No words left her lips, but in her soft dear eyes I saw the truth--that truth that held me to her with a band that was indivisible, a bond that, though our lives lay apart, would still exist as strong as it had ever been. "Ella," I whispered at last, holding her slight, trembling form in my embrace, and kissing her again upon the lips, "will you not tell me the reason you dare not allow me to denounce this fellow? Is it not just that I should know?" She shook her head sadly, and, sighing deeply, answered:-- "I cannot tell you." "You mean that you refuse?" "I refuse because I am not permitted, and further, I--" "You what?" "I should be revealing to you his secret." "And what of that?" "If you knew everything, you would certainly go to the police and tell them the truth. They would arrest him, and I--I should die." "Die? What do you mean?" I asked quickly. "I could not live to face the exposure and the shame. He would seek to revenge himself by making counter-charges against me--a terrible allegation--but--but before he could do so they would find me dead." "And I?" "Ah! you, dear one! Yes, I know all that you must suffer. Your heart is torn like my own. You love just as fondly as I do, and you have mourned just as bitterly. To you, the parting is as hard as to myself. My life had been one of darkness and despair ever since that night in London when I was forced to lie to you. I wrecked your happiness because circumstances conspired against us--because it was my duty as a daughter to save my father from ruin and penury. Have you really in your heart forgiven me, Godfrey?" "Yes, my darling. How can I blame you for what was, after all, the noblest sacrifice a woman could make?" "Then let me go," she urged, speaking in a low, distinct voice, pale almost to the lips. "We must part--therefore perhaps the sooner the better, and the sooner my life is ended the more swiftly will peace and happiness come to me. For me the grave holds no terrors. Only because I leave you alone shall I regret," she sobbed. "And yet I must in future be alone," I said, swallowing the lump that arose in my throat. "No, Ella!" I cried, "I cannot bear it. I cannot again live without your presence." "Alas! you must," was her hoarse reply. "You must--you must." Wandering full of grief and bitter thoughts, vivid and yet confused, the hours sped by uncounted. To the cosmopolitan, like I had grown to be, green plains have a certain likeness, whether in Belgium, Germany or Britain. A row of poplars quivering in the sunshine looks much alike in Normandy or in Northamptonshire. A deep forest all aglow with red and gold in autumn tints is the same thing, after all, in Tuscany, as in Yorkshire.