to some deep inward sorrow—for it could be no trivial passing grief that could so suddenly and so completely change so quick and gay a spirit—a gentle footstep sounded upon the gravel walk behind a cluster of thick leafy lilacs, and in a moment Annabel stepped from their screen upon the mossy greensward; her pale and pensive features were even paler and more thoughtful than was common, and her eyes showed as if she had been weeping, yet her step was as light and elastic as a young fawn’s, and a bright smile dimpled her cheek as she addressed her sister. “Dear Marian, why so early? And why did you not call me to share your morning walk? What ails you, dearest, tell me? For I have seen you from my window walking here up and down so sorrowful and sad—” “Oh! can you ask me—can you ask me, Annabel,” exclaimed the lovely girl in a wild, earnest burst of passion—“can you not see that my heart is breaking?”—and with the words she flung her arms about her sister’s neck, and burying her face in her bosom fell into an agony of tears. Annabel clasped Marian to her heart and held her there for many moments, kissing away the big drops from her cheeks, and soothing her with many a kind and soft caress, before she replied to her incoherent and wild words; but when her violent sobbing had subsided, “Dearest,” she said, “I do not understand at all, nor can I even guess what should so grievously affect you—but if you fancy that we shall be parted, that our lives will hereafter be divided, and weep for that fond fancy, it is but a false apprehension that distresses you. I go not hence at all, dear sister, until these fearful wars be over; and then I go not till the course of time shall place De Vaux in his good father’s station, which—I pray Heaven—shall not fall out for years. And when I do go—when I do go away from this dear happy spot, you cannot, no you _did_ not dream, my sister, that you should not go with me. Oh, if you did dream that, it would be very hard for me to pardon you.” “Oh no—no! no! dear Annabel,” replied the other, not lifting up her eyes at all from the fond bosom on which she hung so heavily, and speaking in a thick husky voice, “it is not that at all—but I am so unhappy—so miserable—so despairing! Oh, would to God—oh, would to God! that I had never gone hence—or that Ernest De Vaux, at least, had not come hither!” “Nay! now, I must know what you mean,” Annabel answered mildly, but at the same time very firmly—“I must, indeed, dear Marian—for either such words have a meaning, in which case it is absolutely right that I, _your_ sister and _his_ affianced wife, should know it—or, if they have not any, are cruel equally and foolish. So tell me—tell me, dear one, if there be aught that I should know; and in all cases let me share your sorrow—” “Oh! do not—do not ask me, Annabel—oh! oh! to think that we two who have been so happy should be so wretched now.”