“One day I received a very urgent invitation from Mrs. Ames to lunch with them. I gladly accepted. We did not wait for Mr. Ames, as he was often detained beyond luncheon hour at his office. As we sat at the table idly chatting he entered. Up to this time I had never seen Mr. Ames and, in fact, had scarcely given his existence a thought. I gave him a casual glance as Mrs. Ames presented him to me, and noticed what a strong, finely developed man he was. “He was rather quiet during the hour and had little to say, but when he was leaving he came over to me and said, ‘I am glad to have had the pleasure of meeting you at last, for I have heard your praises sung by many and was quite anxious to know this little paragon of virtues.’” She shuddered as she said this and perhaps the quiver which shook the clergyman’s frame in his effort at self-control at this mention of the name Ames had communicated itself to her, and she remained silent for awhile. Again the clergyman’s sympathetic hand sought to soothe and encourage her by stroking her hair. Reassured, she continued: “Not long after this I was quite ill, and much to my surprise, considering my limited acquaintance in the city, received a large box of American Beauties. The card accompanying them was that of Mr. Ames. On the back was written, ‘Because you are so like one I used to know.’ “I wondered whom he could mean and resolved to ask him the first time I saw him, yet I felt rather timid because he was quite a stranger to me. I need have felt no timidity, however, because he embraced the first opportunity to tell me when we were quite alone that I was so like his first wife, Laura, the mother of his children. He told me what a good, true woman the present Mrs. Ames was, and what a good mother she had made his children, but explained to me that it had been a matter of convenience on both sides—not a love affair. She had passed the age when women are most sought and was glad to accept the luxurious home he offered her, and he was glad to have such a sensible woman for the mother of his children. “It was but a short time after that that Mrs. Ames asked me to come to her house and make my home with them as one of the family. No one but myself knew what a God-send that was. My class had been greatly decreased by a diphtheria scare and my finances were low, and now that I had no board to pay I could manage very nicely. Everyone at the house was so kind to me except Mrs. Ames’ mother, who lived with them, and she seemed to look upon me as an intruder, but I was thoroughly happy notwithstanding. “I was at that time as innocent as a child, with absolutely no knowledge of the world except what I had seen in my own little sphere.