We sat down upon a bank, our conversation drifting back to their uneventful ride northward, and later to our experiences during those last weeks of war. I have often reflected since on the vivid contrast we must have made while resting there, each holding the rein of his horse, our animals as widely differing in appearance as ourselves. Both were typical of the two services in those last days. Caton was attired in natty uniform, fleckless and well groomed, his linen immaculate, his buttons gleaming, the rich yellow stripes of his arm of the service making marked contrast with the blue he wore and the green he sat upon. I, on the other hand, was haggard from hard, sleepless service and insufficient food, my shapeless old slouch hat and dull gray jacket torn and disfigured, the marks of rank barely discernible. But his manly, hopeful spirit reawakened my courage, and for the time I forgot disaster while listening to his story of love and his plans for the future. His one thought was of Celia and the Northern home so soon now to be made ready for her coming. The sun sank lower into the western sky, causing Caton to draw down his fatigue cap until its glazed visor almost completely hid his eyes. With buoyant enthusiasm he talked on, each word drawing me closer to him in bonds of friendship. But the time of parting came, and after we had promised to correspond with each other, I stood and watched while he rode rapidly back down the road we had traversed together. At the summit of the hill he turned and waved his cap, then disappeared, leaving me alone, with Edith's face more clearly than ever a torture to my memory of defeat,--her face, fair, smiling, alluring, yet the face of another man's wife. CHAPTER XXXIX MY LADY OF THE NORTH I walked the next mile thoughtfully, pondering over those vague hopes and plans with which Caton's optimism had inspired me. Then the inevitable reaction came. The one thing upon which he built so happily had been denied me,--the woman I loved was the wife of another. I might not even dream of her in my loneliness and poverty; the remembrance of her could be no incentive to labor and self-denial. The Lieutenant's chance words, kindly as they were spoken, only opened wider the yawning social chasm between us. The greatest mercy would be for us never again to meet.