"Is Miss Beulah Benton here? There is a gentleman in the parlor to see her; here is the card."
Beulah still knelt on the floor and held out her hand indifferently.
The card was given, and she sprang up with a cry of joy.
"Oh, it is Eugene!"
At the door of the parlor she paused and pressed her hand tightly to her bounding heart. A tall form stood before the grate, and a glance discovered to her a dark mustache and heavy beard; still it must be Eugene, and, extending her arms unconsciously, she exclaimed:
"Eugene! Eugene! Have you come at last?"
He started, looked up, and hastened toward her. Her arms suddenly dropped to her side, and only their hands met in a firm, tight clasp. For a moment they gazed at each other in silence, each noting the changes which time had wrought. Then he said slowly:
"I should not have known you, Beulah. You have altered surprisingly." His eyes wandered wonderingly over her features. She was pale and breathless; her lips trembled violently, and there was a strange gleam in her large, eager eyes. She did not reply, but stood looking up intently into his handsome face. Then she shivered; the long, black lashes drooped; her white fingers relaxed their clasp of his, and she sat down on the sofa near. Ah! her womanly intuitions, infallible as Ithuriel's spear, told her that he was no longer the Eugene she had loved so devotedly. An iron hand seemed to clutch her heart, and again a shudder crept over her as he seated himself beside her, saying:
"I am very much pained to find you here. I am just from Dr.
Hartwell's, where I expected to see you."
He paused, for something about her face rather disconcerted him, and he took her hand again in his.
"How could you expect to find me there, after reading my last letter?"