We little thought, any of us, when we saw him lying in the meadow on the grass at her feet, that out of the joyous inspiration of that glorious summer weather, out of two young lives so beautiful, out of young love, a thing so full of poetry and romance, would come such wretchedness as this. After a little while, the touch of those rose-leaf palms, the whiteness of her face, the appeal for mercy in those eyes seeking his own, had a soothing effect upon Jerome. He would now put forth all his strength and quietly say good-by. Softly he pressed to his lips one of those imprisoned hands; softly, in a heart-sick rapture of despairing renunciation, he was about to do the same with the other, when the glint of Rube's solitaire, the pledge of her hated bondage to another, the glaring witness of her treachery towards himself, flashed into his eyes and overcame all his good resolutions. With a look of unutterable reproach, with a gesture of undying contempt, he tossed the offending hand back upon her lap. "Think not," he broke forth, in vehement utterance, "that no thought of me will embitter your bridal joys! I leave you to your fate! I go to my own! Dark it may be, but not darker than yours!" And this was the quiet way in which he bade her good-by. The words pierced Mell to the very soul, and, combined with the blackness of his countenance, filled her with indefinable, but very horrible imaginings. He had almost reached the door, when with a smothered cry of pain, she followed him. As irresistibly as ever he drew her. "Jerome! Jerome! Where are you going?" "To ruin!" exclaimed he, turning upon her with that barbaric fierceness which seems to underlie everything strong in nature--"to ruin, where you women without principle, have sent many a better man! To ruin, and to hell, if I choose," he added, with fearful emphasis. "My going and my coming are no longer any concern of yours!" "Yes, they are, Jerome," she assured him, deprecatingly. "Don't leave me in anger, Jerome!" "Not in anger? Then, how--in delight?" There was now a menacing gleam in his eye which more than ever alarmed her. "My cause is lost. You have done me all the wrong you could, and now that I am dismissed, set aside, told to begone, debased, and dethroned, you expect me to be delighted over it, do you?" "No, Jerome; but do not leave me feeling so. Promise me to do nothing rash." "I will not promise you anything! You have not spared my feelings, why should _I_ spare yours? Since your affection for me has moderated into that platonic kind, which admits of your happiness in union with another, I will do whatever I please to do, knowing no act of mine, however dreadful, will affect you." "Oh, Jerome, do not say that! You must see, you must know in your heart, that I do still care for you--Oh, God! more than I ought." "And yet not enough to make you do what is right!" "But to right you, will wrong Rube," she answered in confusion.