Angela, whose round elbows were on the table, leaned her chin upon her hands in a favorite attitude of hers, and Lyddon, who could almost see the workings of her mind, knew that from the hour she had first seen Isabey he had possessed extraordinary interest for her. He could have told the very instant that the recollection of Neville Tremaine now occurred to Angela. She had been looking down with meditative eyes upon the table, when suddenly she drew back, and glancing up, as if she were frightened and puzzled, said quickly: “I haven’t had a letter from Neville for nearly three weeks, but I have one ready to send him. I will give it to you to-morrow.” “Poor Neville,” said Lyddon, “his fate is hard. I never knew a man in whose honor I had greater confidence, and yet he is reckoned dishonored by those nearest to him; nor a man of stronger natural common sense, yet he has gone against the almost unanimous opinion of his own section in the United States Army. Destiny, my dear, is a queer thing.” “Very,” answered Angela. She was thinking of another strange act of the hand of fate. No man would be less likely to coerce a woman into marrying him than Neville Tremaine; his pride, as well as his principles, would seem to make it impossible; yet deep in her own heart, Angela knew that she had been coerced. It was like one of those promises which are extorted from children never to tell an untruth, never to repeat a certain fault, a promise under compulsion and so little voluntary that it can scarcely be reckoned binding. Angela, however, meant to be bound by her promise. But always since she had first seen Philip Isabey his image had haunted her--haunted her more even than before she had seen him. She had dreamed of him for years and it so happened that the dream came true. He was exactly as she had pictured him and this of itself was enough to give him a peculiar interest. She turned these things over in her mind sitting in the same attitude, at the table, the mellow light of two candles falling upon her white skin and dark eyes. The window toward the river was open, and the odors of the May night stole softly into the room. Lyddon roused her from her reverie. “I have found a new field of usefulness,” he said. “I looked up the subject of making tallow candles. I used to be pretty good at chemistry when I was at Balliol. The old lead candle molds used by Colonel Tremaine’s grandfather during the Revolution have been found in the attic.” “I found them,” answered Angela, reproachfully. “And a good find it was. We’re to use tallow candles, but the beehives furnish enough wax for Madame Isabey and Madame Le Noir and for the Bible reading at night. Mrs. Tremaine told me gently that they always used wax candles for the Bible reading and that it didn’t seem to her right to use tallow candles for that.”