The Argosy — page 93: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Missing Rubies. 83 Redbum, in his extravagant friendship, had magnified a good many common English qualities into wonderful gifts, and the result was, that poor Ward was described as a sort of demi-god. ‘If you could only have known him better, my dear!” said the old man, with a sigh. ‘You were scarcely fifteen when you saw him last? Ah, well, he was a father to be proud of !” ““T wish you had known mamma, too,” said Beatrice. “So do I. But you must have been a mere baby when she died. Your father has often told me what a sweet, gentle thing she was. He might have married again from the best of the girls out there. Not one of them would have refused him ; in fact, it used to amuse me to see how he was run after. But he never could bear to think of putting anyone in your mother’s place.” ‘* That was so nice of him,” said Beatrice, softly. ‘Everything that he did was nice. And you were always first in his thoughts. ‘When I see my little girl again, I will do this or that,’ he would say, a dozen times a day. It was one of his dreams that we should all live at home together—he and I and the little girl. Poor dear fellow, who could possibly foresee that he would be the first to go? It seems absurd that a battered old fogey like myself should have outlived him!” The girl looked at him with the tenderest interest and sympathy. Colonel Lindrick had gone over to his daughter, who still sat at the piano, playing a waltz. “T would have given a great deal if his dream could have been realised,” Mr. Redburn went on. ‘“ He always said that I must help him to take care of you; and now, you see, I am here alone. If he had lived, what a happy home we three could have made together !” Beatrice was silent. Dearly as she loved the memory of her father, she could hardly regret the course that her life had taken. The path that leads us straight to our heart’s love must always be the right road. In her sorrow and loneliness, she had gone out into the empty fields at dawn, and found another soul more sorrowful and lonely than her own. ‘““We must know each other better, child,” said the old man in a pleading tone. ‘We must not be satisfied with a meeting now and then. I want you to tell me all about your life with the Miltons. Are you contented with them ?” ‘Quite contented,” she answered promptly. ‘‘ You know that my father always had a high opinion of Harriet Milton?” “Yes, yes. But there is the governessing. You must give that up, my dear—you must indeed. I am not going to let you spoil your good looks by worrying yourself with naughty children.” ‘*T am not worrying myself in the least,” said Beatrice, with a sunny smile. ‘But I should not mind giving up my pupils very much. Everybody seems to object to them,” she added, thinking of Godwin. comicbooks.com