Adah suffered him to caress her for a moment, and then told him she must go, for Mrs. Ellsworth would wonder at her long absence, and possibly institute a search. Pressing one more kiss upon her hand the doctor crept back to his hiding place, while Adah went slowly back to the house where she knew Irving Stanley was anxiously waiting for her. She dared not meet him alone now, for latterly each time they had so met, she had kept at bay the declaration trembling on his lips, and which must never be listened to. So she staid away from the pleasant parlor where all the morning he sat chatting with his sister, who guessed how much he loved the beautiful and accomplished girl, her daughter’s governess. Right-minded and high-principled, Mrs. Ellsworth had conquered any pride she might at first have felt—any reluctance to her brother’s marrying her governess, and now like him was anxious to have it settled. But Adah gave him no chance that day, and late in the afternoon he rode back to his regiment wondering at the change in Miss Gordon, and why her face was so deadly white, and her voice so husky, as she bade him good-bye. Poor Adah! Hers was now a path of suffering, such as she had never known before. But she did her duty to the doctor, nursing him with the utmost care; but never expressing to him the affection she did not feel. It was impossible to keep his presence there a secret from the two old negroes, and knowing she could trust them, she told them of the wounded Union soldier, enlisting their sympathies for him, and thus procuring for him the care of older and more experienced people than herself. He was able at length to return, and one pleasant summer night, just three weeks after his arrival at Sunnymead, Adah walked with him to the woods, and kneeling with him by a running stream, whose waters farther away would yet be crimson with the blood of our slaughtered brothers, she commended him to God. Through the leafy branches the moon-beams were shining, and they showed to Adah the expression of the doctor’s wasted face, as he said to her at parting, “I have kissed you many times, my darling, but you have never returned it. Please do so once, for the sake of the olden time. It will make me a better soldier.” She kissed him once for the sake of the olden time, and when he whispered, “Again for Willie’s sake,” she kissed him twice, and then she bade him leave her, herself buttoning about him the soldier coat which her own hands had cleaned and mended and made respectable. She was glad afterward that she had done so; glad, too, that she had kissed him and waited by the tree, where, looking backward, he could see the flutter of her white dress until a turn in the forest path hid her from his view. CHAPTER XXXVII. THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULL RUN.