Lily Pearl and The Mistress of Rosedale

"No, Willie! Believe what Mrs. Gaylord has said and grow firm! You can – you will! I feel it in my heart you 'will go up the stairs' and leave some at the foot who do not now expect to stay there! I thought of it to-day and determined not to let you go ahead of me, and so kept close by your side." She laughed while he warmly pressed the hand he had been holding.

"You see," interposed Mrs. Gaylord, "Phebe and I have talked a little about this but I did not mention, even to her, the plans which for more than two weeks I have been maturing. To-morrow we will go to the city, Phebe and I, and see what can be done, and if you will come to us on the following day all can be decided."

It was decided! Mr. Bancroft of Boston would do well by him; take him into his own home and see that his wants were attended to until he had become efficient in the business, and then give him a place in his establishment if he proved himself worthy.

"Worthy?" exclaimed Phebe; "he is noble – he will be all you can desire!"

"The hearts of young ladies are not always reliable in business relations," replied the gentleman with a mischievous twinkle in his bright eye. "However, Mrs. Gaylord, upon your maturer judgment I will try him, for really you have excited in me an interest for the young man; and I see no reason why he cannot be a master workman. I began life by coiling my feet under me on the bench, and I could have done it just as well had they not been incased in No. 9's." He laughed. "His Rover will be just the thing; he can soon be taught to bring his master to his work and return to his kennel for protection. And by the way, I shall be obliged to see that his animal has an 'ordinance' of its own. They kill dogs here so promiscuously."

"I had thought of that and concluded to set Pompy at work training another for his use as soon as I return home. You know he is famous at such work."

Willie received the report of their successful mission in the city with almost ecstatic joy. "Can it be true?" he thought. There would be difficulties; any amount of pride must be overcome – shrinking sensitiveness subdued – but he would try! To have aspirations – anticipations of success – what more could he desire?

In three days Mrs. Gaylord would go with Willie to his new home and Phebe was to accompany them.

CHAPTER XI.

"ROSEDALE."

Come with me, gentle reader, to the sunny south, to the land of orange groves, where the air is sweetest and the sky is bluest; where nature's lyre does not of necessity get unstrung or lose her summer melodies as winter breaks in with harsh, discordant notes to jar the ear and chill the rich, warm blood. Come to the land of flowers, of poetry, of dreams. Hard seems the fate which thrusts a "serpent into every paradise," in whose trail death follows, withering up its freshness and throwing a net-work of decay over its richest beauties. Yet such is the intruder blighting many homes in the cold regions of the bustling north, as well as in the clime where the sweet singers of the faded woods delight to pour out their winter's songs. Alas! that it should be so.

"Why, my Lily-Bell, how faded you look this morning! Worse than the rose you wore in your hair last night. Now let me wager something. What shall it be? Ah! my yesterday's letter against your's of yesterday, also, that I can divine the cause. Shall it be? Ah! that smile! It was like the morning zephyrs sporting with the withered petals of my 'Lily-Bell.' Let me kiss back its beauty, or breath some of my exuberance into it, which seems so worthless in its prodigality," and the lively little lady bent over the invalid's chair and kissed over and over again the brow of her companion.

"There! there! Look quickly! Two little rose leaves of unquestionably pinkish hue are fluttering in close proximity to those lovely dimples. But they have flitted away again. What a pity that beauty is so fleeting."

"I should think you would despair, dear Grace, of charming one into life who has been so long dead. The task would be more congenial to your taste, I imagine, to roll me up and lay me away in your casket of precious relics for memory to grow sentimental over in future years. Why do you not do it, la Petite

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