has filled the place of spiritual comforter to Esther Lockwin, and has
filled it well.

If you ask what friends Mrs. Lockwin has, the servants will speak of
Dr. Tarpion first, of the architects, and of Corkey. Harpwood they do
not mention. He may have called--so have a thousand other gentlemen.
They have rarely seen Mrs. Lockwin, for she has been at the cenotaph,
the hospital, and the grave of little Davy.

So long as Harpwood's suit has flourished by letter, why should the
less cautious method of speech be interposed? To-day, Esther could not
sustain the intermission of the usual consolatory epistle.

George Harpwood is one of those characters who have many friends and
are friends to few. Others need him--not he them. He can please if he
attempt the task, and if the task be exceedingly difficult, he will
become infatuated with it. He will then grow sincere. At least he
believes he is sincere. Thus his patience is superb.

His manners are widely praised. If he have served Esther Lockwin with
rare personal devotion, it cannot be denied that it has piqued many
other beautiful, eligible and desirable women.

He can well support the air of a disinterested friend. The ladies
generally bewail his absence from their society. Esther Lockwin must
soon be warm in the praise of a gentleman who, divining the needs of a
widow, has so chivalrously taken up her woes as his own.
Tenderly--like a mother--he has touched upon her projects. Gladly he
has accepted the mission she has given to him. At last when he brings
Dr. Tarpion to the special censorship of Esther's mail, and to the fear