Which road should he take? Not more unstable was the blue ring of smoke which the breeze carried from his lips, tossing it hither and thither in a cloudy wreath upon the white air, than was this man between the opposing influences which divided his nature. At last he tossed his cigarette upon the platform, carefully quenching its spark with his foot, and with a light, fleet step ran down the wide carriage-road which led to the house--which would bring him to Millicent. He had known all along, with that inner consciousness which decides with lightning rapidity a question which the intellect debates long and seriously, that his feet would follow that pleasant, open road rather than the dark wood-trail; and yet the train had sped twenty miles further on its journey before he turned his face toward the happy valley. So clumsy is reason compared to instinct; so tedious are the modes of thought to the working of the feelings; so useless is the grave gate of wisdom to check the tumultuous torrent of feeling. He found the wide piazza deserted, the front door fast closed, the blinds of the library and dining-room tightly drawn. The hospitable house was silent and deserted. His imperative summons was finally answered by a domestic, the successor of poor Ah Lam, who in his ridiculous vernacular informed the visitor that "Alley folk go waly." Which, being translated into English, signified that no one was at home. Graham felt as if a flood of cold water had been dashed into his face. He shivered, as he turned from the door and descended the steps; and yet before he had walked two miles in the familiar road which led to his tower, he gave a profound sigh of relief. It was better so! The exercise had cooled his fevered blood; the crisp forest air had brought reason back to his passion-tossed breast. It was better that he had not seen her. Something of the fatalist was there about this strong-brained rationalist. He half fancied that it was not chance alone which had decreed that Millicent should be absent from the Ranch that day. But he sang no more as he had done on his way to the house; and his serious face lost that smile of hope which had lighted the eyes and touched the mouth into an unaccustomed softness. If he was silent, the wild birds were melodious, and he walked between choirs of invisible songsters; while the whirring of a partridge, the fleet step of a wild fox in the thicket, gave him the assurance that he was not alone in the mysterious wood. At last the distance was accomplished; and at high noon, when the shadows had all shrunk back into the tall trees before the ardent heat of the sun, he reached the ruin of the old church. He leaned against the fragment of a pillar which stood at the foot of the staircase, and looked up at the square gray tower with its close-clinging pall of moss and yellow lichens. From a rift in the wall burst a blaze of color,--a clump of wallflowers stretching its flame of blossoms upward toward his