"Only this, Adele: I see that a coolness has grown up toward you in the parsonage; the old prejudice against French blood may revive again; besides which, there is, you know, Adele, that little family cloud"---- "Is this the old, kind Reuben, my brother, who reminds me of a trouble so shadowy I cannot fairly measure it?" And Adele covered her face with her hands. "Forgive me, Adele, for God's sake!" "There _is_ a cloud, Reuben; thank you for the word," said Adele, recovering herself; "and there is, I fear, an even darker cloud upon your faith. Until both are passed, I can never listen to such talk as you would urge upon me,--never! never!" And there was a spirit in her words now that awed Reuben. "Would you impute my unbelief to me as a crime, Adele? Is this your Christian charity? Do you think that I enjoy this fierce wrestling with doubts? or, having them, would you bid me play false and conceal them? What if I am a final castaway, as your good books tell us some must be, would you make me a castaway before my time, and balk all my hopes in life? Is this your charity?" "I would not,--you know I would not, Reuben." "Listen to me, Adele. If there be any hope of making my way out of this weary wrangle, it seems to me that it would be in the constant presence of your simple, exultant faith. Will you be my teacher, Adele?" "Teacher,--yes, with all my heart, Reuben." "Then be mine," said he, seizing her hand again, "from this very hour!" An instant she seemed to waver; then came over her the memory of her father's injunction,--the mystery, too, that overshadowed her own life. "I cannot,--I cannot, Reuben!" "Is this final?" said he, calmly. "Final." She sighed it rather than spoke aloud; the next instant she had slipped away through the shrubbery, with a swift, cruel rustle of her silken dress, toward the parsonage. Reuben lingered in the orchard until he saw the light flashing through the muslin hangings of her window. She had gone early to her chamber. She had kissed the crucifix that was her mother's with a fervor that sprang as much from devotion as from sentiment. She had sobbed out her prayer, and with sobs had buried her sweet face in the pillow. Could Reuben have seen or conceived all this, he might have acted differently. As it was, he entered the Doctor's study an hour later, with the utmost apparent coolness. "Well, father," said he, "I have offered marriage to your motherless and pious French _protegee_, and she declines." "My poor son!" said the Doctor. But his sympathy was not so much with any possible feeling of disappointment as with the chilling heartlessness and unbelief that seemed to boast themselves in his speech. "It will be rather dull in Ashfield now, I fancy," continued Reuben, "and I shall slip off to New York to-morrow and take a new taste of the world." And the Doctor (as if to himself) said despairingly, "'_Whom He will He hardeneth._'"