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But at this juncture Mr. Haymaker came pitching into the room, as his nature was, and pinned himself to a standstill, as it were, with his eyeglass, in the central aisle of tables. Drayton at once gave himself up for lost, and therefore received Mr. Haymaker with kindness and serenity when, a minute or two later, he came plunging up, in his usual ecstasy of sputtering amiability, and seated himself in the chair at the other side of the table with an air as if everything were charming in the most charming of all possible worlds, and he himself the most charming person in it.

“My dear Drayton, though,” exclaimed Mr. Haymaker, in the interval between the soup and the bluefish, “there is some one here you must know–most charming girl you ever knew in your life, and has set her heart on knowing you. We were talking about you this morning–Miss Mary Leithe. Lovely name, too; pity ever to change it–he! he! he! Why, you must have seen her about here; has an old aunt, widow of Jim Corwin, who’s dead and gone these five years. You recognize her, of course?”

“Not as you describe her,” said Mr. Drayton, helping his friend to fish.

“Oh, the handsomest girl about here; tallish, wavy brown hair, soft brown eyes, the loveliest-shaped eyes in the world, my dear fellow; complexion like a Titian, figure slender yet, but promising. A way of giving you her hand that makes you wish she would take your heart,” pursued Mr. Haymaker, impetuously filling his mouth with bluefish, during the disposal of which he lost the thread of his harangue. Drayton, however, seemed disposed to recover it for him.

“Is this young lady from New England?” he inquired.

“New-Yorker by birth,” responded the ever-vivacious Haymaker; “father a Southern man; mother a Bostonian. Father died eight or nine years after marriage; mother survived him six years; girl left in care of old Mrs. Corwin–good old creature, but vague–very vague. Don’t fancy the marriage was a very fortunate one; a little friction, more or less. Leithe was rather a wild, unreliable sort of man; Mrs. Leithe a woman not easily influenced–immensely charming, though, and all that, but a trifle narrow and set. Well, you know, it was this way: Leithe was an immensely wealthy man when she married him; lost his money, struggled along, good deal of friction; Mrs. Leithe probably felt she had made a mistake, and that sort of thing. But Miss Mary here, very different style, looks like her mother, but softer; more in her, too. Very little money, poor girl, but charming. Oh! you must know her.”

“What did you say her mother’s maiden name was?”

“Maiden name? Let me see. Why–oh, no–oh, yes–Cleveland, Mary Cleveland.”

“Mary Cleveland, of Boston; married Hamilton Leithe, about nineteen years ago. I used to know the lady. And this is her daughter! And Mary Cleveland is dead!–Help yourself, Haymaker. I never take more than one course at this hour of the day.”

“But you must let me introduce you, you know,” mumbled Haymaker, through his succotash.

“I hardly know,” said Drayton, rubbing his mustache. “Pardon me if I leave you,” he added, looking at his watch. “It is later than I thought.”

Nothing more was seen of Drayton for the rest of that day. But the next morning, as Mary Leithe sat on the Bowlder Rock, with a book on her lap, and her eyes on the bathers, and her thoughts elsewhere, she heard a light, leisurely tread behind her, and a gentlemanly, effective figure made its appearance, carrying a malacca walking-stick, and a small telescope in a leather case slung over the shoulder.

“Good-morning, Miss Leithe,” said this personage, in a quiet and pleasant voice. “I knew your mother before you were born, and I can not feel like a stranger toward her daughter. My name is Ambrose Drayton. You look something like your mother, I think.”

“I think I remember mamma’s having spoken of you,” said Mary Leithe, looking up a little shyly, but with a smile that was the most winning of her many winning manifestations. Her upper lip, short, but somewhat fuller than the lower one, was always alive with delicate movements; the corners of her mouth were blunt, the teeth small; and the smile was such as Psyche’s might have been when Cupid waked her with a kiss.