"Gone without giving me a syllable, a word, a touch! Gone, for an indefinite period, without even a cold 'good-by, Salome!' You call yourself a Christian, Dr. Grey, and yet you are cruel, now and then, and make me writhe like a worm on a fish-hook! He told Stanley he would return in two or three weeks, perhaps sooner,--but I know better. I have a dull monitor here that says it will be a long, dreary time, before I see him again. A wall of ice is rising to divide us--but it shall not! it shall not! I will have my own! I will look into his calm eyes! I will touch his soft, warm, white palms! I will hear his steady, low, clear voice, that makes music in my ears and heaven in my heart! It is three months since he shook hands with me, but all time cannot remove the feeling from my fingers; and some day I can cling to his hand and lean my cheek against it,--and who dare dispute my right? He says he never loved any woman! I heard him tell his sister he had yet to meet the woman whom he could marry,--and, if truth lingers anywhere in this world of sin, it finds a sanctuary in his soul! He never loved any woman! Thank God! I can't afford to doubt it. No one but his sister has touched his lips, or his noble, beautiful forehead. How I envied little Jessie when he put his arm around her and stooped and laid his cheek on hers. Oh, Dr. Grey, nobody else will ever love you as I do! I know I am unworthy, but I will make myself good and great to match you! I know I am beneath you, but I will climb to your proud height,--and, so help me God, I will be all that your lofty standard demands! He does not care for me now,--does not even think of me; but I must be patient and merit his notice, for my own folly sank me in his good opinion. When these apples were pale, pink blossoms, I dreaded his coming, and hoped the vessel would be wrecked; now, ere they are ripe, I am disposed to curse the cause of his temporary absence and think myself ill-used that no farewell privileges were granted me. Now I can understand why people find comfort in praying for those they love; for what else can I do but pray while he is away? Oh, I shall not, cannot, will not, miss my way to heaven if he gets there before me!" In utter abandonment she threw herself down in the long yellow sedge-grass,--frightening a whole covey of gossiping young partridges and a couple of meek doves, all of which whirred away to an adjacent pea-field, leaving her with her face buried in her hands, and watched by trembling mute crickets and cicadae. On the topmost twig of the tallest tree a mocking-bird poised himself, and sympathetically poured out his vesper canticle,--a song of condolence to the prostrate figure who, just then, would have preferred the echo of a man's deep voice to all Pergolese's strains. After a little while pitying Venus swung her golden globe in among the apple-boughs, peeping compassionately at her luckless votary; and, finally, in the violet west,--