CONFESSIONS OF A MEAN WHITE 240 XXV. MEETINGS AND PARTINGS 251 XXVI. CLARA MAKES AN IMPORTANT PURCHASE 257 XXVII. DELIGHT AND DUTY 264 XXVIII. A LETTER OF BUSINESS 274 XXIX. THE WOMAN WHO DELIBERATES IS LOST 279 XXX. A FEMININE VAN AMBURGH 290 XXXI. ONE OF THE INSTITUTIONS 300 XXXII. A DOUBLE VICTORY 305 XXXIII. SATAN AMUSES HIMSELF 314 XXXIV. LIGHT FROM THE PIT 327 XXXV. THE COMMITTEE ADJOURNS 335 XXXVI. THE OCCUPANT OF THE WHITE HOUSE 349 XXXVII. COMPARING NOTES 359 XXXVIII. THE LAWYER AND THE LADY 372 XXXIX. SEEING IS BELIEVING 382 XL. THE REMARKABLE MAN AT RICHMOND 392 XLI. HOPES AND FEARS 397 XLII. HOW IT WAS DONE 430 XLIII. MAKING THE BEST OF IT 442 XLIV. A DOMESTIC RECONNAISSANCE 455 XLV. ANOTHER DESCENDANT OF THE CAVALIERS 464 XLVI. THE NIGHT COMETH 471 XLVII. AN AUTUMNAL VISIT 480 XLVIII. TIME DISCOVERS AND COVERS 489 XLIX. EYES TO THE BLIND 493 PECULIAR. CHAPTER I. A GLANCE IN THE MIRROR. “Wed not for wealth, Emily, without love,—’tis gaudy slavery; nor for love without competence,—’tis twofold misery.”—_Colman’s Poor Gentleman._ It is a small and somewhat faded room in an unpretending brick house in one of the streets that intersect Broadway, somewhere between Canal Street and the Park. A woman sits at a writing-table, with the fingers of her left hand thrust through her hair and supporting her forehead, while in her right hand she holds a pen with which she listlessly draws figures, crosses, circles and triangles, faces and trees, on the blotting-paper that partly covers a letter which she has been inditing.