Yet--the bed-linen, how strangely yellow!--the shawl, how dim and faded!--the flowers, how withered! He advanced again; he began to understand that the maiden who had dreamed on that pillow, whose hand had left its dainty mould in that glove, the sweetness of whose virgin breath still lingered in the room with the scent of the withered rosebuds, went out from it years ago,--a bride,--to be known thenceforth as wife and mother,--his mother! His eyes grew moist; one by one he touched the little possessions left behind with her girlhood, striving thus to come a little closer to the fair, shy image, that moved him with such unutterable tenderness, yet seemed so far beyond his ken. Reverently, at last, he closed the door, as upon a still, white, smiling corpse, at once ineffably beautiful and ineffably sad. But who had cared for this one room so tenderly, while all the rest of the house had been left to go to ruin? The answer was plain. Old Rue, whose love for her young mistress was half a worship, had taken a sorrowful pleasure in keeping the room (with such help as she could easily command) in the exact state in which it had been left. Bergan was in no mood for further exploration. He made his way back to the entrance-hall, and sat down in one of the antique chairs. He was not quite ready for the instant transition into the outward sunshine. His heart was too heavy. The ancestral home was only an ancestral tomb. Surrounded by memorials of the old state and splendor of Bergan Hall, he felt all the more keenly its present desolation and decay. Remembering the noble Bergan lineage, he was humiliated to the dust by the thought of its present representative. And here, first, his uncle's offer rose before him in the dazzling garments of temptation. Was it, after all, an ignoble ambition to lift the family name out of the dust, to restore the family home, fill it again with social life and warmth, and make it the centre of purer, more refining, and more elevating influences than ever before? Was it not better than any mere personal ambition? Might it not be just the place which he was meant to fill, and which, if he declined to take it, would be left empty? From questions he went on to answers; and his thoughts shaped out a tempting vision of Bergan Hall restored, revivified. Light steps and rustling garments went up and down the broad staircase,--his mother sat smiling in her old room,--voices of children echoed through the large, sunshiny parlors,--guests came and went,--he himself sat in the library, crowned with honors as with years, and-- He was recalled to the present and the actual by a low rumble of thunder. The sunshine had faded from the sky; clouds were rolling up from the west; he hastened back to the cottage through the first drops of the rain.