He knew only too well that Anne Ashton was suffering from the shock caused by his conduct. The love of these quiet, sensitive, refined natures, once awakened, is not given for a day, but for all time; it becomes a part of existence; and cannot be riven except by an effort that brings destruction to even future hope of happiness. Not even Mr. Hillary, not even Dr. and Mrs. Ashton, could discern the utter misery that was Anne's daily portion. She strove to conceal it all. She went about the house cheerfully, wore a smiling face when people were present, dressed well, laughed with their guests, went about the parish to rich and poor, and was altogether gay. Ah, do you know what it is, this assumption of gaiety when the heart is breaking?--this dread fear lest those about you should detect the truth? Have _you_ ever lived with this mask upon your face?--which can only be thrown off at night in the privacy of your own chamber, when you may abandon yourself to your desolation, and pray heaven to take you or give you increased strength to _live_ and _bear_? It may seem a light thing, this state of heart that I am telling you about; but it has killed both men and women, for all that; and killed them in silence. Anne Ashton had never complained. She did everything she had been used to doing, was particular about all her duties; but a nervous cough attacked her, and her frame wasted, and her cheek grew hectic. Try as she would she could not eat: all she confessed to, when questioned by Mrs. Ashton, was "a pain in her throat;" and Mr. Hillary was called in. Anne laughed: there was nothing the matter with her, she said, and her throat was better; she had strained it perhaps. The doctor was a wise doctor; his professional visits were spent in gossip; and as to medicine, he sent her a tonic, and told her to take it or not as she pleased. Only time, he said to Mrs. Ashton--she would be all right in time; the summer heat was making her languid. The summer heat had nearly passed now, and perhaps some of the battle was passing with it. None knew--let me repeat it--what that battle had been; none ever can know, unless they go through it themselves. In Miss Ashton's case there was a feature some are spared--her love had been known--and it increased the anguish tenfold. She would overcome it if she could only forget him; but it would take time; and she would come out of it an altogether different woman, her best hope in life gone, her heart dead. "What brought him down here?" mentally questioned Mr. Hillary, in an explosion of wrath, as he watched his visitor down the street. "It will undo all I have been doing. He, and his wife too, might have had the grace to keep away for this year at least. I loved him once, with all his faults; but I should like to see him in the pillory now. It has told on him also, if I'm any reader of looks. And now, Miss Anne, you go off from Calne to-morrow an I can prevail. I only hope you won't come across him in the meantime."