“Oh,” said Alice, with a sigh of relief. “Will you just be so kind as to let me have that letter?” added she, reaching out her hand. “It is already mailed.” “Mailed!” shouted Alice, springing to her feet. “Yes. I took it to the post-office myself before breakfast.” CHAPTER LXV. In those days, before the mail-delivery system had been introduced, we had to send to the post-office for our letters. If we were in love, we went in person, of course. “Where are you going?” called out Alice across the street. Mary came over to her. “I am going to the post-office,” said she, in a low voice. “I will go part of the way with you,” said Alice. The two girls walked on for a little while in silence. “Mary,” said Alice, presently, “tell me,—what do you expect him to say?” “Don’t ask me that,” she said, with a shiver. “I think I can tell you. Your letter, as you quoted it to me, severed all relations between you. But have you not a kind of dim, unacknowledged hope that he will recant his heresies and bridge the chasm between you?” Mary walked on in silence. “It is natural that you should nourish such a hope. But suppose it should prove delusive?” “The die is cast. I must abide the issue. And, Alice,—though you think I have been hasty,—I feel a profound conviction that it is best as it is.” “Well, good-by! Be brave.” And more than once, as she hastened homeward, Alice passed her hand across her eyes. Mary stood before the little square window at the post-office. “Any letters?” The clerk knew who she was, and the sight of her pretty, pale face lent a certain alacrity to his calm, official legs. Briskly diving into her father’s box, he handed her half a dozen letters. As she passed them nervously between thumb and finger, glancing at the addresses, he held his steady, postmasterish eye upon her. What else had he to do? Could not that other woman who stood there, could not she wait? Was not her nose red; and her chin, was not her chin (by a mysterious dispensation of Providence) bumpy? Let her stand there, then, craning her anatomical neck to catch his stony gaze. Let her wait till pretty little Miss Rolfe sorts her letters. Ah, that’s the one she hoped to get,—that with the distinct, yet bold and jagged address, that I have noticed so often. Ah, that’s the one—What name, madam? Adkins? Miss Elizabeth Ann? One for Miss Elizabeth Adkins. Beg your pardon,—five cents due, Miss Adkins. My reader, be pretty. Let me entreat you—be pretty, if you can in anywise compass it. If not, be good. Even that is better than nothing. It will be a comfort to you in your declining years. And your little nephews and nieces will rise up, some day, and call you blessed. “Will you be so kind as to put these back in the box?”