Mr. Blisset shaded his long pale face with his long pale hand, and sat, with closed eyes, listening. Myles was listening too, but ear, with him, was subservient to eye and to thought. His gaze never left Adrienne, and the longer he looked, the deeper became the charm. There had slumbered in his mind, throughout these years of toil and striving, a latent, dormant, ideal of loveliness, purity, and fitness for worship, and it was as though, when Adrienne’s fingers touched the keys, that the door of heaven was opened, and a ray, falling upon her fair head, proclaimed her his soul’s dearest wish. With a sigh, promptly repressed, he rose from his dream as she finished, and took his departure, after Mr. Blisset had made him promise to come again. It was Saturday night, and Myles found the din of the town not yet hushed. He saw sights which were familiar enough to his eyes, heard sounds to which his ears were accustomed--drunken men reeling out of the public-houses which must be closed, brawling songs shouted hoarsely up and down--all the ugliness of rude, coarse natures taking their pleasure. He had never in his life found pleasure himself in such things; but equally, he had grown accustomed to the fact that others--men with whom he was on good terms--did take pleasure in them. He thought of the scene he had just left, and there shot a sudden sense of chill doubt and discomfiture through his frame of musing, high-strung happiness, a desperate feeling that those whom he saw about him in the streets now, were his class, his companions; that, ever since he had begun to hope and think, he had hoped for their advancement, their good, and he must not be untrue to them. ‘Pah!’ said he to himself, ‘as if she could ask a man to be false to what he ought to be true to. She’s like truth itself.’ CHAPTER VI. FINE LADIES AND FOLLY. Monday morning, with the business of this work-a-day world in full swing, or rather in preparation for the week’s swing of labour. In the freshness and rawness of a six o’clock morning air, Myles walked with his sister to his work. He and Mary were accustomed to do all their private conversation during these walks. They sometimes discussed their mother and her doings, and the discussion took away from the bitterness which silence would have left to rankle there. To-day Myles was exceedingly silent, but Mary, who knew him and loved him better than any other soul, felt that the silence was no sign of dejection. The brother and sister separated on arriving at the factory. Mary went to the weaving shed, and Myles to the warehouse. After breakfast the same arrangement took place; but the day was not destined to be one of pleasant memories for Myles. In the course of the forenoon he was in the outer office, with Wilson the overlooker, when the latter, glancing through the window, remarked, ‘There’s Mrs. Mallory coming. I see her carriage.’