Four weeks after George’s death, Annie left the cottage in the Hollow, and went to live for a time with Mrs. Mather. Early orphaned, and thrown upon the charities of a scheming aunt, who, after her marriage with George, had cast her off entirely, there was now no one to whom she could look for help and sympathy save Rose, and when the latter insisted that her home should be Annie’s also, while William, too, joined his entreaties with those of his wife, and urged as one reason his promise made to George, Annie consented on condition that as soon as her health was sufficiently restored, she should do something for herself, either as teacher, or governess in some private family. Amid a wild storm of sobs and tears she had read her husband’s dying message, growing sick and faint just as he knew she would when first she learned of his loss, and why it was he had never written to her himself. But this was naught compared to the horror which crept round her heart as she read what George had written of a coming time when the long grave by the gate would not be visited as often as at first, or he who slept there remembered as tearfully. “Oh, George, George!” she cried, “it was cruel to tell me so,” and sinking to her knees, she essayed to breathe a vow that other love than that she had borne for George Graham should never find entrance to her bosom. But something sealed her lips,—the words she would have uttered were unspoken, and the rash vow was not made. Still there was an added drop to her already brimming cup of sorrow, and a sadder, more loving note in the tone of her voice when she spoke of her husband, as if she would fortify herself against the possibility of his prediction coming true. It was a sorry day when she finally left her cottage home, and only God was witness to the parting; but the dim, swollen eyes and colorless cheeks attested to its bitterness, as, with one great upheaving sob, she crossed the threshold and entered the carriage where Rose sat waiting for her, while the motherly Widow Simms wrapped around her the pile of shawls which were to shield her from the cold, and bade her god speed to her new home. Rapidly the carriage drove away, while the widow returned to the cottage to perform the last needful office of fastening down the windows and locking up the doors, then, with a sigh at the changes a few short months had wrought, she went back to her own long deserted home. And the busy tide of life rolled on in Rockland just the same as if in the churchyard there was no new-made grave, holding the buried love of Annie, who, in Rose Mather’s beautiful home, was surrounded with every possible comfort and luxury, and treated with as much consideration as if she were a born princess, instead of the humble woman, who, a few months before, was wholly unknown to the little lady of the Mather Mansion. CHAPTER XV. THE DESERTER.