"Happy fellow!" said Gabriel.

Meanwhile Miss Ellen had probably found the mysterious something which she had left up stairs; for she entered the room, and bowed very calmly upon seeing Edward, and, seating herself upon the side of the table farthest from him, was presently industriously netting. As for Edward, he had snapped a sentence in the middle as he rose and bowed to her, and could not possibly fit the two ends together when he sat down again, and so lost it.

Gradually, as the evening wore on, the conversation threatened to divide itself into _tetes-a-tete_; for Gabriel suddenly discovered that he had an article upon Hemp to read in the Encyclopedia which he had recently purchased, and was already profoundly immersed in it, while Mr. and Mrs.

Bennet resumed their murmuring talk, and the chair of the youth with the large black eyes, somehow--nobody saw how or when--slipped round until it was upon the same side of the table with that of Ellen, who was busily netting.

Mrs. Bennet was conscious that the chair had gone round, and the swimming eyes of her husband lingered with pleasure upon the mass of black curls bent toward the golden hair which was bowed over that intricate purse.

Ellen was sitting under that portrait of the lady, with the flashing, passionate eyes, who seemed to bear a family likeness to Mrs. Bennet.

The more closely he looked at the handsome youth and the lovely girl the more curious Mr. Bennet's eyes became. He watched the two with such intentness that his wife several times looked up at him surprised when she received no answer to her remarks. Evidently something had impressed Mr. Bennet exceedingly.

His wife bent her head a little nearer to his.

"My dear, did you never see a pair of lovers before?"

He turned his dreaming eyes at that, smiled, and pressed his lips silently to the face which was so near his own that if it had been there for the express purpose of being caressed it could hardly have been nearer.

Then slipping his arm around her waist, Mr. Bennet drew his wife toward him and pointed with his head, but so imperceptibly that only she perceived it, toward the young people, as if he saw something more than a pair of lovers. The fond woman's eyes followed her husband's. Gradually they became as intently fixed as his. They seemed to be curiously comparing the face of the young man who sat at their daughter's side with the face of the portrait that hung above her head. Mrs. Bennet grew perceptibly paler as she looked. The unconscious Edward and Ellen murmured softly together. She did not look at him, but she felt the light of his great eyes falling upon her, and she was not unhappy.

"My dear," began Mr. Bennet in a low tone, still studying the face and the portrait.

"Hush!" said his wife, softly, laying her head upon his shoulder; "I see it all, I am sure of it."

Gabriel turned at this moment from his Encyclopedia. He looked intently for some time at the group by the table, as if studying all their thoughts, and then said, gravely, in a loud, clear voice, so that Ellen dropped a stitch, Edward stopped whispering, and Mr. and Mrs. Bennet sat erect,

"Exactly. I knew how it was. It says distinctly, 'This plant is supposed to be a native of India; but it has long been naturalized and extensively cultivated elsewhere, particularly in Russia, where it forms an article of primary importance.'"

CHAPTER LVII.

DINING WITH LAWRENCE NEWT.

Gabriel Bennett was not confident that Edward Wynne would be at the birthday dinner given in his honor by Lawrence Newt, but he was very sure that May Newt would be there, and so she was. It was at Delmonico's; and a carriage arrived at the Bennets' just in time to convey them. Another came to Mr. Boniface Newt's, to whom brother Lawrence explained that he had invited his daughter to dinner, and that he should send a young friend--in fact, his confidential clerk, to accompany Miss Newt. Brother Boniface, who looked as if he were the eternally relentless enemy of all young friends, had nevertheless the profoundest confidence in brother Lawrence, and made no objection. So the hero of the day conducted Miss May Newt to the banquet.

The hero of the day was so engaged in conversation with Miss May Newt that he said very little to his neighbor upon the other side, who was no other than Hope Wayne. She had been watching very curiously a young man with black curls and eyes, who seemed to have words only for his neighbor, Miss Ellen Bennet. She presently turned and asked Gabriel if she had never seen him before. "I have, surely, some glimmering remembrance of that face," she said, studying it closely.

Her question recalled a day which was strangely remote and unreal in Gabriel's memory. He even half blushed, as if Miss Wayne had reminded him of some early treason to a homage which he felt in the very bottom of his heart for his blue-eyed neighbor. But the calm, unsuspicious sweetness of Hope Wayne's face consoled him. He looked at her for a moment without speaking. It was really but a moment, yet, as he looked, he lay in a heavily-testered bed--he heard the beating of the sea upon the shore--he saw the sage Mentor, the ghostly Calypso putting aside the curtain--for a moment he was once more the little school-boy, bruised and ill at Pinewood; but this face--no longer a girl's face--no longer anxious, but sweet, serene, and tender--was this the half-haughty face he had seen and worshipped in the old village church--the face whose eyes of sympathy, but not of love, had filled his heart with such exquisite pain?

"That young man, Miss Wayne, is Edward Wynne," he said, in reply to the question.

It did not seem to resolve her perplexity.

"I don't recall the name," she answered. "I think he must remind me of some one I have known."

"He is as black as Abel Newt," said Gabriel, looking with his clear eyes at Hope Wayne.

"But much handsomer than Mr. Newt now is," she answered, with perfect unconcern. "His eyes are softer; and, in fact," she said, smiling pleasantly, "I am not surprised to see what a willing listener his neighbor is. I wish I could recall him. I don't think that he resembles Mr. Newt at all, except in complexion."

Arthur Merlin heard every word, and watched every movement, and marked every expression of Hope Wayne's, at whose other hand he sat, during this little remark. Gabriel said, in reply to it,

"The truth is, Miss Wayne, you have seen him before. The first time you ever saw me he was with me."

The clear eyes of the young man were turned full upon her again.

"Oh, yes, I remember now!" she answered. "He was your friend in that terrible battle with Abel Newt. It seems long ago, does it not?"

However far away it may have seemed, it was apparently a remembrance that roused no especial emotion in Miss Hope Wayne's heart. Having satisfied herself, she released the attention of Gabriel, who had other subjects of conversation with May Newt than his quarrel with her brother for the favor of Hope Wayne.

But Arthur Merlin observed that while Hope Wayne listened with her ears to him, with her eyes she listened to Lawrence Newt. His simple, unselfish, and therefore unconscious urbanity--his genial, kindly humor--and the soft, manly earnestness of his face, were not unheeded--how could they be?--by her. Since the day the will was read he had been a faithful friend and counselor. It was he who negotiated for her house. It was he who daily called and gave her a thousand counsels in the details of management, of which every woman who comes into a large property has such constant need. And in all the minor arrangements of business she found in him the same skill and knowledge, combined with a womanly reserve and softness, which had first so strongly attracted her.

Yet his visits as financial counsel, as he called himself, did not destroy, they only heightened, the pleasure of the meetings of the Round Table. For the group of friends still met. They talked of poetry still.

They talked of many things, and perhaps thought of but a few. The pleasure to all of them was evident enough; but it seemed more perplexed than formerly. Hope Wayne felt it. Amy Waring felt it. Arthur Merlin felt it. But not one of them could tell whether Lawrence Newt felt it. There was a vague consciousness of something which nearly concerned them all, but not one of them could say precisely what it was--except, possibly, Amy Waring; and except, certainly, Lawrence Newt.

For Aunt Martha's question had drawn from Amy's lips what had lain literally an unformed suspicion in her mind, until it leaped to life and rushed armed from her mouth. Amy Waring saw how beautiful Hope Wayne was.

She knew how lovely in character she was. And she was herself beautiful and lovely; so she said in her mind at once, "Why have I never seen this?

Why did I not know that he must of course love her?"

Then, if she reminded herself of the conversation she had held with Lawrence Newt about Arthur Merlin and Hope Wayne, she was only perplexed for a moment. She knew that he could not but be honest; and she said quietly in her soul, "He did not know at that time how well worthy his love she was."

CHAPTER LVIII.

THE HEALTH OF THE JUNIOR PARTNER.

"I call for a bumper!" said Lawrence Newt, when the fruit was placed upon the table.

The glasses were filled, and the host glanced around his table. He did not rise, but he said:

"Ladies and gentlemen, commercial honesty is not impossible, but it is rare. I do not say that merchants are worse than other people; I only say that their temptations are as great, and that an honest man--a man perfectly honest every how and every where--is a wonder. Whatever an honest man does is a benefit to all the rest of us. If he become a lawyer, justice is more secure; if a doctor, quackery is in danger; if a clergyman, the devil trembles; if a shoemaker, we don't wear rotten leather; if a merchant, we get thirty-six inches to the yard. I have been long in business. I have met many honest merchants. But I know that 'tis hard for a merchant to be honest in New York. Will you show me the place where 'tis easy? When we are all honest because honesty is the best policy, then we are all ruined, because that is no honesty at all. Why should a man make a million of dollars and lose his manhood? He dies when he has won them, and what are the chances that he can win his manhood again in the next world as easily as he has won the dollars in this?

For he can't carry his dollars with him. Any firm, therefore, that gets an honest man into it gets an accession of the most available capital in the world. This little feast is to celebrate the fact that my firm has been so enriched. I invite you to drink the health of Gabriel Bennet, junior partner of the firm of Lawrence Newt & Co.!"

There was a moment of perfect silence. Then every body looked at Gabriel except his mother, whose eyes were so full of tears that she could see nothing. Gabriel himself was entirely surprised. He had had no hint from Lawrence Newt of this good fortune. He had worked faithfully, constantly, and intelligently--honestly, of course--that was all Gabriel knew about his position. He had been for some time confidential clerk, so that he was fully cognizant of the state of the business, and knew how prosperous it was. And yet, in this moment of delight and astonishment, he had but one feeling, which seemed entirely alien and inadequate to the occasion, for it was merely the hope that now he might be a regular visitor at the house of Boniface Newt.

Hope Wayne's eye had hung upon Lawrence Newt, during the little speech he had made, so intently, that Arthur Merlin's merriment had been entirely checked. He found himself curiously out of spirits. Until that moment, and especially after the little conversation between Hope and Gabriel, in which Abel Newt's name had been mentioned, Arthur had thought it, upon the whole, the pleasantest little dinner he had ever known. He was not of the same opinion now.

Edward Wynne and Ellen Bennet showed entire satisfaction with the dinner, and especially with Lawrence Newt's toast. And when the first hum of applause and pleasure had ceased, Edward cried out lustily,

"A speech from the junior partner! A speech! a speech!"

There was a general call. Gabriel could not help rising, and blushing, and bowing, and stuttering, and sitting down again, amidst tempestuous applause, without the slightest coherent idea of what he had said, except that he was very happy, and very glad, and very sure, and very, etc., etc.

But he did not care a song for what he had said, nor for the applause that greeted it, when he saw certain blue eyes glistening, and a soft shyness upon certain cheeks and lips, as if they had themselves been speaking, and had been saying--what was palpably, undeniably, conspicuously true--that they were very happy, and very glad, and very sure, and very, etc., etc. Very, indeed!