“Dear, do you know it almost breaks your poor papa’s heart to see you always in that heavy, dismal black? Besides, he considers it quite prejudicial to your health. Now, won’t you please us, dear, by laying it aside in the evenings for something lighter in white or lavender?” Viola knew how they doted on her, and how she had grieved their hearts by her long stay abroad. She did not refuse, and permitted her aunt to select a soft white merino gown from her wardrobe, and have the maid trim it with pale lavender ribbons and dainty white chiffon. Then with great, odorous clusters of purple violets on her breast and in her hair, she went down to her father, who started with delight, exclaiming: “What a delightful change, my dear! Now you look more like my little girl Viola, and perhaps you will play and sing for me again?” Viola was in an acquiescent mood. She granted his request, though she had never before touched the piano since she came home. She tried to put her heart into the work, playing all he asked for, even singing again, and he noticed her voice had lost none of its beauty or power, only gained a deeper pathos that made it irresistible. Suddenly, in the midst of the singing, a caller was announced--Professor Desha. Viola greeted him with no apparent embarrassment, only she wished in her heart that she had still worn her black gown, and wondered if papa and Aunt Edwina had known of his coming. But her hasty glance at their faces showed no consciousness, only surprise, and in a little while they had slipped away, and she found herself alone with her old lover--alone for the first time since that March night almost a year ago when they had quarreled so bitterly, and he had gone away in anger, leaving her a jilted bride, mad with shame and misery. It all rushed over them both, and they could not speak of indifferent things. Desha cried, passionately: “Viola, you surely understand why I have come?” She smiled strangely, thinking that, like Florian, he wanted to pay his debt and get it over. She resolved that she would permit him to do so as soon as possible, wishing also to have it over. Desha’s eyes glowed with excitement as he said: “Viola--if you will permit me to call you again by that sweet name--you received my letter sent to you on the morning of the day that was to have witnessed our wedding?” She inclined her dark head in silent assent, and the exquisite odor of the violets on her breast floated out to him entrancingly, intoxicating his senses till he longed to crush her against his heart, whispering to her of all his love and repentance and despair. But there was no encouragement to such daring in her distant, half-weary pose as she waited for his next words, her large, brilliant eyes fixed on his pale, intellectual face, while she wondered how it had ever commanded her love.