Standing on the pavement in front I listened to the city clock clanging two A.M. A light shone from an upper window; elsewhere all was dark. Only granite walls shut me from sight of one whose precious lips had felt the touch of mine. As I stood in the pelting sleet, over the silence of the night I heard a sound that seemed to come from the opening heavens. An organ roll thrilling that 'Adagio' no fingers but yours had ever adequately interpreted to me. Our Adagio--yours and mine--sanctified by blessed associations with the hallowed days of our betrothal. As I listened, the dreary lost years rolled away as a black curtain, and in the limelight of memory I saw again all our surroundings on that last happy evening when you played for me; the misty purple of mountain heights, the ferny gorges where scarlet rhododendrons flared their torches, the clustering honeysuckle whose chalices swung in the breeze, and you--my promised bride--seated at the piano, the sunset glow burnishing your hair, your white dress and floating blue ribbons. I knew your touch; the passionately tender, closing chords drifted like a whisper from our past, like an answer from your soul to the call of mine, and it told me why Kingdon could never claim you. Ah! tears gathered, dripped; happy tears. I knew then you could not forget, and since that night I have found grim comfort in the belief that only your inexorable, merciless pride stood between us. Sweetheart of my young manhood, darling of my lonely, weary old heart, will you crucify us both until death ends all?" She had withdrawn from his detaining hand, shrinking back to the support of the dial, but the surging torrent of his words stirred frozen depths never before beyond control. Tears glittered in her eyes, and her lips fluttered like wind-swept rose leaves. "You believe my pride separates us now? No, no; not pride. Can't you understand that my bitter humiliation is the barrier that shuts me out? The lofty distinction you have attained is the dividing wall I could never scale. In the dark days of calumny I forsook you; when most you needed loyalty I refused to share your disgrace. Now, as the popular idol, at whose feet the noblest public tributes are laid, you must accept my confession that I am not worthy to share your honors. I was weighed in the balance and found wofully wanting. The verdict of the scales thirteen years ago cannot be reversed by an eternity of regrets."