"If you don't mind my company, I'll
manage for you. You are not strong
enough to slave about with that weight
always in your arms. You can do it, I
know; but you should not overtax your
strength to-day; your nerves should be in
good order to-morrow."

She blanched, suddenly, to that absolute
pallor again.

"Will they let me be in the room? Will
they let her lie in my lap?" she asked.

I shook my head.

"In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred
this would not answer, though it might in
yours; it is difficult to make exceptions."

She gave a patient sigh; sat some time
with her eyes fixed on the gliding shore;
then said, looking at me again:

"Will it take long?"

"Oh, no, no; a very short time; a few
moments."

"And she will feel no pain?"

"None."

She said, as if to herself, her eyes
subsiding from my face to settle on the shore
again:

"After all, God is sometimes merciful.
I almost feel as if I could love Him. When
these little feet"—touching them with a
tender hand—"walk, I will try with all
my soul to love Him."

I don't know what possessed me this
day. I laid aside all my habitual shyness.
I hardly thought of exposing myself to the
ridicule of my colleagues, should I encounter
any of them. But thinking of this
chance, I glanced at Mrs. Rosscar's dress;
trying to discover how she would strike a
stranger, and to what rank she would be
supposed to belong.

Of the dress I could make nothing; it
was all deep and long-worn mourning. As
far as I could tell, nothing of her station
could be learned from her dress.

She was standing. She had moved to
the side of the vessel, a little way apart
from me. She was pointing out something
to the child. From the poise of her head,
down all the lines of her form, to the
firmly-planted beautiful foot, from which,
by times, the wind swept back the drapery,
there was something regal about her. The
child was daintily dressed in white; it
looked all soft swansdown and delicate
embroideries. It might, I thought, have
been a queen's child.

I went to her side, and proposed that we
should land at the first stopping place, and
take a row-boat. She agreed. She would
have agreed to anything I proposed; she
had a feeling that the child's life was in
my hand. So, we were soon gliding along
the shady bank of the river—she and I and
the child—sometimes, among the water-
lilies and close to the swans; sometimes,
almost touched by drooping boughs;
sometimes, for a moment held entangled by the
sedges. All very silent.

Mrs. Rosscar was one of those women
who have a talent for silence, and, more
than that, who seem hardly to need speech.
To-day she was content to watch the child.
The child sat on her knees, with musing
eyes and tranquil face, watching the gliding
water.

Now and then, the child smiled up into
the mother's face; now and then, the
mother bent over and kissed the child;
there seemed no need, between them, for
any other kind of speech. That child's
smile was of the most wonderful sad sweetness.
It was the loveliest and tenderest
expression. I did not then, you must
understand, consciously note all the things
I speak of as I go along; they returned
upon me afterwards. I had time enough,
in time to come, to remember the past.
Time enough, Heaven knows!

Early in the afternoon, we stopped at
a comparatively unfrequented place, and
dined.

Mrs. Rosscar's quiet undemonstrative,
and yet pleased and grateful, acceptance of
all my services, her acquiescence in all I
proposed, did not seem to me strange.
The day was altogether a dream-day. I
was in the sort of mood in which to find
myself the hero of a fairy-tale's adventures
would hardly have surprised me: a most
unwonted mood for me.

I have thought about it since, and
wondered if she acted as she did, from
inexperience, or from indifference. Was she
ignorant, or was she careless, as to what
might be concluded about her? I believe
the fact was, that she thought neither of
herself, nor of me, but merely of "a good
day" for the child.

She laid aside her bonnet, and her cap
with it, before she sat down to table: showing
that wealth of brown hair, and, what
much more interested me, that head fit to
be the head of a goddess. " And yet,"
I thought, " she seems a very ordinary
woman; she seems, even more foolishly
than most women, absorbed and satisfied
by the possession of a child."

In laying aside her bonnet and cap, she
had laid aside, also, her shapeless cloak;
her close-fitting black dress displayed the