 CHAPTER XXI. A FLOWER OF THE DUSK by Myrtle Reid. This Lieber-Vox recording is in the public domain. THE PARALS OF THE CITY. RADGER, remarked Miss Maddie, laying aside her paper, I don't know, as I'm in favour of you having to go to the city. Can't you get the judge another dog? Why not a mother? asked Roger, ignoring her question. Because it seems to me, from all I've been reading in here and lately, that the city ain't a proper place for a young person. Take that minister, now, that those folks brought down for Ambrose North's funeral. I never heard anything like it in all my life. You was there, and you heard what he said. So there ain't no need of dwelling on it, but it wasn't what I'm accustomed to in the way of funerals." Miss Maddie's militant hairpins bristled as she spoke. I thought it was all right, mother. What was wrong with it? Wrong, repeated Miss Maddie, in astonishment. Everything was wrong with it. Ambrose North wasn't a church member, and he never went more in once or twice than I know of. Even after the Lord chastened him with blindness for not going, there was no power to the sermon and no crying except Barbara and that miss-win that's saying that outlandish peace instead of a hymn. Why, Roger, I was to a funeral once over to the ridge, where the corpse was an unbaptised infant, and you ought to have heard that preacher describe in the abode of the lost. The child's mother fainted dead away and had to be carried out of the church. It was that powerful in moving. That was something like. It was in Roger's mind to say he was glad that the minister had not made Barbara faint, but he wisely kept silent. That's only one thing, Miss Maddie went on. What with religion being in that condition in the city, and the life-folks live there? I don't think it's any fit place for a person that ain't strong in the faith, and you know you ain't Roger. You take after your paw. I was reading in the Metropolitan Weekly only last week a story about a lovely young orphan that was caught one night by a rejected suitor and died to the railroad track just as the train was going to run over her, the man she wanted to marry come along on the dead run with a knife and cut her bonds. She got off the track just as the night express come around the curve going ninety-five miles an hour. This man says to her, Genevieve, will you come to me now and let me put you out of this dread villain's power for ever? Then he opened his arms, and the beautiful Genevieve fled to them as to some arc of safety and laid her pale and weary face upon his lovin' and forgiven haunt. That's the exact ending of it. And I must say it's written beautiful, but when I wake up in the night and think about it, I get scared to have you go. You ain't looking so bad, Roger, and you're gettin' to the age where you might be expected to take notice. And what if some designing female should tie you to the railroad track? I declare. It makes me nervous to think of it. Roger did not like to shake his mother's faith in the Metropolitan Weekly, but he longed to set her fears at rest. Those things aren't true, mother, he said kindly. They not only haven't happened, but they couldn't have happened. It's impossible. Roger, what do you mean by stayin' such things? Of course it's true, or it wouldn't be in the paper. Ain't it right there in print, as plain as the nose on your face? You can see it for yourself. A hope-studyin' law ain't going to make an infidel of you. I don't think it will, temporized, Roger. I'll keep a close watch for designing female's, and we'll avoid railroad tracks at night. Miss Maddie shook her head doubtfully. That ain't going to do no good, Roger, if they once get set after you. I've noticed that the villain always triumphs. But only for a little while, mother. Surely you must have seen that. She settled her steel-bowed spectacles firmly on the wart and gazed at him. I believe you're right, she said, after a few moments of reflection. I can't recall no story now where the villain was not foiled at last. Let me see. There was lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's Darling, and Margaret Merriman, or the maid's mad marriage, and true gold, or pretty crystal's love, and the American Countess, or Hearts, a flame, and this one I was just speakin' of, Genevieve Carlton, or the Breakman's Bride. In every one of them the villain got his just desserts, though sometimes they was disjointed, Owen, to the story being broke off at the most interest and point, and continued the following week. Well, if the villain is always foiled, you're surely not afraid, are you? I don't know as I'm afraid in the long run, but I don't like to have you go through such things and be exposed to the temptations of a great city. Why don't you come with me, mother, and keep house for me? We can find a little flat somewhere, and—what on earth is that? I've never been in one myself, but Miss Wynne said that, if you wanted to come, she would find us a flat or an apartment. What's the difference between a flat and an apartment? That's what I asked her. She said it was just the rent. You pay more for an apartment than you do for a flat. I wouldn't want anything I had to pay more for," observed Miss Maddie, stroking her chin thoughtfully. You ain't told me what a flat is. A few rooms, all on one floor, like a cottage. It's like several cottages, all under one roof. What do they want to cover the cottages with a roof for? Don't they want light and air? You don't understand, mother. Suppose that our house here was an apartment house. The stairs would be shut off from these rooms, and the hall would be accessible from the street. Instead of having three rooms upstairs, there might be six, one of them a kitchen, and the other's living rooms and bedrooms, don't you see? You mean a kitchen on the same floor with the bedrooms? Yes, all the rooms on one floor. Just as if an earthquake was to jolt off the top of the house and shake all the bedrooms down here? Something like that. Well, then, said Miss Maddie firmly, all I've got to say is that it ain't decent. Think of people sleeping just off kitchens and washing their faces and hands in the sink. I think some of them must be very nice, mother. Miss Wynne expects to live in an apartment after she's married, and she has a little one of her own now. If you'll come with me, we'll find some place that you'll like. I don't want to leave you alone here. No, she answered with due deliberation. I reckon I'll stay here. You can't transplant an old tree, and you can't take a woman who has lived all her life in a house and put her in a place where there are several cottages all under one roof with bedrooms off of kitchens and folks washing in the sinks. Miss Wynne can do it if she likes, but I was brought up different. I'm afraid you'll be lonesome. I don't know why I should be any more lonesome than I always have been. All I see of you is at meals and while you're reading nights, you're just like your paw. If I propped up a book by the lamp, it would just be as sociable as it is to have you sitting here. Reading is a good thing in its place, and I enjoy it myself, but sometimes it's pleasant to hear the human voice say in something besides what, and yes, and all right, and a supper ready. I've been looking through your things and getting them ready. The moths has ate your winter flannels, and you'll have to get more. I've mended your coat linens and sewed on buttons and darned and patched, and I've took Barbara North's blue hair ribbon back to her, the one you found someplace and had in your pocket. You mustn't be careless about those things, Roger. She might think you meant to steal it. What did Barbara say? He stammered. The high colour had mounted to his temples. She didn't know what to say at first, but she recognised it as her hair ribbon. I told her you hadn't meant to steal it, that you'd just found it somewheres, and had forgot to give it to her, and it was all right. She laughed some, but it was a funny laugh. You must be careful, Roger. You won't always have your mother to get you out of scrapes. Roger wondered if the knot of blue ribbon that had so strangely gone back to Barbara had, by any chance, carried to her its intangible freight of dreams and kisses, with a boyish tear or two, of which he had the grace not to be ashamed. Your paw was in the habit of annexing female belongings, though the Lord knows where he ever got them. I suppose he picked them up on the street. He was so dreadful, absent-minded. He was systematic about them in a way, though. After he died I found them all put away most careful in a box, a handkerchief and one kid glove, and a piece of ribbon about like the one I took back to Barbara. He was flighty sometimes. Constant devotion to Readon had unsettled his mind. That brings me to what I wanted to say when I first started out. I don't want you should load up your trunk with your paws focused to the exclusion of your clothes, and I don't want you to spend your evenings reading. I'm not apt to read very much, mother, if I work in an office in the daytime and go to law school at night. That's so, too, but there's Sundays. You can take any ten of your paws books that you like, but no more. I'll keep the rest here against the time the train is blocked and the males don't come through. I may get a taste for your paws books myself. Roger did not think it likely, but he was too wise to say so. And I didn't tell you this before, but I've made it my business to go and see the judge and tell him how you saved my life at the expense of phytos. I don't know when I've seen a man so mad. I was going to suggest that we get him another dog from some place, and Lance sakes. He clean drove it out of my mind. I don't know how you've stood it being there in the office with him, and I told him so. He's got a redheaded boy from the ridge in there now, and I think maybe the judge will get what's coming to him before he gets through. I've learned not to trifle with anybody what has red hair, but seemingly the judge ain't. It takes some folks a long time to learn. Barbara's going to the city, too, to spend the winter with that Miss Wynne in the cottage that's under the same roof with other cottages and the bedrooms off the kitchen. I don't know how Barbara will take to Washington in the sink when she's always had that rose-sprigged bowl and pitcher of her maws, but it's her business, not mine. And if she wants to go, she can. Me and Merriam will sit together evenings and keep each other from being lonesome. She ain't much more company than a cow, as far as talking goes, but there's a feeling some way. And another person being in the house when the wind gets to howlin' down the chimney, we may arrange to have supper together once in a while, and in case of severe weather, put the two fires going in one house, whichever's the warmest. I don't know what we shall do, or we ain't talked it over much, but with church twice on Sunday and prayer meetin' Wednesday evenings, and the sewin' circle on Friday, and two New York papers every week, and Merriam and all your pause books to prop up against the lamp, I don't reckon I'll get so dreadful lonesome. I've thought some of gettin' myself a cat. There's somethin' buddy comfortable, unheartin'in' about a cup of hot tea and the sound of burn close by, and on the spring excursion to the city, I reckon I'll come up and see you, if I don't have no more pain in my back. I'd love to have you, come, mother, and I do all I could to give you a good time. I know the others would, too. Dr. Conrad has an automobile, and Miss Maddie became deeply concerned. Is he treatin' himself for it? She demanded. I don't think so, answered Roger, choking a laugh. It beats all, used Miss Maddie. They say the shoemaker's children never have shoes, and it seems that doctors have diseases just like other folks. I'd just remember of havin' heard of this, but I know from my own experience that a disease with only one word to it can be dreadful painful. Is it catchin'? Not with speedful arm, replied Roger, and automobile is very hard to catch. Well, see that you don't take it, cautioned Miss Maddie. The first part of his answer was obscure, but she was not one to pause over an uninteresting detail. You've warned me about almost everything now, mother, he said, smiling. Is there anything else? Nothing but matrimony, and that's included under the head of designing females. I shouldn't want you to get married. Why not? I don't know as I could tell you just why, only it seems to be that a person is just as well off without it. I've been thinking of it a good deal since I've had these New York papers, and read so much about two souls being welded into one. My soul wasn't never welded with your paws, nor his with mine, as I know of. Marriage wasn't so dreadful different from livin' at home. It reminded me of the summer Ma took a border. Your paw required so much weight on, and when you came I had a baby to take care of besides. If I was welded I never noticed it. I was too busy. Roger's heart softened into unspeakable pity. In missing the welding Miss Maddie had missed the best that life has to give. Somewhere, doubtless, the man existed who could have stirred the woman's soul beneath the surface shallows and set the sort of tasks of daily living in tune with the music that sways the world. There's a good deal in the papers about unmarriage too, resumed Miss Maddie. And I can't understand it. When you've stood before the altar and said till death do us part, I don't see how another man who ain't even a minister can undo it and let you have another chance at it. Maybe you do bein' as your up in law. But I don't. It looks to me as if the laws were wrong or else the marriage ceremony ought to be written different. If a man said, I take thee to be my wedded wife to love and to cherish until I see somebody else I like better, I could understand the unmarriage. But I can't now. When you get to be a power in the law, Roger, I think you should try to get that fixed. I never was welded, but after I'd given my word I stuck to it, even though your paw was dreadful aggravating sometimes. He didn't mean to be, but he was. I guess it's the nature of men, folks. Deeply moved Roger went over and kissed her smooth cheek. Have I been aggravating mother? Miss Maddie's eyes grew misty. She took off her spectacles and wiped them briskly on one corner of the table cover. No more and was natural, I guess, she answered. You've been a good boy, Roger, and I want you should be a good man. When you get away from home, where your mother can't look after you, just remember that she expects you to be good, like your paw. He might have been aggravating, but he wasn't wicked. All the best part of the boy's nature rose in answer, and the mist came into his eyes too. I'll remember, mother, and you shall never be disappointed in me. I promise you that. END OF CHAPTER XXI CHAPTER XXII A FLOWER OF THE DUSK by Myrtle Reed This leap of ox recording is in the public domain. Autumn leaves. Summer had gone long ago, but the sweetness of her passing yet lay upon the land and sea. The hills were glorious with the pageantry of scarlet and gold ware. In the midnight silences the soul of the woods had flamed in answer to the far mysterious bugles of the frost. Bloom was on the grapes in the vineyard, and fairy lace of cobweb fineness had been hung by the secret spinners from stem to stem of the purple clusters and across bits of stubble in the field. From the blue sea now and then came the breath of winter, though autumn lingered on the shore. Many of the people at the hotel had gone back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen wind, Eloise, with a few others, waited. She expected to stay until Barbara was strong enough to go with her, but Barbara's strength was coming very slowly now. She grieved for her father, and the grieving kept her back. Allen came down once a fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though he realized that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach. She doesn't need medicine, he said to Eloise. She is perfectly well, physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for some time to come. What she needs is happiness. That is what we all need, answered Eloise. Allen flashed a quick glance at her. Even I, he said, in a different tone. But I must wait for mine. We all wait for things, she laughed, but the lovely color had mounted to the roots of her hair, and that waved so softly back from her low forehead. When, dear, insisted Allen, possessing himself of her hand, I promised once, she answered, when the color is all gone from the hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I'll come. You're not counting the oaks, he asked half fearfully. Sometimes the oak leaves stay all winter, you know, and evergreens are ruled out, aren't they? Certainly. We won't count the oaks or the Christmas trees. Long before Santa Claus comes, I'll be as a date matron instead of a flyaway frivolous spinster. For the first time since I grew up, remarked Allen with evident sincerity, I wish Christmas came earlier. Upon what day, fair lady, do you think the leaves will be gone? In November, I suppose, she answered with an affected indifference that did not deceive him. The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps. That's Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday. Then the day before, that's Wednesday, you know the old rhyme says Wednesday the best day of all. So it was settled, Allen laughingly put down in his little red leather pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November 25th, Miss Winn's wedding. Where is it to be? he asked. I wouldn't miss it for worlds. I've been thinking about that, said Eloise slowly, after a pause. I suppose we'll have to be conventional. Why? Because everybody is. The very reason why we shouldn't be. This is our wedding, and we'll have it to please ourselves. It's probably our last. In spite of the advanced civilization in which we live, she returned. I hope and believe it is the one and only wedding in which either of us will ever take a leading part. Haven't you ever had daydreams, dear, about your wedding? Many a time, she laughed. I'd be the rankest kind of polygamist if I had all the kinds I've planned for, but the best kind, he persisted. Which is the ascendant now? If I could choose, she replied thoughtfully, I'd have it in some quiet little country-church on a brilliant sun-shiny day. The kind that makes your blood tingle and fills you with the joy of living. I'd like it to be an Indian summer, with gold and crimson leaves falling all through the woods. I'd like to have little brown birds chirping, and squirrels and chipmunks pattering through the leaves. I'd like to have the church almost in the heart of the woods, and have the sun stream into every nook and corner of it while we were being married. I'd like to taper lights at the altar and the Episcopal service, but no music. Any crowd? Her sweet face grew very tender. No, she said. Nobody but our two selves. We'll have to have a minister, he reminded her, practically, and two witnesses, otherwise it isn't legal. Whom would you choose for witnesses? I'd like to have Barbara and Roger. I don't know why, for I have so many other friends who mean more to me. Yet it seems some way as if the two belonged in the picture. A bright idea came to Alan. Dearest, he said, you couldn't have the falling leaves and the squirrels, if we waited until Thanksgiving time. But it's all here, right now. Don't you remember that little church in the woods that we passed the other day, the little white church with maples all around it, and the autumn leaves dropping silently through the still warm air? Why not here, and now? Oh, I couldn't, cried Eloise. Why not? Oh, you're so stupid. Clothes and things. I've got a million things to do before I can be married decently. He laughed at her woman's reason, as he put his arms around her. I want a wife, and not a Parisian wardrobe. You're lovelier to me right now in your white linen gown than you've ever been before. Don't wear yourself out with dressmakers and shopping. You'll have all the rest of your life for that. Won't I have all the rest of my life to get married in? She queried demurely. You have if you insist upon taking it, darling, but I feel very strongly to get married to-day. Not to-day, she demured. Why not? It's only half past one, and the ceremony doesn't last over twenty minutes. I suppose it can be cut down to fifteen or eighteen if you insist upon having it condensed. You don't even need to wash your face. Get your hat, and come. His tone was tender, even pleading, but some far survival of primitive woman whose marriage was by capture stirred faintly in Eloise. Our friends won't like it, she said, as a last excuse. He noted with joy that she said won't instead of wouldn't, but she did not realize that she had betrayed herself. We don't care, do we? he asked. It's our wedding and nobody's else. When we can't please everybody, we might as well please ourselves. Matrimony is the one thing in the world that concerns nobody but the two who enter into it, and it's the thing that everybody has the most to say about. While you're putting on your hat, I'll get the license and see about a carriage. I thought I'd wait until Barbara could go to town with me, she said. There's nothing to hint her you're coming back for her, if you want to, and she isn't willing to come with Roger. I insist upon having my honeymoon alone. All alone? If I were very good, wouldn't you let me come along? Alan colored. You know what I mean, he said softly. I've waited so long, darling, and I think I've been patient. Isn't it time I was rewarded? They were on the beach, behind the friendly sand dune that had been their tristing place all summer, thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet wholly womanly. Eloise put her soft arms around his neck. I will, she said. Kiss me before the last time, before— Before what? demanded Alan, as laughing. She extricated herself from his close embrace. Before you exchange your sweetheart for a wife. I'm not making any exchange. I'm only making my possession more secure. Look, dear, he took from his pocket a shining golden circlet, which exactly fitted the third finger of her left hand. Their initials were engraved inside. Only the date was lacking. I've had it for a long, long time, he said in reply to her surprised question. I hoped that some day I might find you in a yielding mood. When she went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden plunge into the unknown was blinding, even if she longed to make it. Having come to the edge of the precipice, she feared the leap, in spite of the conviction that lifelong happiness lay beyond. In the fond side of her lover, Eloise was very lovely when she went down in her white gown and hat. Her eyes shining with the world-old joy that makes the old world new for those to whom it comes, be it soon or late. It's beautifully unconventional, she said, as he assisted her into the Surrey. No bridesmaids, no waiting-presence, and no dreary round of entertainments. I believe I like it. I know I do, he responded fervently. You're the loveliest thing I've ever seen, sweetheart. Is that a new gown? I've worn it all summer, she laughed. And it's been washed over a dozen times. You have lots to learn about gowns. I'm a willing pupil, he announced. Shouldn't you have a veil? I believe the bride's veil is usual of Tula, caught with the diamond star, the gift of the groom. You've been reading the society column. Give me the star, and I'll get the veil. You shall have it the first minute we get to town. I'd rob the milky way for you, if I could. I'd give you a handful of stars to play with, and let you roll the sun and moon over the golf links. I may take the moon, she replied. I've always liked the looks of it. But I'm afraid the sun would burn my fingers. Somebody once caught into trouble, I believe, for trying to drive the chariot of the sun for a day. Give me the moon, and just one star. Which star do you want? The left star, she answered very softly. Will you keep it shining for me in spite of clouds and darkness? Indeed I will. The horses stopped at Barbara's door. Alan went across the street to call for Roger, and Eloise went in to invite Barbara to go for a drive. How lovely you look! cried Barbara in admiration. You look like a bride! Make yourself look bridal also, suggested Eloise flushing, by putting on your best white gown. Roger is coming, too. Barbara missed the point entirely. It did not take her long to get ready, and she sang happily to herself while she was dressing. She put a white lace scarf of her mother's over her golden hair, which was now piled high on her shapely head, and started out, for the first time in all her twenty-two years, for a journey beyond the limits of her own domain. Alan and Roger helped her in. She was very awkward about it, and was sufficiently impressed with her awkwardness to offer a laughing apology. I've never been in a carriage before, she said, nor seen a train, nor even a church. All I've had is pictures and books. And Roger, she added, as an afterthought, when he took his place beside her on the back seat. You're going to see lots and lots today that you never saw before. Absurd, Alan, starting the horses toward the hill road. We'll begin by showing you a church, and then a wedding. A wedding? cried Barbara. Who is going to be married? We, he replied concisely. Don't you think it's time? Isn't it sudden? asked Roger. I thought you weren't going to be married until almost Christmas. I've been serving time now for two years, explained Alan. And she's given me two months off for good behavior. Just remember, young man, when your turn comes that nothing is sudden when you've been waiting for it all your life. The door of the little white church was open, and the sun that streamed through the door and the stained glass windows carried the glory and the radiance of autumn into every nook and corner of it. At the altar burned two tall taper lights, and the young minister in white vestments was waiting. The joking mood was still upon Alan and Eloise, but she requested in all seriousness that the word obey be omitted from the ceremony. Why? asked the minister gravely. Because I don't want to promise anything I don't intend to do. Put it in for me, suggested Alan cheerfully. I might as well promise, for I'll have to do it anyway. Gradually the hush and solemnity of the church banished the light mood. A new joy, deeper and more lasting, took the place of laughter as they sat in the front pew, reading over the service. Barbara and Roger sat together, halfway down to the door. Neither had spoken since they entered the church. A shaft of golden light lay full upon Eloise's face. In that moment before they went to the altar, Alan was afraid of her. She seemed so angelic, so unreal. But the minister was waiting with his open book. Come! said Alan in a whisper, and she rose smiling to follow him, not only then, but always. Dearly beloved, began the minister, we are gathered here together in the sight of God and in the face of this company to join together this man and this woman in holy matrimony. He went on through the beautiful service, while the light streamed in, bearing its very freight of color and gold, and the swift patter of the little people of the forest rustled through the drifting leaves. It was all as Eloise had chosen, even to the two who sat far back, with their hands clasped as wide-eyed as children before the sacred merging of two souls into one. A little brown bird perched on the threshold, chirped a few questioning notes, then flew away to his own nest. Acorns fell from the oaks across the road, and the musical hum and whir of autumn came finally from the fields. The taper lights burned in the sunshine, like yellow stars. That ye may so live together in this life, the minister was saying, that in the world to come, ye may have life everlasting. Amen. It was over in an incredibly brief space of time. When they came down the aisle, Allen had the satisfied air of a man who had just emerged, triumphantly, through his own skill, from a very difficult and dangerous ordeal. Eloise was radiant, for her heart was singing within her a splendid strove of joy. When Barbara and Roger went to meet them, the strange new shyness that had settled down upon them both effectively hindered conversation. Roger began an awkward little speech of congratulation, which immediately became inarticulate and ended in silent embarrassment. But Allen rung Roger's hand in a mighty grip that made him wince, and Eloise smiled, for she saw more than either of them had yet guessed. Your kids, she said fondly, just dear, foolish kids. Impulsively she kissed them both, then they all went out into the sunshine again. The minister's eyes followed them, with a certain wistfulness, for he was young, and as yet the great miracle had not come to him. He sighed when he put out the tapers and closed the door that divided him from the music of autumn, and one great overwhelming joy. On the way home, neither Barbara nor Roger spoke. They had nothing to say, and the others were silent because they had so much. They left the two at Barbara's gate, then Allen turned the horses back to the hill-road. They were to have two glorious golden hours alone before taking the afternoon train. Barbara and Roger watched them as they went slowly up the tawny road that trailed like a ribbon over the pageantry of the hill. When they came to the crossroads, where one road led to the church and the other into the boundless world beyond, Eloise leaned far out to wave a fluttering bit of white. In farewell. And on her lover's arm she lent, and round her waist she felt it fold, and far across the hills they went, in that new world which is the old, quoted Barbara softly, and o'er the hills and far away, beyond their utmost purple rim, beyond the night across the day, through all the world she followed him, added Roger. The carriage was now only a black speck on the brow of the hill. Presently it descended into the autumn sunset and vanished altogether. I'm glad they asked us, said Roger. Wasn't it dear of them? cried Barbara, with her face aglow. Oh, Roger, if I ever have a wedding, I want it to be just like that. End of Chapter 22 Chapter 23 A Flower of the Dusk by Myrtle Reed This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Roger was in the library, trying to choose, from an embarrassment of riches, the ten of his father's books, which he was to be permitted, to take to the city with him. With characteristic thoughtfulness, Eloise had busied herself in his behalf immediately upon her return to town. She had found a good opportunity for him, and the letter appointing the time for a personal interview was even then in his pocket. Neither he nor his mother had the slightest doubt, as to the result. Miss Batty was certain that any lawyer would sense enough to practice law, would be only too glad to have Roger in his office. She scornfully dismissed the grieving owner of Fido, from her consideration, for it was obvious that anyone with even passable mental equipment would not have been disturbed by the accidental and painless removal of a bullpup. Roger's ambition and eagerness made him very sure of the outcome of his forthcoming venture. All he asked for was the chance to work, and Eloise was giving him that. How good she had been, and how much she had done for Barbara. Roger's heart fairly overflowed with gratitude, and he registered a boyish vow not to disappoint those who believed in him. It seems strange to think of Eloise as Mrs. Conrad. She had signed her brief note to Roger, very cordially, Eloise win, Conrad. Down in the corner she had written Mrs. Allen Conrad. Roger smiled as he noted the space between the wind and the Conrad in her signature, the surest portrayal of a bride. If I should marry, Roger thought, my wife's name would be Mrs. Roger Austin. He wrote it out on a scrap of paper to see how it would look. It was certainly very attractive, and if it were Barbara, for instance, she would sign her letters Barbara North Austin. He wrote that out too, and in the lamp light appreciatively studied the effect from many different angles. It was really a very beautiful name. He lost himself in reverie, and it was nearly an hour afterward when he returned to the difficult task of choosing his ten books. Shakespeare, of course. Fortunately, there was a one-volume edition that came within the letter of the law, if not the spirit of it. To this he added, Browning, as it happened, there was a complete one-volume edition of this, too. Emerson came next, the essays in two volumes, that made four. He added Vanity Fair, David Copperfield, a translation of The Aenid, and his beloved Keats. He hesitated a long time over the last two, but finally took down Boswell's Life of Johnson, and the essays of Elia, neither of which he had read. Behind these two books, which had stood side by side, there was a small, thin book that had either fallen down or been hidden there. Roger took it out and carefully wiped off the dust. It was a blank book in which his father had written on all but the last few pages. He took it over to the table, drew the lamp closer, and sat down. The gay cover had softened with the years. The pages were yellow, and some of them were blurred by blistering spots. The ink had faded, but the writing was still legible. At the top of the first page was The Date, Evening, June, The Seventh. I have long lived, was written on the next line below, but a thousand years of living have been centered remorselessly into today. I cannot go over, though in this house, and in the one across the road it will seem very strange. I knew the clouds of darkness must eternally hide us each from the other, that we must see each other no more save at a great distance, but the thunder and the riving, lightning, have put heaven between us, as well as earth. I cannot eat, for food is dust and ashes in my mouth. I cannot drink enough water to moisten my dry, parched throat. I cannot answer when anyone speaks to me, for I do not hear what is said. It does not seem that I shall ever sleep again. Yet God, pitiless and unforgiving, lets me live on. The remainder of the page was blank. The next entry was dated, June 10th, night. I had to go. There was no other way. I had to sit and listen. I saw the blind man in the room beyond, sitting beside the dark woman with the hard face. She had the little lame baby in her arms, the baby who was a year or so younger than my own son. I smelled the tuberoses, and the great clusters of white lilacs, and I saw her dead, with her golden braids on either side of her, smiling in her white casket, when no one was looking. I touched her hand. I called softly. Constance. She did not answer. So I knew she was dead. I had to go to the churchyard with the others. I was compelled to look at the grave and see the white casket lowered in. I heard that awful fall of earth upon her, and a voice saying those terrible words. Dust to dust, earth to earth, ashes to ashes. The blind man sobbed aloud when the earth fell. The dark woman with the hard face did not seem to care. I could have strangled her, but I had to keep my hands still. They said that she had not been sleeping, and that she took too much ladnum by mistake. It was not a mistake, for she was not of that sort. She did it purposely. She did it because of that one mad hour of full confession. I have killed her. After three years of self-control, it failed me, and I went mad. It was my fault. For if I had not failed, she would not have gone mad, too. I have killed her. June 15th, midnight. I am calmer now. I can think more clearly. I have been alone in the woods all day and every day since. I have been thinking, thinking, thinking, and going over everything. She left no word for me. She was so sure I would understand. I do not understand yet, but I shall. There was no wrong between us. There never would have been. We were divided by the whole earth, denied by all the leagues of sundering sea. Now we are estranged by all the angels of heaven, and all the hosts of hell. My arms ache for her. My lips hunger for hers. In that mysterious darkness, does she want me to? Did her heart cry out for me as mine for her, until the blood of the poppies mingled with hers and brought the white sleep? It would have been something to know that we breed the same air. Trot the same highways. Listen together to the Thresh and Robin, and all the winged wayfares of forest and field. It would have been comfort to know the same sun shone on us both, that the same moon lighted the midnight silences with misty silver, that the same stars burned table lights in the vaulted darkness for her and for me. But I have not even that. I have nothing, though. I have done no wrong beyond holding her in my arms for one little hour. Out of all the time that was before our beginning, out of all the time that shall be after our ending, and in all the unpitying years of our mortal life, we have had one hour. June 19th. I have been to her grave. I have tried to realize that the little mound of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars sweep endlessly, still shelters her, that in some way she is there. But I cannot. The mystery agonizes me, for I have never had the belief that comforts so many. Why is one belief any better than another when we come face to face with the gray, impenetrable veil that never parts save for a passage? Freed from the bonds of earth, does she still live somewhere in perfect peace with no thought of me? Sentient but invisible. Is she here beside me now? Or is she asleep? Dreamlessly abiding in the earth, until some archangel shall sound the trumpet bidding all the myriad dead arise. Oh God! God! Only tell me where she is, that I may go too. June 21st. It is true that the path she took is open to me also. I have thought of it many times. I am not afraid to follow where she has led, even into the depths of hell. I have had for several days a vial of crushed puppies, and the bitter odor even now fills my room. Only one thought stays my hand. My little son. Should I follow, he must inevitably come to believe that his father was a coward, that he was afraid of life, which is the most craven fear of all. He will see that I have given to him something that I could not bear myself, and will despise me, as people despise a man who shirks his burden and shifts it to the shoulders of one weaker than he. When temptation assails him, he will remember that his father yielded. When life looms dark before him, and among the fearful shadows, there is no hint of light. He will recall that his father was too much of a coward to go into those same shadows, carrying his own light. And if his heart is ever filled with an awful agony that requires all of his strength to meet it, he will remember that his father failed. I could not rest in my grave if my son, living, should despise me, even though my narrow house was in the same darkness that hides her. July 10th, dawn. This, then, is my punishment, because for one hour my self-control deserted me, when my man's blood had been crying out for three years for the touch of her, because for one little hour my hungry arms held her close to my aching heart, there is no peace. Nowhere in earth nor in heaven nor in hell is there one moment's forgetfulness. Nowhere in all God's illimitable universe is there pardon and surcease of pain. The blind man comes to me and talks of her. He asks me piteously why. He calls me his friend. He says that she often spoke of me, that they were glad to have me in their house. He asks me if she ever said one word that would give reason. Was she unhappy? Was it because he was blind and the little yellow-haired baby with her mother's blue eyes was born lame? I can only say no, and beg him not to talk of it, not even to think of it. July 20th, night. The beauty of the world amidst summer only makes my loneliest more keen. The butterflies flip through the meadows, like wandering souls of last year's flowers, that died and were buried by the snow. The harvest moon, red gold and wonderful, will rise slowly up out of the sea. The path of light will lie on the still waters and widen into a vast arc at the line of the shore. Cobwebs will come among the stubble when the harvest is gathered in, and on them will lie dewdrops that the moon will make into pearls. The gorgeous coloring of autumn will transfigure the hills with glory and fill the far silences with misty amethyst and gold. The year-long sleep will come with the first snow, and the stars burn blue and cold in the frosty night. April bugles will wake the violets and anemones. The dead leaves of autumn will be starred with springtime bloom. May will dance through the world and lilacs and apple blossoms, and I shall be alone. I can go to her grave again and see the violets all around it, their exquisite odor made of her dust. I can carry to her the first roses of June, as I used to do, but she cannot take them in her still hands. I can only lay them on that impassable mound and let the warm rains, as soft as woman's tears, drip down and down, until the fragrance and my love come to her in the mist. But will she care, as that last sleep so deep that the quiet heart is never stirred by love? When my whole soul goes out to her in an agony of love and pain, is it possible that there is no answer? If there is a God in heaven, it cannot be. October 5th, night. It is said that time heals everything. I have been waiting to see if it were so. Day by day my loss is greater. Day by day my grief becomes more difficult to bear. I read all the time, or pretend to. I sit for hours with the open book before me and never see a line that is printed there. Oh, love, if I could dream tonight, in the earth with you. October 7th, just four months ago today, I was numb then, with the shock and horror. I could not feel as I do now. When the tide of my heart came in, with agony in every pulse beat, it rose steadily to the full, without pause, without rest. I think it has reached its flood now, for I cannot endure more, while there ever be recession. November 10th. I am coming gradually to have some sort of faith. I do not know why, for I have never had it before. I can see that all things made of earth must perish as the leaves. Passion dies because it is of the earth, but does not love live? If only the finer things of the spirit could be bequeathed, like material possessions. All I have to leave my son as a very small income and a few books. I cannot give him endurance, self-control, or the power to withstand temptation. I cannot give him joy. If I could, I should leave him one priceless gift. My love for Constance. To which, for one hour, hers answered fully, I should give him that love with no barrier to divide it from its desire. I wonder if Constance would have left hers to her little yellow-haired girl. I wonder if sometimes the joys of the fathers are not visited upon their children, as well as their sins. November 19th. Night. I have come to believe that love never dies for God as love, and he is immortal. My love for Constance has not died and cannot. Why should hers have died? It does not seem that it has. Since today, for the first time, I have found her cease. Constance is dead, but she has left her love to sustain and strengthen me. It streams out from the quiet hillside tonight, as never before, and gives me the peace of benediction. I understand now. The blinding pain of the last five months. The immortal spirit of love, which can neither die nor grow old, was extricating itself from the earth that clung to it. December 3rd. At last I have come to perfect peace. I no longer hunger so terribly for the touch of her, for my aching arms clasp her close, for her lips to quiver beneath mine. The tide has ebbed. There is no more pain. I have come, strangely, into kinship with the universe. I have a feeling tonight of brotherhood. I can see that death is no division when hot is deep enough to hold a grave. The grey angel cannot separate her from me, though she took the white poppies from his hand, and gave none to me. December 18th. Constance, beloved, I feel you near tonight. The wild snows of winter have flown across your grave, but your love is warm and sweet around my heart. The sorrow is all gone, and in its place has come a peace as deep and calm as the sea. I can wait, day by day, until the grey angel summons me to join you, until the poppies that stilled your heartbeats shall, in another way, quiet mine too. I can have faith. I can believe that somewhere beyond the star-filled spaces, when this arc of mortal life merges into the perfect circle of eternity, there will be no barrier between you and me, because if God is love, love must be God, and he has no limitations. I can take up my burden and go on until the road divides, and the grey angel leads me down your path. I can be kind. I can try each day to put joy into the world that so sorely needs it, and to take nothing away from whatever it holds of happiness now. I can be strong because I have known you. I can have courage because you were brave. I can be true because you were true. I can be tender because I love you. At last I understand it is passion that cries out for continual assurance, for fresh sacrifices, for new proof. Love needs nothing but itself. It asks for nothing but to give itself. It denies nothing, neither barriers nor the grave. Love can wait until life comes to its end, and trust to eternity, because it is of God. Roger put the little book down and wiped his eyes. He had never come upon a man's heart-laid bear, and was thrilled to the depths by the revelation. He was as one who stands in a holy place, with uncovered head in the hush that follows prayer. In the midst of his tenderness for his dead father, welled up a passionate loyalty toward the woman who slept in the room adjoining the library, whose soul had never been welded. She had known life no more than a prattling brook in a meadow may know the sea. Bound in shallows she knew nothing of the unutterable vastness, in which deep answered unto deep. Tide and tempest and blue surges were fraught with no meaning for her. The clock struck twelve and Roger still sat there, with his head resting upon his hand. He read once more his father's wish to bequeath to him his love, with no barrier to divide it from its desire. Hedged in by earth and hopelessly put asunder, could it at last come to fulfillment through daughter and son? At the thought his heart swelled with a pure passion all its own, the eager pulse beats owed nothing to the dead. He found a sheet of paper and reverently wrapped up the little brown book. An hour later he slipped under the string a letter of his own, sealed and addressed and quietly, though afraid that the beating of his heart sounded in the stillness, went out into the night. End of Chapter 23 Chapter 24 A Flower of the Dusk by Myrtle Reed This Librivox recording is in the public domain. The bells in the tower The sea was very blue behind the Tower of Cologne, though it was not yet dawn. The velvet darkness in that enchanted land seemed to have a magical quality. It veiled, but did not hide. Barbara went up the glass steps, made of Cologne bottles, and opened the door. She had not been there for a long time, but nothing was changed. The winding stairway hung with tapestries, and the round windows at the landings, through which one looked to the sea, were all the same. King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, and Guinevere were all in the tower, as usual. The Lady of Chalot was there, with Mr. Pickwick, Dora, and Little Nell. All the dear people of the books moved through the lovely rooms, sniffing at Cologne, or talking and laughing with each other, just as they pleased. The red-haired young man, and the two blue and white nurses, were still there, but they seemed to be on the point of going out. Dr. Conrad and Eloise were in every room she went into. Eloise was all in white, like a bride, and the doctor was very, very happy. Ambrose North was there, no longer blind or dead, but well and strong and able to see. He took Barbara in his arms. When she went in, kissed her and called her Constance. A sharp pang went through her heart, because he did not know her. I'm Barbara, Daddy! she cried out. Don't you know me? But he only murmured, Constance, my beloved, and kissed her again, not with a father's kiss, but with a yearning tenderness that seemed very strange. She finally gave up trying to make him understand that her name was Barbara, that she was not Constance at all. At last, she said, It doesn't matter by what name you call me, as long as you love me. And went on upstairs. One of the tapestries that hung on the wall along the winding stairway was new. At least she did not remember having seen it before. It was the soft rose and gold and brown and blue of the other tapestries, and appeared old. As though it had been hanging there for some time, she fingered it curiously. It felt and looked like the others, but it must be new, for it was not quite finished. In the picture a man in white vestments stood at an altar, with his hands outstretched in blessing. Before him knelt a girl and a man. The girl was in white, and the taper lights at the altar shone on her two long yellow braids that hung down over her white gown, so that they looked like burnished gold. The face was turned away so that she could not see who it was, but the man who knelt beside her was looking straight at her. Or would have been if the tapestry-maker had not put down her needle at a critical point. The man's face had not been touched, though everything else was done. Barberside. She hoped that the next time she came to the tower the tapestry would be finished. She went into the violet room, for a little while, and sat down on a green chair with a purple cushion in it. She took a great bunch of violets out of a bowl and buried her face in the sweetness. Then she went to the mantle and drenched her handkerchief with violet water. She had tried all the different kinds of cologne that were in the tower, but she liked the violet water best, and nearly always went into the violet room, for a little while, on her way upstairs. As she turned to go out the boy joined her. He was a young man now, taller than Barbara, but his face as always was hidden from her, as by a mist. His voice was very kind and tender as he took both her hands in his. How do you do, Barbara, dear? he asked. You have not been in the tower for a long time. I have been ill, she answered. See? She tried to show him her crutches, but they were not there. I used to have crutches, she explained. Did you? he asked in surprise. You never had them in the tower. That's so, she answered. I had forgotten. She remembered now that when she went into the tower she had always left her crutches leaning up against the glass steps. Let's go upstairs, suggested the boy, and ring the golden bells in the cupola. Barbara wanted to go very much, but was afraid to try it, because she had never been able to reach the cupola. If you get tired, the boy went on, as though he had read her thought, I'll put my arm around you and help you walk. Come, let's go. They went out of the violet room and up the winding stairway. Barbara was not tired at all, but she let him put his arm around her and leaned her cheek against his shoulder as they climbed. Some way she felt that this time they were really going to reach the cupola. It was very sweet to be taken care of in this way, and to hear the boy's deep tender voice telling her about the Lady of Shalat and all the other dear people who lived in the tower. Sometimes he would make her sit down on the stairs to rest. She sat beside her so that he might keep his arm around her, and Barbara wished, as never before, that she might see his face. Finally they came to the last landing. They had been up as high as this once before, but it was long ago. The cupola was hidden in a cloud as before, but it seemed to be the cloud of a summer day and not a dark mist. They went into the cloud, and an angel with a flaming sword appeared before them and stopped them. The angel was all in white and very tall and stately, with a divine tender face, Barbara's own face, exalted and transfigured into beauty beyond all words. Please, said Barbara softly, though she was not at all afraid, may we go up into the cupola and ring the golden bells. We have tried so many times. There was no answer, but Barbara saw the angel looking at her with infinite longing and love. All at once she knew that the angel was her mother. Please, mother dear, said Barbara, let us go in and ring the bells. The angel smiled and stepped aside, pointing to the right with the flaming sword that made a rainbow in the cloud. In the light of it they went through the mist that seemed to be lifting now. We're really in the cupola, cried the boy, in delight. See, here are the bells. He took the two heavy golden chains in his hands and gave one to Barbara. Ring, she cried out, oh ring all the bells at once, now! They pulled the two chains with all their strength, and from far above them rang out the most wonderful golden chimes that anyone had ever dreamed of, strong and sweet and thrilling, yet curiously soft and low. With the first sound the mist lifted, and the angel with the flaming sword came into the cupola and stood near them, smiling. Far out was the blue sky that bent down to meet a bluer sea, the sand on the shore was as white as the blown snow, and the sea birds that circled around the cupola in the crystalline, fragrant air were singing. The melody blended strangely with the sound of the surf on the shining shore below. The angel with the flaming sword touched Barbara gently on the arm and smiled. Barbara looked up, first at the angel, and then at the boy who stood beside her. The mist that had always been around him had lifted too, and she saw that it was Roger whom she had known all her life. Barbara woke with a start. The sound of the golden bells was still chiming in her ears. -"Roger?" she said dreamily. We rang them all together, didn't we? But Roger did not answer, for she was in her own little room, now, and not in the Tower of Cologne. She slipped out of bed, and her little bare pink feet pattered over to the window. She pushed the curtains back and looked out. It was a keen, cool autumn morning, and still dark, but in the East was the deep, wonderful purple that presages daybreak. -"Oh, to see the sun rise over the sea!" Barbara's heart ached with longing. She had wanted to go for so many years, and nobody had ever thought of taking her. Now, though Roger had suggested it more than once, she had said, each time, that when she went, she wanted to go alone. -"I'll try it," she thought. If I get tired, I can sit down and rest. And if I think it is going to be too much for me, I can come back. It can't be very far, just down this road. She dressed hurriedly, putting on her warm white wool gown, and her little low, soft shoes. She did not stop to brush out her hair and braid it again, for it was very early and no one would see. She put over her head the white-leaf scarf she had worn to the wedding, took her white-knitted shawl, and went downstairs so quietly that Aunt Miriam did not hear her. She unbolted the door noiselessly, and went out, closing it carefully after her. On the top step was a very small package, tied with string, and a letter addressed simply to Barbara. She recognized it as a book and a note from Roger. He had done such things before. She did not want to go back, so she tucked it under her arm and went on. It seemed so strange to be going out of her gate alone, and in the dark Barbara was thrilled with a sense of adventure and romance, which was quite new to her. This journeying into unknown lands in pursuit of unknown waters had all the fascination of discovery. She went down the road faster than she had ever walked before. She was not at all tired and was eager for the sea. The autumn dawn with its keen cool air stirred her senses to new and abounding life. She went on and on and on, pausing now and then to lean against somebody's fence, or to rest on a friendly boulder when it appeared along the way. Faint suggestions of color appeared in the illimitable distances beyond. Barbara saw only a vast gray expanse, but the surf murmured softly on the shadowy shore. Crossing the sand and stumbling as she went, she stooped and dipped her hand into it, then put her rosy forefinger into her mouth to see if it were really salt, as everyone said. She sat down in the soft cool sand, drew her white-knitted shawl and lace scarf more closely about her, and settled herself to wait. The deep purple softened with rose. Tints of gold came far down on the horizon line. Barbara drew a long breath of wonder and joy. Out in the vastness dark surges sang and crooned, breaking slowly into white foam as they approached the shore. Rose and purple melted into Amethyst and Azure, and, out beyond the breakers, the gray sea changed to opal and pearl. Mist rose from the far waters, and the long shafts of leaping light divided it by rainbows as it lifted. Prismatic fires burned on the boundless curve where the sky met the sea. Wet-winged gulls crying hoarsely came from the night that still lay upon the islands near shore, and circled out across the breakers to meet the dawn. Spires of splendid color flamed to the zenith. The whole east burned with crimson and glowed with gold, and from that far mystical arc of heaven and earth, a javelin of molten light leaped to the farthest hill. The pearl and opal changed to softest green, mellowed by turquoise and gold. The slow blue surges chimed softly on the singing shore, and Barbara's heart beat high with rapture, for it was daybreak in earth and heaven and morning in her soul. She sat there for over an hour asking for nothing but the sea and sky, and the warm sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal, and touched the autumn hills with living flame. She drew long breaths of the wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, halfway across the world. At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent. How strange that the boy in the tower should be Roger, and yet was it so strange, after all, when she had known him all her life. Before looking at the book she tore open the letter and read it, with wide-wondering eyes and wild-beating heart. Barbara, my darling, it began. I found this book to-night, and so I sent it to you, for it is yours as much as mine. I think my father's wish has been granted, and his love has been bequeathed to me. I have known for a long time how much I care for you, and I have often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me silent. It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to you when you were sowing or while you were ill, and sweeter than all else besides to help you walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending on me, for strength and guidance. Sometimes I have thought you care too, and then I was not so sure, so I have kept the words back, fearing to lose what I have. But tonight, after having read his letters, I feel that I must throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal loss. You can never know if I should spend the rest of my life in telling you just how much you have meant to me in a thousand different ways. Looking back, I see that you have given me my ideals, since the time we made mud pies together and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, we never got the golden bells. I have loved you always, and it has not changed since the beginning, save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day that passed. As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or truth or honour, I owe to you, who set my standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my dearest, my love has kept me clean. If I have nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my life that can make me ashamed to look straight into the eyes of the woman I love. Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, I have been wishing it were our own, that to you and I might stand together before God's High Altar in that little church with the sun streaming in, and be joined, each to the other, until death do us part. Sweetheart, can you trust me? Can you believe that it is for always and not just for a little while? Has your mother left her love to you as my father left me is? Let me have the sweetness of your leaning on me always. Let me take care of you, comfort you when you are tired, laugh with you when you are glad, and love you until death, and even after, as he loved her. Tell me you care, Barbara, even if it is only a little, tell me you care, and I can wait a long, long time. Roger. Barbara's heart sang with the joy of the morning. She opened the little worn book with its yellow, tear-stained pages, and read it all up to the very last line. Oh! she cried aloud in pity. Oh! oh! fully understanding. She put it aside, closing the faded cover reverently on its love and pain. Then she turned to Roger's letter and read it again, dreaming over it in the first flush of that mystical rapture which makes the world new for those to whom it comes, as light is recreated with every dawn she took no heed of the passing hours. She did not know that it was very late, nor that Aunt Merriam, much worried, had asked Roger to go in search of her. She knew only that love and mourning and the sea were all hers. The tide was coming in. Each wave broke a little higher upon the thirsting shore. Far out on the water was a tiny dark object that moved slowly, shoreward, on the crests of the waves. Barbara stood up, shading her eyes with her hand, and waited, counting the rhythmic pulse beats that brought it nearer. She could not make out what it was, for it advanced and then receded, or paused in a circling eddy made by two retreating waves. At last a high wave brought it in and left it stranded at her feet. Barbara laughed aloud, for, broken by the wind and wave and worn by tide, a fragment of one of her crutches had come back to her, the bit of flannel with which she had padded the sharp end, so that the sound would not distress her father, still clung to it. She wondered how it came there, never guessing that it was but the natural result of Eloise's attempt to throw it as far as Alan had thrown the other, the day he took them away from her. A great sob of thankfulness almost choked her. Here she stood firmly on her own two feet, after twenty-two years of helplessness, reminded of it only by a fragment of a crutch that the sea had given back, as it gives up its dead. She had outgrown her need of crutches as the tiny creatures of the sea outgrow their shells. Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, as the swift seasons roll, leave thy low-volted past, let each new temple, nobler than the last, shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, till thou at length art free, leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea. The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning uplifted by all the world's joy. Her blood sang within her, and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of life lay before her, that life which is made sweet by love. She felt again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne. She went and the boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had wrung all the golden bells at once. And the boy was Roger, always had been Roger, only she did not know. Into Barber's heart came something new and sweet, that she had never known before. The deep sense of conviction and the everlasting peace which the true lover and he alone had power to bestow. It was the part of the wonder of the morning, that when she turned, startled a little by a muffled footstep, she should see Roger, with his hands outstretched in pleading and all his soul in his eyes. Barber's face took on the unearthly beauty of Dawn. Her blue eyes deepened to violet, her sweet lips smiled. She was radiant from her feet to the heavy braids that hung over her shoulders and the shimmering halo of soft hair that blew like golden mist about her face. Roger caught her mood unerringly. It was like him always to understand. He was no longer afraid, and the trembling of his boyish mouth was lost in a smile. She was more beautiful than the morning of which she seemed a veritable part, and she was his. Flower of the Dawn, he cried, his voice ringing with love and triumph. Do you care? Are you mine? She went to him, smiling with the color of the fiery dawning on her cheeks and lips. Yes, she whispered, didn't you know? Then the sun in the morning and the world itself vanished. All at once beyond his ken, for Barber had put her soft little hand upon his shoulder and lifted her love-lit face to his.