"I am glad that you are happy, dear boy. I do congratulate you. Grizel will be an inspiring wife. No one could live with her and find life boring." "Isn't she wonderful? So beautiful, so fascinating, so--_simple_! I am overwhelmed that she should give up so much. That's the only fly in the ointment. I can't feel that it is justified. You must help me to look out for a house for her, Katrine--a bright, sunny place, which won't be too painful a contrast. I can afford a higher rent nowadays, and she must have all that she wants. She said to me--`Wherever we go there will always be a Katrine's room, a place for Katrine.' That was one of the first things she said!" "Sweet of her!" said Katrine, smiling bravely once again. "I shall be delighted to come as a visitor sometimes, but not to live! Newly married couples are best alone. I must move my camp." Martin looked troubled and anxious. "For a time perhaps; just for a time. What about that visit to Dorothea? Wouldn't it be a good chance to fit that in?" The blood rushed over Katrine's face. "No!" she said sharply. "No!" and there was such unflinching decision in her voice that Martin dared not pursue the subject. Was there after all some foundation for Grizel's romance about a mysterious lover in India? It seemed like it, since no human girl would blush like that at the mention of a female friend. And yet, if there _were_ a lover, why this emphatic refusal? Martin gave it up, too engrossed in his own beatitude to feel much interest in the problem. "Well! we needn't discuss things to-day, dear. There's plenty of time," he said, using Grizel's own words. "Only remember this--we shan't be satisfied, either of us, unless _you_ are happy!" He kissed her again, and passed on to his study. From the central place on the mantelpiece the portrait of his dead wife gazed at him with innocent young eyes as it had gazed every day of the last eight long years. He stood before it, gazing back, his face working with emotion. There had been a time when to return that gaze had been his first impulse upon entering the room, days when he had sat for hours holding the photograph in his hand, had risen from his work to bend over it once and again; times again when work, and success, and the trend of life had brought a passing forgetfulness, followed by periods of passionate longing and despair. He had even thought of ending life itself for the sake of that smiling face. Now for months past it had counted for little more than the ornaments by which it was surrounded... "_Juliet_!" he murmured beneath his breath. "_Juliet_!" It was a summoning cry, as if he would call the dead girl's spirit from the unseen world. He stretched out his hand as a prisoner at the bar. "Little girl! Little girl! I was faithful to you. I gave you all that was mine to give..." The wide eyes stared on. The lips smiled; a blank, unanswering smile. CHAPTER FIFTEEN. "Cumly, _September 30, 19--_.