The Strange Perfume

Lounging carelessly in the arm-chair, his eyes fixed on a lady beside him with an open letter in her hand, was a tall, fair-haired young man.

“What have you there, mother?” he said, throwing his arms around her in a caressing way. “That smile makes you positively young, I declare.”

Losing his father in India when he was a child, a small legacy from his godmother had, with a most severe economy, given George Roberts a liberal education, while his mother had her small pension alone to depend upon.

Long years had passed, her father was dead, and her only brother, who inherited the estate, had refused any overtures toward a reconciliation. Not even in her mildest day-dream had Mrs. Roberts hoped to behold her childhood’s home again.