"God can make it right," whispers Lady Etwynde drawing the white, sad face down upon her bosom, and softly kissing the weary lips. "If you can take those words home to your heart as I did, my darling, your burden will grow easier to bear; the strength you ask for will be given. Oh, life is hard, terribly hard, I know! There is so much sorrow, so little joy; and then the errors, the sins which beset, the weakness that shackles us!--but still, still, we are not tried _beyond_ our strength, and we may be able at last to look back and see it was all for the best!" "What would I not give to recall these last four years!" cries Lauraine bitterly. "How different my life might have been!" "There's no turning back," says Lady Etywnde solemnly. "Errors, once committed, are irrevocable; for them we must suffer; by them we must abide. Ah, my dear! who would not live their time again if they might, and by the light of the present alter all the mistakes of the past? But it cannot be done. All the remorse and all the regret are so futile. Tears of blood cannot wash away one memory, take out the sting of one mistake. We must just bear life as it is, till Death seals all its woes into forgetfulness." "You are so good," cries Lauraine sadly. "I am not like you. I am wicked and rebellious, and I cannot accept my fate with patience, even though I know my own past weakness is to blame for all my present misery." "I am not good. Do not praise me," says Lady Etwynde humbly. "And I know I do not deserve my present happiness. It makes me fearful of my great joy. For I was so wicked and rebellious once, and I wonder often that God did not take my life instead of sparing it, and blessing it as He has done. Now, darling, you look worn out, and must need rest. I will leave you for awhile. If your husband suspects anything you must try and banish such suspicions, or your married life will grow yet more unhappy. The great wrench is over, the worst is past. Time, and the consciousness of having done what is right, will give you peace and comfort at last. Youth and strength are yours still, and many good gifts of life, and if you throw yourself into others' sufferings, and widen your sympathy with the interests and trials of those around you, believe me it will do much to making your own troubles less. I speak from an experience as bitter as, if less hopeless, than your own." And once more kissing the closed lips which seem too weary for tears, she lays Lauraine back on the pillows, and softly leaves the room. "'Thy heart's desire!'" Lauraine cries to herself. "Oh, God--not that--not that should be my prayer. Teach my heart to say, 'Thy will, not mine!'" CHAPTER XXVI When Keith Athelstone leaves Lauraine that morning he is scarcely conscious of what he is doing. And yet with his brain whirling, with a desperate sense of his life's complete failure oppressing his heart, he goes straight to his _fiancée's_ house and asks to see her.