"Although it is a sad disappointment to me," he sighed. "When she was but a girl at school I told her that her voice belonged to the world, and when she came to me at last to teach her again I was charmed that the public should have its due. Ah, well, I must not spoil her happiness with my vain regrets!" CHAPTER XLIX. The moonlight lay on Bay View House--not the tender moonlight of June as when we saw it first--but the cold, wintry whiteness of November. The ground was covered with a thin, light carpeting of snow, and a wind from the bay swept coldly across the land, almost freezing those who were so unfortunate as to be exposed to its piercing rigor. In the sky the stars were glittering coldly bright. But no hint of the outdoor cold and discomfort penetrated to the luxurious parlor where we first met our pretty, willful Irene. A bright coal fire burned in the wide, steel bars of the grate, and diffused a lazy, luxurious warmth through the large apartment. Basking in its comfortable rays sat Mrs. Brooke and Bertha, the lamplight falling softly on their black silk dresses and the delicate lisse at throat and wrists. A white rose fastened in Bertha's silky, dark hair diffused the pleasant fragrance of summer amid their wintry surroundings. A dark frown disfigured the handsome face of the brunette, evoked by her mother's words, uttered a moment ago. "To-morrow, Bertha, we must go up to New York and sell my diamonds," Mrs. Brooke had said. "There is no help for it. They will have to be sacrificed." "A pretty appearance we shall make in society when we lay off our mourning--no jewels to wear!" snapped Bertha, discontentedly. "You will have your pearls and rubies; I have not asked you to part with them," said Mrs. Brooke, soothingly. "You needn't to, for I shall not do it--no, not if it came to starvation with us!" declared the brunette, passionately. "You talk foolishly, Bertha," declared her mother. "Do you not suppose that it grieves me also to part with my jewels, the gift of your poor dead father? Yet I make no foolish lament over it. I consider the necessities of the case; but I also remember that if you had not forced me to make the tour of the summer resorts this season I should have been able to live through the winter without selling my beautiful diamonds!" "Oh, yes, everything is my fault!" cried Bertha, angrily. "Could I help it if Guy Kenmore went gadding off to Europe instead of going to the summer resorts where I expected to find him? I am sure I should not have asked you to spend the money if I had not felt perfectly sure of finding him somewhere. And if I had found him I should have won him, I know, for I am very sure he was in love with me last year."