“Home again! Home again! From a foreign shore. And, oh! it makes my heart rejoice To meet old friends once more!” “Do you see any familiar faces on the pier, Miss Dawn?” queried Frederick Foster, wondering why Cinthia had turned her lovely face away so abruptly. She looked back at him, pale, but composed. “No, there is no one that I know,” she answered; and in spite of her pride, her lip quivered. It was such a dreary home-coming, after all, with no one to welcome her and smile a glad welcome. She felt a keen pang of envy of the happier ones by whom she was surrounded. Madame Ray and Mr. Dawn came up to them, and the actress said with a little smothered sigh: “What a scene of joyous excitement and confusion! Parents waiting to greet sons and daughters, lovers to greet sweethearts! I am almost sad that there is no one to welcome us, Cinthia!” “Madame, you are mistaken on your part,” laughed Foster. “I see a group of reporters with their eyes fixed on you already, and only waiting till the gang-plank is thrown out to rush upon you, demanding to know if it is not likely you will return to the stage again. To-morrow morning they will report in their papers that you have returned from Europe more beautiful than ever from your long rest, and with a new play that will charm the theater-going public this winter.” Madame Ray darted behind him, exclaiming: “Do help me to escape them. I do not wish to be interviewed. I belong to private life now.” “Mr. Dawn, will you kindly help the madame to escape the newspaper men, and I will lead Miss Dawn ashore,” exclaimed Frederick Foster, coolly drawing Cinthia’s arm through his, and rushing forward with the tumultuous throng as the gang-plank was thrown out. Oh, what a Babel of noise and confusion! but through it all Cinthia could hear the young man whispering ardent words to her, vowing that the past week had been the happiest of his life, that he adored her, and would ask no greater joy than to walk with her through life arm in arm as now, heedless of the rushing, jostling throng. Would she give him one little word of hope to live on till they met again at Newport? He knew he was presumptuous, but love was his excuse. “Oh, you must not talk to me any more like this. I--I----” began Cinthia in confusion; but just at that moment they stepped on _terra-firma_, and came face to face with a young man waiting there with a lady on his arm, at sight of whom Foster whispered to his companion: “My aunt and cousin, the Varians!” Sky and earth, and sea seemed to jumble and blend together in Cinthia’s confused consciousness as her startled eyes met the equally surprised ones of Arthur Varian. CHAPTER XXIII. “I CAN NOT LOVE AGAIN!” It was the most surprising and unwelcome _rencontre_ in the world, that meeting between those four, Everard Dawn and his daughter and Mrs. Varian and her son.