wondered what they were all doing at home, and whether Ronald Bruce would make his appearance at all in the drawing-room that evening. He did not; and, therefore, upon the whole, Em. spent another one of the dullest evenings she had ever passed in her life. When the hour of ten, their sober bedtime, struck, and the circle broke, Em. was glad. But as she was about to leave the room the old commodore, awakened by the general movement, aroused himself, got up from his chair and took her hand, saying kindly: “Good-night, and may the Lord bless you, my dear child!” “And you, too, sir,” replied Em. in a low, timid, but earnest tone as she bowed over his wrinkled hand and then left the room. She glanced up and down the hall in the hope of seeing Ronald Bruce, to give him good-night. She could scarcely help doing this; indeed, she was scarcely conscious of doing it; for if she had met him, waylaying her, to speak a word, she would certainly and very properly have rebuked him for doing so. Yet she heaved a deep sigh of disappointment when she had passed all the way upstairs without seeing him. When Em. entered her cheerful room in the attic she found the candles on the dressing-table lighted, the fire burning brightly, and the little maid, Liza, waiting. “Cold night, Miss Em., ain’t it? ’Spect dere’ll be a mighty heavy frost, if not snow, ’fore mornin’. We had snow airlier’n dis last year,” said Liza as she pushed up a chair nearer the fire.