It was a curious feeling, and all to come out of a foolish song; but if ever she felt thankful to God from the bottom of her heart that she had said "No," at once and decisively, to the good man who slept at peace beneath the church-yard elms, it was at that moment. But the feeling and the moment passed by immediately. Mr. Roy took up the thread of conversation where he had left it off--it was some bookish or ethical argument, such as he would go on with for hours; so she listened to him in silence. They walked on, the larks singing and the primroses blowing. All the world was saying to itself, "I am young; I am happy;" but she said nothing at all. People grow used to pain; it dies down at intervals, and becomes quite bearable, especially when no one see it or guesses at it. They had a very merry picnic on the hilltop, enjoying those mundane consolations of food and drink which Auntie was expected always to have forth-coming, and which those young people did by no means despise, nor Mr. Roy neither. He made himself so very pleasant with them all, looking thoroughly happy, and baring his head to the spring breeze with the eagerness of a boy. "Oh, this is delicious! It makes me feel young again. There's nothing like home. One thing I am determined upon: I will never quit bonnie Scotland more." It was the first clear intimation he had given of his intentions regarding the future, but it thrilled her with measureless content. If only he would not go abroad again, if she might have him within reach for the rest of her days--able to see him, to talk to him, to know where he was and what he was doing, instead of being cut off from him by those terrible dividing seas--it was enough! Nothing could be so bitter as what had been; and whatever was the mystery of their youth, which it was impossible to unravel now--whether he had ever loved, or loved her and crushed it down and forgotten it, or only felt very kindly and cordially to her, as he did now, the past was--well, only the past!--and the future lay still before her, not unsweet. When we are young, we insist on having every thing or nothing; when we are older, we learn that "every thing" is an impossible and "nothing" a somewhat bitter word. We are able to stoop meekly and pick up the fragments of the children's bread, without feeling ourselves to be altogether "dogs". Fortune went home that night with a not unhappy, almost a satisfied, heart. She sat back in the carriage, close beside that other heart which she believed to be the truest in all the world, though it had never been hers. There was a tremendous clatter of talking and laughing and fun of all sorts, between David Dalziel and the little Roys on the box, and the Misses Moseley sitting just below them, as they had insisted doing, no doubt finding the other two members of the party a little "slow."