"Oh," replied Ella hastily, and flushing a little, "I've been told that Mr. Clancy's parents are dead! A plague on them both, and all people that I can't understand--I don't mean the dead Clancys, but these two who are fooling like enough. You should be able to interpret Clancy better than I, for Cousin Sophy says you were once very good friends." "I cannot remain the friend of any one who is utterly out of sympathy with all that I believe is right and dignified." "Well, Mara, forgive me for saying it, but Mr. Clancy may have had convictions also." "Undoubtedly," replied Mara coldly, "but there can be no agreeable companionship between clashing minds." "No, I suppose not," said Ella, laughing; "not if each insists that both shall think exactly alike. It would be like two engines meeting on the same track. They must both back out, and go different ways." "Well, I've back out," Mara remarked almost sternly. "That's like you, Mara dear. Well, well, I hope the war will be over some day. By the way, papa told me to tell you that he was busy last evening, but that he would call this afternoon for a breathing with you on the Battery." At the usual hour the veteran appeared. Mara's greeting was outwardly the same; nevertheless, Clancy's words haunted her, and her old serene unconsciousness was gone. Now that her faculties were on the alert, she soon began to recognize subtle, unpremeditated indications of the light in which Bodine had begun to regard her, and a sudden fear and repugnance chilled her heart. "Was Clancy right after all?" she began to ask herself in a sort of dread and presentiment of trouble. Instinctively, and almost involuntarily, she grew slightly reserved and distant in manner, ceasing to meet his gaze in her former frank, affectionate way. With quick discernment he appreciated the change, and thought, "She is not ready yet, and, indeed, may never be ready." His manner, too, began to change, as a cloud gradually loses something of its warmth of color. Mara was grateful, and in her thoughts paid homage to his tact and delicacy. "Mara," he said, "has Ella told you of her experiences at Mrs. Willoughby's?" "Yes, quite fully. I should think, however, from her words that you were more truly her confidant." "Yes, she has acted very honorably, just as I should expect she would, and yet I am anxious about her. I wish she sympathized with us more fully in our desire to live apart from those who are inseparable in our thoughts from the memory of 'all our woes,' as Milton writes." "I have often expressed just this regret to Ella; but she loves us all, and especially you, so dearly that I have no anxiety about her action." "No, Mara, not her action; I can control that: but I should be sorry indeed if she became interested in this young man. There is often a perversity about the heart not wholly amenable to reason."