“And _I_ know her as other people do not, perhaps. She does not show as much of her real self to outsiders as they think. I have often thought her daring, open way deceived people when it made them fancy she was so easy to read. She has romantic fancies of her own the world never suspects her of,--if I did not know her as I do, she is the last person on earth I should suspect of cherishing such fancies. The fact is, you are a sort of romance to her, and her love for you is one of her dreams, and she clings to it as closely as she would cling to life. It is a dream she has lived on so long that it has become part of herself, and it is my impression that if anything happened to break her belief in it she would die,--yes, _die!_” with another emphatic shake of the pretty head. “And Dolly is n't the sort of girl to die for nothing.” Griffith raised his bowed head from his hands, his soft, dark, womanish eyes lighting up and his sallow young face flushing. “God bless her,--no!” he said. “Her life has not been free from thorns, even so far, and she has not often cried out against them.” “No,” answered Aimée. “And when the roses come, no one will see as you will how sweet she finds them. Your Dolly is n't Lady Augusta's Dolly, or Mollie's, or Ralph Gowan's, or even mine; she is the Dolly no one but her lover and her husband has ever seen or ever will see. _You_ can get at the spark in the opal.” Griffith was comforted, as he often found himself comforted, under the utterances of this wise one. His desperation was toned down, and he was readier to hope for the best and to feel warm at heart and grateful,--grateful for Dolly and the tender thoughts that were bound up in his love for her. The tender phantom Aimée's words had conjured up, stirred within his bosom a thrill so loving and impassioned, that for the time the radiance seemed to emanate from the very darkest of his clouds of disappointment and discouragement. He was reminded that but for those very clouds the girl's truth and faith would never have shone out so brightly. But for their poverty and long probation, he could never have learned how much she was ready to face for love's sake. And it was such an innocent phantom, too, this bright little figure smiling upon him through the darkness, with Dolly's own face, and Dolly's own saucy, fanciful ways, and Dolly's own hands outstretched toward him. He quite plucked up spirit. “If Old Flynn could just be persuaded to give me a raise,” he said; “it would n't take much of an income for two people to live on.” “No,” answered the wise one, feeling some slight misgivings, more on the subject of the out-go than the income. “You might live on very little--if you had it.” “Yes,” said Griffith, apparently struck by the brilliancy of the observation, “Dolly and I have said so often.” “Let me see,” considered Aimée, “suppose we were to make a sort of calculation. Give me your lead-pencil and a leaf out of your pocket-book.”