of Pity--to feel that in life the sole end of each shift and contrivance is to slip the view--hallo, into a grave without epitaph, by paths as stealthy and sly as the poor hunted fox, when his last chance--and sole one--is, by winding and doubling, to run under the earth; to know that it would be an ungrateful imposture to take chair at the board--at the hearth, of the man who, unknowing your secret, says, 'Friend, be social'; accepting not a crust that one does not pay for, lest one feel a swindler to the kind fellow-creature whose equal we must not be!--all this--all this, Sophy, did at times chafe and gall more than I ought to have let it do, considering that there was ONE who saw it all, and would--Don't cry, Sophy; it is all over now." "Not cry! Oh, it does me so much good." "All over now! I am under this roof--without shame or scruple; and if Guy Darrell, knowing all my past, has proved my innocence in the eyes of those whom alone I cared for, I feel as if I had the right to stand before any crowd of men erect and shameless--a Man once more with Men! Oh, darling! let me but see thy old happy smile again! The happy smiles of the young are the sunshine of the old. Be patient--be firm; Providence is so very kind, Sophy." CHAPTER XI. WAIFE EXACTS FROM GEORGE MORLEY THE FULFILMENT OF ONE OF THOSE PROMISES WHICH MEAN NOTHING OR EVERYTHING. The next day George Morley visited Waife's room earlier than usual. Waife had sent for him. Sophy was seated by her grandfather--his hand in hers. She had been exerting herself to the utmost to talk cheerfully--to shake from her aspect every cloud of sorrow. But still THAT CHANGE was there--more marked than even on the previous day. A few hours of intense struggle, a single night wholly without sleep, will tell on the face of early youth. Not till we, hard veterans, have gone through such struggles as life permits not to the slight responsibilities of new recruits--not till sleepless nights have grown to us familiar will Thought seem to take, as it were, strength, not exhaustion, from unrelaxing exercise--nourish the brain, sustain the form by its own untiring, fleshless, spiritual immortality; not till many a winter has stripped the leaves; not till deep, and far out of sight, spread the roots that support the stem--will the beat of the east wind leave no sign on the rind. George has not, indeed, so noticed, the day before, the kind of withering blight that has passed over the girl's countenance; but he did now--when she met his eye more steadfastly, and had resumed something of the open genial infantine grace of manner which constituted her peculiar charm, and which it was difficult to associate with deeper griefs than those of childhood. "You must scold my grandfather," she said. "He chooses to fancy that he is not well enough yet to leave; and I am sure that he is, and will recover more quickly at home than here."