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"The English name, Champney," continued the man in the chair, "you know that might derive from it, might derive. But I am not so well acquainted with the English names as with the French. You comprenez pour quoi, sans doute. I am derive myself, from a great French name, a great family."
"Oh, no, I've not forgotten Mr. Champney Googe; how could I?" "Indeed, I think it is the other way round; if I remember rightly you gave me the opportunity of never forgetting you." He held her hand just a trifle longer than was necessary. The girl smiled and withdrew it. "Milky hands are not so sticky as spruce gum ones, Mr. Googe, but they are apt to be quite as unpleasant."
Courtland remained to represent the company as superintendent at Redlands, and with the transfer of the English investments Champney retired, as he had suggested, to a smaller venture of his own, on a plantation a few miles distant which the company had been unable to secure. During this interval Courtland had frequent interviews with Miss Sally, and easy and unrestrained access to her presence.
"Damn her damn her damn her " he kept saying over and over to himself, and the mere repetition seemed to ease him of his over-powering surcharge of pity. But it was Almeda Champney he had in mind, and, after all, his unuttered inner curses were only a prayer for help, read backwards. At last, Aurora Googe lifted her face from her hands and looked at Octavius Buzzby. He reddened and rose to go.
Aileen is still with her faithful as the sun, but rebelling at times as is only natural. The girl gave promise of rich womanhood, but even you would wonder at such fine development in such an environment of continual invalidism. Mrs. Champney has had two strokes of paralysis; it is only a question of time." "There is one who never was my friend I've often wondered why."
Champney Googe was beginning to realize, as he stood on the porch with his mother and waved to his old neighbors, the Caukinses, the changed conditions he was about to face. He was also realizing that he must change to meet these conditions.
Will you not be reconciled to him?" he pleaded. "No." "But why?" He spoke very gently, almost in appeal. "Why?" she repeated tonelessly, her eyes still fixed on his face, "because he is hers Aurora Googe's " She paused for another effort. Her eyes turned at last to the portrait of Louis Champney on the wall at the foot of her bed.
"I was thinking of you, of your future, and how you have been used by Almeda Champney; and that gave me the confidence, almost the push of a man and I dealt with them as a man with men; but I felt unsexed in doing it. I've wondered what they think of me." "Think of you! I can tell you what one man thinks of you, and that's Mr. Van Ostend.
She spoke with cutting sarcasm: "What amount, may I inquire, do you deem necessary for the present to insure prospective freedom for your son?" "You know well enough, Almeda; I must have eighty thousand at least." Mrs. Champney laughed aloud the same mocking laugh of a miserable old age that had raised Octavius Buzzby's anger to a white heat of rage.
"You've changed a sight; it don't come easy to call you Champ, any more than it did to call Mr. Louis by his Christian name. You look a Champney every inch of you, and you act like one." He spoke emphatically; his small keen eyes dwelt admiringly on the face and figure of the tall man before him. "I thought 't was better to send Aileen on ahead, for Mrs.
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