“Well, do the same to-morrow,” cried he, peevishly, for another twitch of gout had just crossed him. “It's always so,” muttered he; “every annoyance of life lies in wait for the moment a man is laid up with gout, just as if the confounded malady were not torture enough by itself. There's Charley going out as a volunteer to India, for what or why no one can say. If there had been some insurmountable obstacle to his marriage with May, he 'd have remained to overcome it; but because he loves her, and that she likes _him_--By Jove, that was a pang!” cried he, wiping his forehead, after a terrible moment of pain. “Isn't it so, Clara?” he resumed. “_You_ know better than any of us that May never cared for that tutor fellow,--I forget his name; besides, that's an old story now,--a matter of long ago. But he _will_ go. He says that even a rash resolve at six-and-twenty is far better than a vain and hopeless regret at six-and-forty; but I say, let him marry May Leslie, and he need neither incur one nor the other. And so this guardian's name is Harris?” “No, grandpapa, Stocmar.” “Oh, to be sure. I was confounding him with another of those stage people. And what business has he to carry you off without your mother's consent?” “Mamma _does_ consent, sir. She says that my education has been so much neglected that it is actually indispensable I should study now.” “Education neglected! what nonsense! Do they want to make you a Professor of the Sorbonne? Why, child, without any wish to make you vain, you know ten times as much as half the collegiate fellows one meets, what with languages, and music, and drawing, and all that school learning of mamma's own teaching. And then that memory of yours, Clara; why, you seem to me to forget nothing.” “I remember but too well,” muttered she to herself. “What was it you said, child? I did not catch it,” said he. And then, not waiting for her reply, he went on: “And all your high spirits, my little Clara, where are they gone? And your odd rhymes, that used to amuse me so? You never make them now.” “They do not cross my mind as they used to do,” said she, pensively. “You vote them childish, perhaps, like your dolls?” said he, smiling. “No, not that. I wish with all my heart I could go back to the dolls and the nursery songs. I wish I could live all in the hour before me, making little dramas of life, with some delightful part for myself in each, and only to be aroused from the illusion to join a real world. Just as enjoyable.” “But surely, child, you have not reached the land of regrets already?” said he, fondly drawing her towards him with his arm. She turned her head away, and drew her hand across her eyes. “It is very early to begin with sorrow, my dear child,” said he, affectionately. “Let me hope that it's only an April cloud, with the silver lining already peeping through.” A faint sob broke from her, but she did not speak.