"The dear child works incessantly," she wrote, "but she is very quiet and seems easily tired. She is not as bright as she used to be, and looks very pale, so that I fear she is doing too much, though she says she is perfectly well and happy. We had a call from Mr. John Harrington the other afternoon--I think you know him--and he seemed quite to think with me that she is over-working herself. He suggested that I should persuade her to go for a change somewhere, either with me or with other friends. I wonder if you would care for us to join you at the Italian Lakes? If you would I might be able to manage it. I have not mentioned the idea to her yet, as I know she is finishing some work--but she tells me it will all be done in a few days, and that then she will take a rest. I hope she will, for I'm sure she needs it." Another part of the letter ran as follows:-- "I rather hesitate to mention it, but I think so many prolonged sittings for her portrait to that painter with the strange name, Amadis de Jocelyn, have rather tired her out. The picture is finished now, and I and a few friends went to see it the other day. It is a most beautiful portrait, but very sad!--and it is wonderful how the likeness of her father as he was in his young days comes out in her face! She and Mr. de Jocelyn are very intimate friends--and some people say he is in love with her! Perhaps he may be!--but I do hope she is not in love with HIM!" Lord Blythe took off his spectacles, folded up the letter and put it in his pocket. Then he looked out towards the lake and the charming picture it presented. How delightful it would be to see Innocent in one of those dainty boats scattered about near the water's edge, revelling with all the keenness of a bright, imaginative temperament in the natural loveliness around her! Young, and with the promise of a brilliant career opening out before her, happiness seemed ready and waiting to bless and to adorn the life of the little deserted girl who, left alone in the world, had nevertheless managed to win the world's hearing through the name she had made for herself--yet now--yes!--now there was the cruel suggestion of a shadow--an ugly darkness like a black cloud, blotting the fairness of a blue sky,--and Blythe felt an uncomfortable sense of premonition and wrong as the thought of Amadis de Jocelyn came into his head and stayed there. What was he that he should creep into the unspoiled sphere of a woman's opening life? A painter, something of a genius in his line, but erratic and unstable in his character,--known more or less for several "affairs of gallantry" which had slipped off his easy conscience like water off a duck's back,--not a highly cultured man by any means, because ignorant of many of the finer things in art and letters, and without any positively assured position. Yet, undoubtedly a man of strong physical magnetism and charm--fascinating in his manner, especially on first acquaintance,