Laura Stanbury and George Gaston, have brought to you in your solitude.
They are very observing, truly," she pursued. "Creatures that never
penetrate beneath the surface, though. Self-deluders, I fancy, however,
rather than story-tellers."

"Do you pretend to deny it, Evelyn? Now, look me in the eyes and say
'No' if you dare," and I grasped her slender wrists playfully. She
opened her large, blue eyes and fixed them full on mine, responsively.

"_No_! Now you have the unmitigated truth. Ah, Miriam, I have no wish to
interfere with you," and she leaned forward and kissed my cheek
tenderly, disengaging her hands as she did so. Her manner had so changed
to me of late that she was growing rapidly into my affections, and I
returned her embrace cordially.

In the next moment we were laughing merrily together over the ridiculous
schemes of the elder Bainrothe, so transparent that every one understood
them perfectly, motive and all, and which my father winked at evidently,
rather than favored or encouraged, as our charlatan thought he
did--"Cagliostro," as we habitually called him.

"The fact is, prophetess, the person in question would not suit you at
all, with your grand ways and notions and prospects. I have fathomed his
depth pretty successfully, and I find him full of shoals and shallows.
Pretty well for a flirtation, though, and to keep one's hand in, but
unavailable any further."

"Having brought him to his knees, you are perfectly willing to pass him
over to me as a bond-slave. Is that the idea, Evelyn?"