From the steamer Mr. Van Kuren and his family went directly to a large and fashionable hotel on Broadway, intending to remain there until their own house could be repaired and put in thorough order. The children continued their studies under the direction of their tutor and an English governess, who had accompanied them home from London, and every afternoon went out to walk in the streets. Sometimes Harry and Mr. Reed enjoyed long strolls along the river front, where the boy never wearied of looking at the great ships and little fishing sloops, as they lay at the docks, and sometimes the two went down into the poorer portions of the town, where Mr. Reed pointed out to him the habitations of different races of people, and explained to him their curious modes of living.
Sometimes Laura accompanied them, when they walked along the principal avenues or through Central Park, but as a general thing she went out with her governess, and sometimes invited some young girl of her own age to accompany her. She was walking in this way one afternoon, talking to a richly dressed young girl, and accompanied by the prim-looking governess, when her young companion drew her attention to the fact that some one was trying to attract her attention. Laura looked up hastily and beheld Bruce Decker standing with his hat in his hand and a rosy flush on his cheeks almost in front of her. The governess was looking in wonder at the presuming young man, and the young girl beside her was beginning to laugh, for to tell the truth, Bruce presented an appearance that was not at all like that of little Victor Dufait.
“How do you do, I did not know you were back from Europe,” began the boy. But to his amazement Laura, who had always treated him in a most friendly manner, simply stared him in the face, bowed to him very coldly, and then walked on with her eyes turned in another direction, and a look in her face that was anything but pleasant or cordial. And as she passed on she realized that the boy was standing stock still on the pavement behind her, amazed beyond expression at the way in which he had been treated. She knew, moreover, that what with her annoyance at her companion’s sneers, and her fear lest the English governess should tell her father of the chance meeting, she had treated Bruce with a degree of harshness, which she never intended, and she would have given almost anything—at least it seemed so to her at that moment—to have been able to live the past few minutes over again.