"Indeed! then he is a widower? And it was the loss of her, that made him so bitter! But I think it is lovely that he has been true to her memory. There is just romance enough about it to please me."
"No, no!" interrupted Dolores, hastily, "you do not understand. He married her and worshiped her, with a young man's first poetic passion; they lived together two years, and then—and then, Lena, she ran off and left him, and he has never been the same man since."
"Ran off and left him!" echoed Helena in shocked amazement, "why, was she homesick—or was he unkind to her? And did her parents take her back?"
"No, she did not go home. She was—oh, Lena dear, you are too innocent to understand how wicked the world is. I know all about it, because Uncle has told me; he thinks it better for me to be forewarned since I may be left alone to defend myself. Lena, his wife was faithless, and his nearest friend false, and two homes were disgraced forever."
"Oh!" was Helena's only response. She was puzzled and pained to find the world not all like the sweet and holy atmosphere of her own home. But she felt sure that Mr. Laurence's life was a great exception to the rule, which must be peace, harmony and purity in the domestic relations.
As the two girls stood in the pale blue bower which was Dolores's apartment, disrobing for the night, Helena noticed a photograph album lying near at hand. "May I look at the pictures?" she asked, and as she turned the leaves, she uttered an exclamation of delight as her eyes fell on the photograph of a beautiful child, a boy seemingly four or five years old.
"Oh, Dolores, what a cherub! who is this?" she asked. "He is a perfect beauty—and he has your lovely mouth too—is he a relative?"
Dolores leaned over her shoulder and looked at the portrait.
"That? Oh, that is my father's little boy," she said indifferently. "The picture was sent me from California several years ago."