When at last he reached the gate to his aunt's cottage and walked swiftly up the path, the hour and the scene were almost the same as when he had first come, an indifferent stranger, long years before. The fruit-trees were as snowy white with blossoms, the air as fragrant, the birds singing as jubilantly, as when he had stood at the window and gazed with critical admiration on a sportive girl, a child-woman, playing with her little Spitz dog. As he passed the spot where she had stood, beneath his ambush behind the curtains, his excited mind brought back her image with lifelike realism--the breeze in her light hair, her dark eyes brimming with mirth, her bosom panting from her swift advance, and the color of the red rose in her cheeks. He groaned as he thought of her now. His aunt saw him from the window, and a moment later was sobbing on his breast. "Aunt," he gasped, "I'm not too late?" "Oh, no," she said, wearily; "Grace is alive; but one can scarcely say much more. Alford, you must be prepared for a sad change." He placed her in her chair, and stood before her with heaving breast. "Now tell me all," he said, hoarsely. "Oh, Alford, you frighten me. You must be more composed. You cannot see Grace, looking and feeling as you do. She is weakness itself;" and she told him how the idol of his heart was slowly, gradually, but inevitably sinking into the grave. "Alford, Alford," she cried, entreatingly, "why do you look so stern? You could not look more terrible in the most desperate battle." In low, deep utterance, he said, "This is my most desperate battle; and in it are the issues of life and death." "You terrify _me_, and can you think that a weak, dying woman can look upon you as you now appear?" "She shall not die," he continued, in the same low, stern utterance, "and she must look upon me, and listen, too. Aunt, you have been faithful to me all these years. You have been my mother. I must entreat one more service. You must second me, sustain me, co-work with me. You must ally all your experienced womanhood with my manhood, and with my will, which may be broken, but which shall not yield to my cruel fate." "What do you propose to do?" "That will soon be manifest. Go and prepare Grace for my visit. I wish to see her alone. You will please be near, however;" and he abruptly turned and went to his room to remove his military suit and the dust of travel. He had given his directions as if in the field, and she wonderingly and tremblingly obeyed, feeling that some crisis was near.