"Because, almost from the first hour we met, I had given you esteem and reverence as a noble woman,--because I promised you honest friendship and have kept my word." Still more coldly she replied: "I fear there can be no friendship between us. My father and brothers lie in nameless graves in your proud and triumphant North, and my heart and hope are buried with them. My mother has since died, broken-hearted; Roberta's husband, the colonel you sent to prison, is a crippled soldier, and both are so impoverished that they know not how to live. And you,--you have been so busy in helping those who caused these woes that you evidently forgot the once light-hearted girl whom you first saw on this veranda. Why speak of friendship, Captain Lane, when rivers of blood flow between us,--rivers fed from the veins of my kindred?" Her words were so stern and sad that Lane sat down on the steps at her feet and buried his face in his hands. His hope was withering and his tongue paralyzed in the presence of such grief as hers. She softened a little as she looked down upon him, and after a moment or two resumed: "I do not blame you personally. I must try to be just in my bitter sorrow and despair. You proved long ago that you were obeying your conscience; but you who conquer cannot know the hearts of the conquered. Your home does not look like mine; your kindred are waiting to welcome you with plaudits. You have everything to live for,--honor, prosperity, and love; for doubtless, long before this, the cold-hearted Northern girl has been won by the fame of your achievements. Think of me as a ghost, doomed to haunt these desolate scenes where once I was happy." "No," he replied, springing to his feet, "I shall think of you as the woman I love. Life shall not end so unhappily for us both; for if you persist in your morbid enmity, my future will be as wretched as yours. You judge me unheard, and you wrong me cruelly. I have never forgotten you for an hour. I wrote to you again and again, and received no answer. The moment I was released from the iron rule of military duty in the West I sought you before returning to the mother who bore me. No river of blood flows between us that my love could not bridge. I admit that I was speechless at first before the magnitude of your sorrows; but must this accursed war go on forever, blighting life and hope? What was the wound you did so much towards healing compared to the one you are giving me now? Many a blow has been aimed at me, but not one has pierced my heart before." She tried to listen rigidly and coldly to his impassioned utterance, but could not, and, as he ceased, she was sobbing in her chair. He sought with gentle words to soothe her, but by a gesture she silenced him. At last she said, brokenly: "For months I have not shed a tear. My heart and brain seemed bursting, yet I could get no relief. Were it not for some faith and hope in God, I should have followed my kindred. You cannot know, you never can know."