"How does Love speak? In the proud spirit suddenly grown meek The haughty heart grown humble; in the tender And unnamed light that floods the world with splendor, In the shy touch of hands that thrill and tremble. In looks and lips that can no more dissemble-- Thus doth Love speak!" "Oh, Cissy, I want you to promise me to come in and see him to-night," pleaded Geraldine, humbly. "I am sure you will be charmed with him, he is so good and so handsome." "So you said of Mr. Standish," reminded Cissy. Geraldine blushed, but answered, warmly: "I know I did; but--Mr. Hawthorne is nicer than the actor--oh, ever so much nicer! And"--slyly--"you will like him, Cissy, because he is as much opposed to my going on the stage as you are." "Then I shall cultivate his acquaintance," declared Cissy, beamingly. And she was almost as anxious for his coming that night as Geraldine was herself. But, as we have seen, both were disappointed. Harry Hawthorne lay ill and suffering at the hospital, and there was no one to tell Geraldine the story of his accident. Her young heart was heavy with pain and wonder all the next day, but still no message came to explain or excuse his failure to keep his engagement. Only some fair young girl as loving and tender as our sweet Geraldine, who has been disappointed as she was, can realize her silent grief that day as she stood behind the counter, patiently waiting on exacting customers and trying to seem cheerful and interested when she was longing to be alone in her own room, to bury her head in the pillow and have a good, comforting cry. She was wretched with doubt and suspense. And only yesterday she had been so wildly happy. Late in the afternoon Clifford Standish came into the store to buy a pair of gloves. He was bright, smiling, and elegant as ever, and chatted gayly with Geraldine. "I have some good news for you this evening," he whispered, but the girl scarcely smiled. She knew that he would not bring her any tidings of Harry Hawthorne, and it seemed to her that she cared for nothing else. How strange is love when it enters the heart as a guest, shutting out interest in everything else--strange, subtle, sweet, and absorbingly selfish. Geraldine forgot how well she had liked the actor, and how she had quarreled with Cissy for his sake. His attentions were repugnant to her now, and she wished ardently to be rid of him. But her tender, girlish heart reproached her for her fickleness, and she thought it would seem ungrateful to snub him now. So she only smiled at him plaintively, assuming an interest she did not feel. Bending across the counter, he whispered, so that Cissy could not hear: "I beg your pardon, but did your new admirer--did he call last night?" "No-o," faltered the girl, and she could hardly keep the tears from her eyes. "Why, that is strange. What prevented him from keeping his engagement?" "I do not know."