The evening was over at last, and to Doris it had been the happiest day, perhaps, of her life. Lord Linleigh had sent to his cellars for some of his choicest wines--wines that only saw daylight when the daughters of the house were married or its heirs christened--wine that was like the nectar of the gods, golden in hue, fragrant of perfume, and exhilarating as the water of life old traditions sing of. He had ordered the dessert to be placed outside in the rose-garden. "We will imitate the ancients," he said; "we will drink our wine to the odor of sweet flowers." So they sat and watched the golden sun set in the west. It seemed to them it had never set in such glorious majesty before. The sky was crimson, and gold, and purple, then pale violet, and pearly gleams shone out; a soft veil seemed to shroud the western skies, and then the sun had set. Lady Doris had sat for some time watching the sun set in silence. Suddenly she said: "I shall never forget my last sunset." "Your last sunset?" repeated Earle. "Do you mean that you will never see it set again?" "No; I mean my last sunset at Linleigh. Earle, if all those strange stories of heaven are true, it must be a beautiful place; and this fair sky, with its gleaming colors, is only the wrong side after all." The faint light died in the west, the flowers closed their tired eyes, the lovely twilight reigned soft and fragrant, the air grew almost faint with perfume from lily, from rose, from carnation; then some bird, evidently of erratic habits, began a beautiful vesper hymn, and they sat as though spell-bound. "A night never to be forgotten," said the earl. "Doris, that little bird is singing your wedding-song." If they could but have heard what the little bird was telling--a warning and a requiem both in one. Doris arose and went to the tree in whose branches the bird was hidden; she raised her face to see if she could see it in the thick green leaves. As she stood there, in the light of the dying day, the earl said: "You will have a beautiful wife, Earle." They all looked at her as she stood there in a beautiful dress of shining white silk, with a set of opals for ornaments; her fair white arms and white neck were half shrouded in lace, her golden hair was fastened negligently with a diamond arrow and hung in shining ripples over her shoulders; the faint light showed her face, fair and beautiful as a bright star. "You will have a beautiful wife," he repeated, thoughtfully. And as they all saw her then, they saw her until memory reproduced no more pictures for them. "We have a fine moonlight night," said Earle. "Doris, this time to-morrow evening we shall be leaning over the steamboat side, watching the light in the water, and the track of the huge wheels; then you will be my wife." Lady Linleigh rose and drew her shawl round her shapely shoulders. "We must not forget to-morrow in the happiness of to-night," she said; "it will not do to have a pale bride. I am going in."