This was her story, which took well when told by herself, with sweet pathos in her voice and a drooping of her long lashes over her lovely blue eyes. Every one of her acquaintances of any account in America had been stepping-stones in Europe, where she met people who knew the Gerards, and John Hayden, and Miss Belknap, who was her very heaviest card, the one she played most frequently, and with the best success. The New Yorkers all knew Beatrice, and were inclined to be very gracious to her friend. Occasionally she had come across some graduate from Amherst, whom she had met before, but never till the rainy day with which this chapter opens had she seen any one from the vicinity of Rothsay, or who knew her husband personally. She was in the habit of looking over the list of arrivals, and had seen the names of “Mr. and Mrs. Philip Evarts, Cincinnati, U. S. A.,” and had readily singled out the new-comers at _table d’hote_, divining at once that the lady was a bride; but no words had passed between them until the evening of the rainy day; then Josephine entered the parlor faultlessly gotten up, and looking very sweet and lovely in her dark-blue silk and velvet jacket, with her golden hair caught up with an ivory comb. Nothing could be prettier than she was, and Phil Evarts, who, as Everard had said, was just the man to be attracted by such a woman as Josephine, and whose wife was sick with a headache in her room, managed to get near the beauty, who took a seat apart from the others, and met his advance with a swift glance of her dreamy eyes, which made his heart beat faster than a man’s heart ought to beat when his wife is up stairs with the headache. It was her business to speak first, and she said, very modestly: “Excuse me, sir, but do you know if there has been a mail since lunch?” “I don’t,” he replied, “but I will inquire. I am just going to the office. What name shall I ask for?” She told him, and during the few minutes he was gone he found out who Miss Fleming from Boston was, and all about her that the English-speaking clerk knew. But there was no letter for her, for which he was very sorry. She was sorry, too; she did so want to hear from home and sister. She did not say _mamma_, for she knew her mother was dead, and had known it for a week, and kept it to herself until she could decide whether to wear black or not, and so shut herself out from any amusements they might have in Paris, where they were going next. Naturally the two began to talk of America, and when Mr. Evarts spoke of Cincinnati as his home, she said: “I have a friend who was once at school there. Everard Forrest, of Rothsay, do you know him?” She had no idea that he did, and was astonished at the vehemence with which he responded: “Ned Forrest, of Rothsay! Of course I know him. We were at school together. He’s the best fellow in the world. And he is your friend, too?”