Bessie's Fortune

"Nasty thing!" she said "how she hates me, and how little I care! I hope I sha'n't let her spoil my fun. I have the inside track, and I mean to keep it!"

Thus deciding, she, too, started for the drawing-room, where the guests were assembling for dinner, and where Mrs. Smithers, who was by nature rather officious and anxious to right everything, was explaining to Lady Jane that she had invited Mr. and Mrs. Archibald McPherson to meet her, and was descanting upon the beauty and amiability of the latter, whom her ladyship was sure to like.

"A little too much of a coquette, perhaps," she said, "but so very pretty and piquant that she cannot help attracting admiration."

"Yes, I know--I have seen her. I made her acquaintance in the upper hall," Lady Jane answered, coldly, and this saved the embarrassment of an introduction when Daisy at last appeared, perfectly self-possessed and graceful, and looking, as Lady Jane unwillingly confessed to herself, as innocent as a Madonna.

Meanwhile Archie had sought his uncle, resolved to have the awkwardness of their first meeting over before any prying eyes were upon them. He found him alone, and, mustering all his courage, went up to him and offered his hand, as if nothing had ever occured to separate them.

John McPherson had heard from his host that his nephew was there, and was in a most perturbed state of mind, on his wife's account, rather than on his own. She would be very indignant, and perhaps do something rash, he feared, while, for himself he wanted to see the boy, whom he had always liked. It was while he was thinking thus that Archie came suddenly upon him. In his surprise, Mr. McPherson forgot everything except the young man standing so humbly before him, with a look on his face, and in his eyes, like the brother dead years ago, and who, when dying, had said, "Be kind to Archie."

Extending both hands to his nephew, he said: "Archie, by Jove, I am glad to see you. I hope you are well, though upon my word, you don't look so," and he glanced curiously, and with a sensation of pity, at the young man, who, though scarcely thirty-one, might have passed for forty, he was so pale and care worn, while his clothes were threadbare and shining in places, and hung upon him loosely. But at this cordial greeting, there was a wonderful transformation, and Archie's face grew almost boyish in its expression, and there was a moisture in his eyes as he took his uncle's hands and held them, while he answered the questions put to him so rapidly. Remembering at last that it was his duty to reprove his nephew a little, the Hon. John said to him: "I have been very angry with you, for your hasty marriage was not what I could have wished. It has severed you from--us--from Lady Jane completely."