The roses in our garden were faded, and the leaves of autumn were piled upon the ground, ere he came to his home again, and I had an opportunity of presenting him with the package which many months before had been committed to my care. His face was very pale, and his voice trembled as he asked me--"Where is she now?" "In Italy," I answered, adding that "her husband was said to be very wealthy." Bowing mechanically, he walked away, and a year and a half went by ere I saw him again. Then he came among us as our minister. The old, white-haired pastor, who for so long had told us of the Good Shepherd and the better land, was sleeping at last in the quiet graveyard, and the people had chosen young Walter Beaumont to fill his place. He was a splendid-looking man--tall, erect, and finely formed, with a most winning manner, and a face which betokened intellect of the highest order. We were proud of him, all of us--proud of our clergyman, who, on the third Sabbath in June, was to be ordained in the old brick church, before whose altar he had years ago been baptized, a smiling infant. On the Thursday afternoon preceding the ordination, a large traveling carriage, covered with dust and laden with trunks, passed slowly through our village, attracting much attention. Seated within it was a portly, gray-haired man, resting his chin upon a gold-headed cane, and looking curiously out at the people in the street, who stared as curiously at him. Directly opposite him, and languidly reclining upon the soft cushions, was a white, proud-faced lady, who evidently felt no interest in what was passing around her, for her eyes were cast down, and her thought seemed busy elsewhere. I was sitting at my chamber window, gazing out upon them, and just as they drew near the gate, the lady raised her eyes--the soft, brown eyes, which once had won the love of Walter Beaumont, and in which there was now an unmistakable look of anguish, as if the long eyelashes, drooping so wearily upon the colorless cheek, were constantly forcing back the hidden tears. And this was Cora Douglass, come back to us again from her travels in a foreign land. She knew me in a moment, and in her face there was much of her olden look as, bending forward, she smiled a greeting, and waved toward me her white, jeweled hand, on which the _diamonds_ flashed brightly in the sunlight.