While Mr. Abbott was answering questions, luncheon was announced, and he passed his hand through his son’s arm. “We are lunching earlier than usual on your account, and the time has run away,” he said haltingly. “I don’t wish to give you too many shocks in one day, but I must make another confession. You have--I married again some years ago.” “My dear father,” replied his son dryly, “if you told me that you had married Queen Victoria and annexed the British realm--in fact I expect it. Are there--have I any more brothers and sisters scattered about among the palaces of Europe?” Mr. Abbott laughed. “No, I did not marry another young wife. Your step-mother is ornamental in her way; but I selected her partly for companionship--I had known her always--partly because I wanted some one to bring up your sister with common-sense and care. I am perfectly satisfied with her; and, as she is a woman of infinite tact, I am sure you will get on with her whether you like her or not. She will probably be a little late for luncheon--she has so many morning engagements--charities--” But this was not the occasion for Mrs. Abbott’s tact to fail her. She had given the father and son their uninterrupted morning; but to hasten home and preside at luncheon at the unseemly hour of half-past twelve, to make such a performance appear both natural and a compliment, was an occasion for subtlety too rare to be missed. She was standing in the dining-room as they entered, one hand resting on the table, her eyes fixed in pleasant anticipation on the Gobelin which hung before the door. She still wore her hat, she was slightly flushed, her wrap was half removed--her whole appearance was stamped with delicate haste. As she shook hands warmly with Fessenden, smiling and talking rapidly in a very cultivated voice, her step-son wondered at her extreme unlikeness to any woman of her probable age that he had ever seen. She was tall, slender, as willowy as youth; her hair was as black as her eyes, her skin, although sallow, was without wrinkle or line, and her features were mobile. She wore a gown of light summer silk and a large hat, yet both were made and worn with such tact that the painful affectation of lost youth was not suggested: she looked what she was, a woman of the ever-receding middle age, fashionably dressed. Whatever use she might make of modern science to avert age, she employed no art to simulate youth, and as her year was various and crowded, both mind and face were plastic. Whatever her temperament may have been originally, she had made it equable long since; and while she escaped the stigma of amiability, her self-control carried her evenly through the smooth waters of her life. No one ever knew whether she were a really intellectual woman or a brilliantly superficial one, for she had a delicately masterful habit of changing the conversation, as if the end of living were to avert the monotonies. Even in the soft vagueness of