The cheap little clock on the mantel striking eight finally aroused her, and, with a long-drawn sigh, she arose, walked deliberately to the grate, laid the epistle on the coals and watched it while the flames devoured it, reducing it to ashes, which were finally whirled in tiny particles up the chimney by the draft.
“So that dream has vanished,” she murmured; “now I will come down to the practical realities of life. But, oh! what has the future for me?”
Picture number three is not unveiled until fourteen years later.
In a palatial residence on Nob Hill, in San Francisco, a distinguished-looking gentleman may be seen sitting in his luxurious library. Its walls are hung with an exquisite shade of old rose, the broad frieze representing garlands of flowers in old rose, gold, and white. The furniture is of solid mahogany, richly carved, upholstered in blue velvet and satins; costly draperies are at the windows; Turkish rugs of almost priceless value are strewn about the inlaid and highly polished floor, and statues, bric-a-brac, and fine pictures, gathered from many countries, are artistically arranged about the room.
The gentleman, who is in evening dress, excepting that he has on a smoking-jacket of rich black velvet, is lazily reclining in an adjustable chair, and engaged in cutting the leaves of one of the late magazines, while he smokes a cigar.
Presently the portieres of a doorway are swept aside, and a beautiful woman enters. She is in full evening dress, and clad like a princess in satin, of a deep shade of pink, brocaded with white. Diamonds encircle her white neck, gleam in her ears, and amid her nut-brown hair.
The gentleman turns to her, his face glowing with mingled pride and pleasure.
“Nell! what a vision of loveliness!” he exclaims, with an eager thrill in his tones.