"I do not see why you should fear life. It is likely to prove very fair and bright to you, if you do your duty--if you implicitly _obey_ the wishes of your parents," he said, watching her keenly. The lovely face flushed crimson, but she made him no answer. She played with her flowers nervously. She was afraid of St. Leon Le Roy's keen, merciless eyes. "You do not wish me to lecture you upon your duty?" he said, after waiting in vain for her to reply. "No, I do not think I do," she replied, frankly. "Then I beg your pardon. Indeed, I am not worthy of lecturing any one upon that cold, hard word, duty," he said to himself rather than her. "I have not been a very dutiful son myself," a shadow crossing his dark features. Beatrix again had no answer ready. She went on quietly grouping her flowers into a large bunch. He watched the white hands with a lazy, æsthetic pleasure in their beauty as they gleamed among the crimson flowers of which she had gathered a larger quantity than of any other color. He began to talk to her of the city where she lived, of the places she had visited, of people whom he supposed the Gordons would know. He was amazed at her ignorance on subjects where he would have supposed her to be at home. "I have been to very few places, and I know very few people," she said, blushing. "I--I haven't been introduced into society yet. I am too young." "Then where did she pick up that lover?" he asked himself. "She must have become infatuated with her dancing-master or her music-master." But that evening when Mrs. Le Roy opened the piano and asked her to play, Beatrix begged to be excused. Being pressed, she declared that she had never learned the piano, she did not care for music--at least not very much. No one expressed the surprise they felt. St. Leon played an aria for his mother, then they closed the piano. "So it was not her music-master who won her heart. The circle narrows down to the professor of the terpsichorean art," he said to himself. "My dear, I have been watching you closely," said Mrs. Le Roy, suddenly. "You do not at all resemble your mother. She had blue eyes, yours are black. Her features were quite different from yours. I have seen your father, but I forget how he looked. I suppose you are like him." "Yes, I am like my father," Beatrix answered, but her face crimsoned, and she looked as if she were about to burst into tears. She commanded herself with an effort, and a little later, declaring that her head ached, she begged to be excused, and left the room. "Poor girl! she is very unhappy!" said Mrs. Le Roy. "Isabel Gordon was very careless to let that child have a lover! She has no business out of the school-room." CHAPTER VII. Beatrix went swiftly to the pretty dressing-room, where the maid was, busy sewing on a dinner-dress of pink nuns' veiling for her beautiful young mistress. She sunk down upon a chair and looked at Clarice with somber, miserable eyes.