His intercourse with the two Bloommaert families was, however, the most important of all his life’s engagements. With other families he had frequent, but casual and intermittent, meetings; he was at the close of this year in one or other of the Bloommaert households every day. With Madame Jonaca he had formed a most affectionate alliance; he asked her counsel, and followed it; he told her all the pleasant news of that society which she still loved; he took her frequently out in his sleigh that she might see any unusual parade of the troops or militia; he brought her all the newspapers, and delighted himself and madame--as well as Annette--by reading aloud the numerous passages he had marked in them, as likely to interest both women. He came in when he was cold, to be warmed in Madame’s cosey parlour; when he was lonely he went there for company; when he was sad for comfort. In the Bowling Green home he had a footing quite as sure, though on a different foundation. In this family it was the judge who favoured him above all others. If St. Ange came into the room his face brightened, he put aside the paper or pamphlet he was reading, and turned to the young man for conversation. He went with him to Dr. Smith’s Club, and said it was the only sensible club he had ever visited. If the day was mild the two men took a brisk walk together on the Battery, and talked politics or science, and sometimes law, if the judge was engaged with any very interesting case; and if all these sources of intercourse were too few, out came the chess board, and in silent moves and monosyllabled conversation the evening passed away. His relations with Mrs. Bloommaert and Sappha were equally friendly and familiar. Very early in his visits to the Bowling Green house he had assured himself that the lovely Sappha had no heart to give--that she was entirely devoted to his friend Leonard Murray. This conviction had at first given him a pang, for not only Sappha’s beauty, but her beautiful disposition, had moved him to an admiration he had never before felt; and he had told himself that to win such an angel for his wife, with the entry into such a perfect home, and the alliance of characters so lovable as Judge Bloommaert and Sappha’s mother, would be as much of heaven on earth as any man could hope to receive. For a week he had nursed this charming illusion, then something happened--a look, a movement, a passing touch or whisper--one, or all of these things opened his eyes; he felt convinced that Leonard had some certain right that he could not honourably infringe upon--and honour was the first, the dominating, sentiment that moved Achille’s thoughts and words and deeds. All was _not_ fair in love to Achille St. Ange; so he deliberately put down his love for Sappha; denied it perpetually to his craving heart; and taught himself to look upon her as his friend’s beloved and his own friend and sister.