One day, early in the afternoon, I was in the
garden, and started to hear a horse's footsteps
on the gravel of the drive. Could Willie have
come home thus soon for some unexpected
reason? Visitors, especially on horseback, were
so rare, that I hardly thought of them, unless it
might be Mr. Heath. So I turned down my
sleeves, took off my gardening gloves, and came
forward to peep through the hedge. It was
Walter Ray, alone. Oh, what should I do?
What should I say? for I knew, seeing him
thus, what he had come for.

Whether he saw me, or knew by some sound
that I was there, I can't tell; but he stopped
his horse, and before I could glide away, which
was what I was tempted to do, he called me by
my name. So I had to come forward to the
gate close by, and meet him.

"Are you angry with me?" he said, when he
had dismounted and taken my hand; for I was
so flushed and trembling I could not speak
intelligibly, and half turned from him, to hide my
confusion.

"Forgive me if I have thus come upon you
by surprise. But I must speak to you alone,
and when I come with Willie it is almost
impossible. Let me go and put my horse up in the
stable, and come and speak to you here, may
I?"

Had I dared to follow my impulse, I should
have said, "Go, I may not listen to you; come
no more, forget me, make my task of forgetting
you possible—if it be possible still—try me not
above my strength." But I murmured something,
and in a minute more he was again beside
me, and had drawn me, I know not how, by the
mere force of his will, into one of the shadiest
of the dark walks. I remember now, though
I hardly heard them at the time, how the
black-birds screamed and scolded as we
entered it.

"I am going to Australia in two months," he
said. Then he waited for me to speak, but I
was still dumb.

"Do you remember, I wonder, something I
said to you, the first time I ever saw you, about
Beatrice?"

"Yes, I remember."

"You do?" he said, smiling, as if pleased and
encouraged. "Need I tell you, Bessie, that I
have found the real Beatrice? that I have come
to ask her if she will take Benedick, with all his
imperfections on his head?"

I struggled for a word, but instead came a
passion of tears, so violent that he stood pained
and startled.

"No, no!" I sobbed; "it cannot be! it must
not be! Don't talk to me of this; leave me.
All you can do for me is to leave me!"

"Bessie, darling! why is this? What have
I said to pain or anger you? tell me!"

"I cannot tell you. I am not angry; it is
not your fault. But you must leave me; indeed
you must."

And I turned from him, and walked slowly in
the direction of home. I was furious with
myself, so furious that I fear I was almost rough to
him. He remained looking after me some
moments in utter bewilderment; then he suddenly
joined me.

"Bessie," he said, taking both my hands, so
that I could not advance, "I cannot leave you
without further explanation. You did not lead
me to expect this, and you give me no reason
for it. Tell me why you refuse to listen to me.
You owe me this."

"You know the reason," I sobbed. "You
know I told you from the first I never meant to
leave Willie."

"But Willie will leave you; I tell you he
will! O, Bessie, if you care for me, if this is
your only reason for refusing me, don't—I
beseech you—don't sacrifice yourself in this way
for an imaginary duty. Listen! I have taken
you, perhaps, by surprise. I will go to Australia
alone if you will say that if I come back in a
year you will marry me; nay, two years if you
prefer it. Will you say so, Bessie?"

"I cannot! I cannot!"

"This is your last word?"

"Yes.""

"Then good-by! I will trouble you no
more."

He wrung my hands till the pain made me
wince, and was gone.

I never told Willie what had passed, or even
of his visit; it was impossible to me to speak of
it; and oh, the anguish of trying to keep calm
and cheerful, and to appear interested in what
Willie was telling me of the Rockminster news,
and of the grand public ball that was to be given
there. Ah me! to smile through the life that
had become suddenly one long, vain, empty
yearning for what could never be.

In two months Walter Ray sailed for Victoria.
He wrote me a line first. Was the last word I
had spoken to him final? I could but say yes,
and the next I heard was that he was gone. I
had to listen calmly and make something like
excuses for him when Willie told me how he
had urged him to come and spend at least a day
with us before he went, and how Walter had
constantly refused him on some pretext or
another, wounding his feelings, as I could see, by
this imaginary unfriendliness.

A year went by. I was now much alone, for
Willie not only frequently stayed in Rockminster
for whatever gaieties might be going on
there, but his friends often asked him to go with
them on shooting and fishing and boating excursions
some way off, and how could he refuse,
poor dear? I was only too glad he should
amuse himself. I felt I was, in spite of all my
efforts, poor company for any one now, and he
was always so happy to come home, and so full
of all he had done and seen, that he was the
less likely to notice the change in me.

One bleak autumn evening we were sitting
by the fire together. As I could not talk to
him now as I used to do, I had taken the habit
of reading aloud, a proceeding which always had
the effect of advancing his sleeping-time
considerably.

But this night, when I took the book, he said,