"Enter not into temptation!" was the warning which she uttered again and again to her own soul; and though she feared the pastor would be pained, she felt that he would not consider her ungrateful--knew that his warm, tender heart would understand hers. Though she had always studiously endeavored to expel Mr. Murray from her thoughts, there came hours when his image conquered; when the longing, the intense wish to see him was overmastering; when she felt that she would give ten years of her life for one long look into his face, or for a picture of him. Now, when she had only to say, "Come!" and he would be with her, she sternly denied her starving heart, and instead of bread gave it stones and serpents. She took her pen to answer the letter, but a pang which she had learned to understand told her that she was not now strong enough; and, swallowing some medicine which Dr. Howell had prescribed, she snatched up a crimson scarf and went down to the beach. The serenity of her countenance had broken up in a fearful tempest, and her face writhed as she hurried along to overtake Felix. Just now she dreaded to be alone, and yet the only companionship she could endure was that of the feeble cripple, whom she had learned to love, as woman can love only when all her early idols are in the dust. "Wait for me, Felix!" The boy stopped, turned, and limped back to meet her, for there was a strange, pleading intonation in her mournfully sweet voice. "What is the matter, Miss Earl? You look troubled." "I only want to walk with you, for I feel lonely this evening." "Miss Earl, have you seen Sir Roger Percival?" "No, no; why should I see him? Felix, my darling, my little brother! do not call me Miss Earl any longer. Call me Edna. Ah, child! I am utterly alone; I must have somebody to love me. My heart turns to you." She passed her arm around the boy's shoulders and leaned against him, while he rested on his crutches and looked up at her with fond pride. "Edna! I have wanted to call you so since the day I first saw you. You know very well that I love you better than every thing else in the world. If there is any good in me, I shall have to thank you for it; if ever I am useful, it will be your work. I am wicked still; but I never look at you without trying to be a better boy. You do not need me--you who are so great and gifted; whose writings everybody reads and admires; whose name is already famous. Oh! you can not need any one, and, least of all, a poor little helpless cripple! who can only worship you, and love the sound of your voice better than all the music that ever was played! If I thought that you, Miss Earl--whose book all the world is talking about--if I thought you really cared for me--Oh, Edna! Edna! I believe my heart would be too big for my poor little body!" "Felix, we need each other. Do you suppose I would have followed you out here, if I did not prefer your society to that of others?"