‘To a deep lawny dell they came, To a stone seat beside a spring, O’er which the columned wood did frame A roofless temple, like the fane Where, ere new creeds could faith obtain, Man’s early race once knelt beneath The overhanging Deity.’ She read on. The scene suited the poem, and its deep melancholy harmonized but too well with her own feelings. A story of love, the fondest, truest, most unworldly, ending in hopeless sorrow. Never had the gloom of that poem sunk so heavily upon her spirit. She closed the book suddenly, with a half-stifled sob. The moon was rising, silver pale, above the dark ridge of moorland. The last streak of golden light had faded behind the red trunks of the firs. The low, melancholy cry of an owl sounded far off in the dark heart of the wood. It was indeed as if-- ‘The owls had all fled far away, In a merrier glen to hoot and play.’ In such a spot a mind attuned to melancholy might easily shape spectral forms out of the evening shadows, and call up the ghosts of the loved and lost. Laura looked up from her book with a strange uncanny feeling, as if, indeed, some ghostly presence were near. Her eyes wandered slowly across the rocky bed of the river, and there, on the opposite bank, half in shadow, half in the tender light of the big round moon, she saw a tall figure and a pale face looking at her. She rose with a half-stifled cry of fear. That face looked so spectral in the mystical light. And then she clasped her hands joyously and cried, ‘I knew you would come back!’ This was the deserter’s welcome. No frowns, no upbraidings--a sweet face beaming with delight, a happy voice full of fondest welcome. ‘Humph!’ cries the woman-hater, ‘what fools these women are!’ John Treverton came stepping lightly across the rocks, at some risk of measuring his length in the stony bed of the river, and in less than a minute was by his wife’s side. Not a word did he say for the first moment or so. His greeting was dumb. He took her to his heart, and kissed her as he had never kissed her yet. ‘My own one, my wife!’ he cried. ‘You are all mine now. Love, I have been patient. Don’t be hard with me.’ This last remonstrance was because she had drawn herself away from his arms, and was looking at him with a smile which was no longer tender, but ironical. ‘Have you come back to Hazlehurst to spend an evening?’ she asked, ‘or can you prolong your visit for a week?’ ‘I have come back to spend my life with you--I have come back to stay for ever! They may begin to build me a vault to-morrow in Hazlehurst churchyard. I shall be here to occupy it when my time comes--if you will have me. That is the question, Laura. It all depends on you. Oh, love, love, answer me quickly. If you but knew how I have longed for this moment! Tell me, sweet, have I quite worn out your love? Has my conduct forfeited your esteem for ever?’