"'Stop, Miss,' she cried, 'and hear what I have to say. If Mr. St. James calls this evening, you are not to make your appearance. He was only making sport of your childishness to-day, and cares no more for you than the sands of the sea-shore. He is no company for you, I assure you. He is a gentleman of the world, and has no taste for the bread and butter misses just let loose from a boarding-school. Do you hear me?' "'I do, madam.' "'Do you mean to obey?' "'I do, madam.' "I will not attempt to describe my feelings that night as I sat alone in my room, and heard the voice of St. James mingling with my step-mother's, which was modulated to its sweetest, most seductive tone. The desolateness of my future life spread out before me. A home without love! Oh, what dreariness! Oh, what iciness! Had my father lived, how different it would have been. I thought of the happy vacation, when he opened his warm heart and took me in, and then I wept to think how cold the world seemed since he had left it. "It was a midsummer's night, and all the windows were open to admit the sea-born breeze. They were open, but bars of gauze wire were put up at the windows and doors to exclude the mosquitos. A very small balcony opened out of my room, where I usually sat listening to the inspiring strains of the band, that, marching on the ramparts, sent their rich, thrilling notes in rolling echoes over the moonlight waves. "It was playing now, that martial band, and the bay was one sheet of burning silver. I had never seen it look so resplendently beautiful, and I could not help thinking that beneath that gently rippling glory, there was peace for the sad and persecuted heart. As I sat there leaning on the railing, gazing into the shining depths of ocean, St. James passed. It was very early in the evening. Why had he left so soon? He started, paused, turned, and approached the balcony. "'Why are you so cruel as to refuse to see me, after showing such knightly devotion to your cause?' he asked, leaning on the side of the balcony and looking earnestly in my face, on which the tear-drops were still glittering. "'I have not refused,' I answered hastily, 'but do not wait to talk with me now. Mrs. Lynn would be much displeased; she would consider it very improper. I pray you not to think me rude, but indeed I must retire.' "I rose in an agony of terror, lest my step-mother should hear his voice, and wreak her wrath on me. "'Fear not,' he cried, catching my hand and detaining me. 'She is engaged with company, who will not hasten away as I have done. I will not stay long, nor utter one syllable that is not in harmony with the holy tranquillity of the hour. I am a stranger in name, but is there not something that tells you I was born to be your friend? I know there is,--I see it in your ingenuous, confiding eye. Only answer me one question,--Was it your _own will_, or the will of another that governed your actions to-night?'