"A single grave," she said, after a long pause. "And you were then but a boy, Harley! Can such a memory influence you even to this day? It is scarcely possible; it does not seem to me within the realities of man's life--though it might be of woman's." "I believe," said Harley, half soliloquising, "that I have a great deal of the woman in me. Perhaps men who live much alone, and care not for men's objects, do grow tenacious of impressions, as your sex does. But oh," he cried aloud, and with a sudden change of countenance, "oh, the hardest and the coldest man would have felt as I do, had he known _her_--had he loved _her_. She was like no other woman I have ever met. Bright and glorious creature of another sphere! She descended on this earth, and darkened it when she passed away. It is no use striving. Mother, I have as much courage as our steel-clad fathers ever had. I have dared in battle and in deserts--against man and the wild beast--against the storm and the ocean--against the rude powers of Nature--dangers as dread as ever pilgrim or Crusader rejoiced to brave. But courage against that one memory! no, I have not!" "Harley, Harley, you break my heart!" cried the Countess, clasping her hands. "It is astonishing," continued her son, so wrapped in his own thoughts that he did not perhaps hear her outcry--"yea, verily, it is astonishing, that considering the thousands of women I have seen and spoken with, I never see a face like hers--never hear a voice so sweet. And all this universe of life cannot afford me one look and one tone that can restore me to man's privilege--love. Well, well, well, life has other things yet--Poetry and Art live still--still smiles the heaven, and still wave the trees. Leave me to happiness in my own way." The Countess was about to reply, when the door was thrown hastily open, and Lord Lansmere walked in. The Earl was some years older than the Countess, but his placid face showed less wear and tear; a benevolent, kindly face--without any evidence of commanding intellect, but with no lack of sense in its pleasant lines. His form not tall, but upright, and with an air of consequence--a little pompous, but good-humoredly so. The pomposity of the _Grand Seigneur_, who has lived much in provinces--whose will has been rarely disputed, and whose importance has been so felt and acknowledged as to react insensibly on himself; an excellent man: but when you glanced towards the high brow and dark eye of the Countess, you marvelled a little how the two had come together, and, according to common report, lived so happily in the union. "Ho, ho! my dear Harley," cried Lansmere, rubbing his hands with an appearance of much satisfaction, "I have just been paying a visit to the Duchess." "What Duchess, my dear father?" "Why, your mother's first cousin, to be sure--the Duchess of Knaresborough, whom, to oblige me, you condescended to call upon; and delighted I am to hear that you admire Lady Mary--"