So now as she looked on this young woman who,
though a widow, seemed still a mere child, it occurred to her that
Fate had with its usual kindness thrown in her path the very person
she needed.
She offered Berene "a home" at the Palace in return for a few small
services. The lonely girl, whose strangely solitary life with her
old father had excluded her from all social relations outside,
grasped at this offer from the handsome lady whom she had long
admired from a distance, and went to make her home at the Palace.
CHAPTER III
Berene had been several months in her new home when Preston Cheney
came to lodge at the Palace.
He met her on the stairway the first morning after his arrival, as he
was descending to the street door.
Bringing up a tray covered with a snowy napkin, she stepped to one
side and paused, to make room for him to pass.
Preston was not one of those young men who find pastime in
flirtations with nursery maids or kitchen girls. The very thought of
it offended his good taste. Once, in listening to the boastful tales
of a modern Don Juan, who was relating his gallant adventures with a
handsome waiter girl at a hotel, Preston had remarked, "I would as
soon think of using my dinner napkin for a necktie, as finding
romance with a servant girl.
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