But to the day of her death Geraldine would never forget that hour on the bridge at Alderson--that hour into whose short compass were crowded so much pain and regret that she longed for death to end her misery. Mechanically she heard the whistle of an approaching train coming over the track at the end of the bridge. The rumble and roar blent with the rush of the river in her ears as she said, wearily: "Let us return to the hotel. I--am--so--tired!" Alas, poor girl! it was a tired heart! They walked back toward the railroad, and the train came rushing on with a thunderous roar. There was not one thought of suicide in her mind--she had always thought it a weak and cowardly act--but somehow a mad longing for death--because life was so bitter--seized on unhappy Geraldine. The train was so close that they must wait for it to pass before they could cross. She darted suddenly from the side of Standish and threw herself face downward across the trembling rails. CHAPTER XIV. A THEATRE PARTY. "Time flies. The swift hours hurry by And speed us on to untried ways; New seasons ripen, perish, die, And yet _love stays_! The old, old love--like sweet at first, At last like bitter wine-- I know not if it blest or curst Thy life and mine." Harry Hawthorne called on Miss Carroll several times, but she always had the same discouraging story to tell--no answer from Geraldine to the letters she had written. He gave up going at last, and tried to resign himself to his cruel disappointment. "If she ever cared for me in the least, that villain Standish with his infernal arts, has turned her against me forever. But let him look out for himself if he ever returns to New York. We shall have a reckoning then, over my letter to Geraldine that he intercepted," he said to himself, bitterly and often. Those were dreary days to the young fireman after he came out of the hospital and found Geraldine gone. People had always called him cold and unsocial somehow, and he became more reticent than ever now, going nowhere at all except when Captain Stansbury fairly dragged him to the house. Mrs. Stansbury, as soon as she returned from Newburgh, had been anxious to renew her acquaintance with Geraldine, but meeting Standish on the street one day and asking after her, she was told that the young girl had lost her position at O'Neill's because of her trip to Newburgh and had gone back to her country home in consequence. "Oh, I am so sorry, for I wished to cultivate her acquaintance, she was such a lovely girl!" the good-natured young woman said, regretfully: "Yes, very pretty, but a shocking flirt! I got acquainted with her on the street by a handkerchief flirtation," laughed the actor, and he saw that the leaven worked. Mrs. Stansbury did not approve of forward girls, and her eagerness to see more of pretty Geraldine was at once abated.