It must not be supposed that Helen, her first surprise over, submitted tamely to a life so utterly at variance with her former experiences and so uncongenial to her tastes. On the contrary, she rebelled fiercely, fairly frightening her composed stepmother with her outbursts of passion, and distressing her father, who could not bear to see his little daughter suffer, but who was daily falling more entirely under his wife's influence, and who began to believe, with her, that nothing but this sharp discipline could save Helen from the evil results of her previous bad training. All his life Colonel Desmond had been completely under the influence of some one person or another. For the last few years he had been Helen's most obedient subject. It soon became evident that her place was being taken by his new wife. Perhaps this was not wonderful. Weak, easy-going, and somewhat broken in health, Colonel Desmond now found himself, for the first time, an object of tender solicitude. His tastes were consulted and his fancies gratified; above all, his wife--pleasant, low-toned, and agreeable to look upon--was constantly at hand to minister to his wants--a gracious, restful presence set in pleasant surroundings--for Mrs. Desmond possessed ample means, and money worries were, for the first time in the colonel's experience, conspicuous by their absence. It can scarcely be wondered at, then, that Colonel Desmond, looking at his wife with her serene untroubled face, and recognizing her perfect propriety of word and action, felt that he could not further Helen's interests more truly than by placing her unreservedly in her stepmother's hands, remembering, too, the wild Irish blood that she had inherited from her mother, for Helen's mother had been a wayward child up to her last hour, and had sorely tried the colonel, notwithstanding the very true love that he had borne her. Poor Helen! She was the jarring note in this contented, middle-aged household. A grief to her father, who loved her; a terrible perplexity to her well-meaning though prejudiced stepmother. Not at all a terrible-looking little person, although Mrs. Desmond, amongst her most intimate friends, did occasionally lament her stepdaughter's unfortunate plainness. It was an interesting little face, with delicate though sharp features, and large, questioning, restless, blue-gray eyes; sad enough sometimes, but gleaming with fun and mischief on the least provocation. Helen's rough dark hair and her rather angular figure were Mrs. Desmond's despair; but the dark hair showed curious red glints when the sun shone upon it such as would have struck an artist's fancy, and the angular figure was lithe, and gave promise of graceful development when the childish angularity should be out-grown.