'I can believe it, mother dear, but our natures are not alike; but there is one thing on which we are agreed, that an engagement is almost as binding as marriage; that is,' correcting herself, 'as long as two persons love each other.' 'It ought not to be binding under such circumstances, Audrey.' 'Ought it not? Ah, there we differ! With all my want of enthusiasm, my absence of sentimentality, I shall hold fast to Cyril. I have never yet regarded myself as his wife; I did not wish to so regard myself. But now I shall give myself up in thought wholly to him, and I pray God that this knowledge will give him comfort.' Mrs. Ross was silent. She felt that she hardly understood her daughter; it was as though she had entered on higher ground, where the wrappings of some sacred mist enveloped her. This was not the language of earthly passion--this sublime womanly abnegation. It was not even the tender language of a Ruth, widowed in her affections, and cleaving with bounteous love and faith to the mother of her young Jewish husband, 'Whither thou goest I will go;' and yet the inward cry of her heart seemed to be like that of honest Tom O'Brien: 'The Lord do so unto me, and more also, if ought but death part me and thee.' The one thought wholly possessed her that she might give him comfort. 'My poor, dear child, if I could only make you feel differently!' Then Audrey laid her hand gently on her mother's lips. It was an old habit of hers when she was a child, and too much argument had proved wearisome. 'Hush! do not let us talk any more. I am so tired, so tired, mother, and I know you are, too.' 'Will you let me stay with you, darling?' Then Audrey looked at her trim little bed, and then at her mother, and smiled. 'There is no room. What can you mean, mother dear? and I am not ill; I am never ill, am I?' 'Thank God at least for that; but you are worse than ill--you are unhappy, my dear. Will you let me help you to undress, and then sit by you until you feel you can sleep?' But Audrey only shook her head with another smile. 'There is no need. Kiss me, mother, and bid me good-night. I shall like to be with my own self in the darkness. There, another kiss; now go, or we shall both be frozen;' and Audrey gently pushed her to the door. 'She would not let me stop with her, John!' exclaimed Mrs. Ross, as she entered her husband's dressing-room. 'She is very calm: unnaturally so, I thought; she hardly cried at all; she is thinking nothing of herself, only of him.'