And so she went on singing, and he remained
listening. Sometimes the song ceased for a
minute or so, and I heard her voice in sneaking
tones. I grew restless—the room was hot, the
couch hard. I would go away to bed. I passed
out to the hall, where the fresh air and
moonlight came freely through the open door. I
stood in the shadows and saw a striking picture
—Sylvia, sitting on the steps like a beautiful
yellow-haired gipsy, with her light dress gathered
about her, and a half-faded scarlet Kerchief
looped under her chin. Mark leaned against
the opposite railings.

"Oh! you do not like that," she said, breaking
off abruptly in the middle of a refrain, and
looking up brightly.

"Yes," he said, with his good-natured smile,
"it is very sweet; go on."

The melody turned to discord, and my heart
began to burn. " Mattie," said Sylvia, suddenly,
"come out here, and do not lurk in the dark
like a spirit of evil. The night is glorious."

"Come here, Mattie," said Mark, softly; but
I said, " No, I am going to bid you good night;"
and I retreated into the shadows, and went away
up-stairs out of reach of the sweet echoes, taking
with me rending pains at the heart. And yet it
was all nothing, I told myself; nothing that
Sylvia should look so fair, and sing bewitchingly;
nothing that Mark should stand oy and see and ,
listen: and if each of these nothings had been
a very important something, still it were nothing
to me. I crushed my throbbing head into the
cold pillow and tried to sleep; and after a time
I must have succeeded, for I did not hear the
people in the house settling to rest, the voices
on the lobbies, nor the doors shutting.

The first thing I heard was the opening of the
door of communication between my room and
Sylvia's, and, starting up, I saw Sylvia walking
across the floor in the moonshine, with a dark
cloak wrapped around her, and all her yellow
Lair lying loose over her shoulders. She shocked
me witli her sudden appearance, as she had
shocked me on the first night I had seen her in
the Mill-house. She reminded me, as then, of
my mother's wandering spirit. I sat up and
spoke to her with irritation. Why had she
startled me out of my tranquil sleep to uneasy
recollections? We were not good enough
friends to hold those nightly talks which have
such an irresistible fascination for some girls.

"What do you want, Sylvia?" said I. " Why
have you wakened me '*"

She had seated herself on the corner of my
bed facing me. The moonlight from the
window fell on my face, leaving hers in shadow;
only rippling down the edges of the long rich
hair that fell to one side in a pale stream over
her arm.

"I did not wish to trouble you, Mattie," she
said, humbly. " I came to talk to you a little.
Let us be better friends than we have been."

"We are pretty good friends," said I; " as
good as we can be, I think. What can we have
to talk about? I do not want to lose my
sleep."

"You do not sleep so well at nights," she
said. " I can hear you fidgeting through the
door. Mattie, you have a sorrow that you are
keeping all to yourself. Open your heart and
talk to me, and you will be the better for it."

"What has put such an absurd idea in your
head?" I said. " Go away to your own room,
Sylvia, please, and let me go to sleep."

"Nay," she said, " I will not be shaken off
so easily. I will tell you about it, then, if you
will not tell me. You are engaged to marry
Luke Elphinstone. He loves some one else
better than you, and you do not like him. I
thought so before; now I know it."

I did not reply to the first part of the
accusation; I thought only of keeping my trouble to
myself.

"Why do you say I do not like him?" I said.
"I never gave you the right. I will not allow
you to say it."

"You are making a confession now," she
said. " You defend yourself: you do not notice
that I said, Luke loves another better than you.
Yet I made you jealous to-night by singing a
little song for Major Hatteraick. Ah, Mattie!
you love Mark, and Mark loves you. I have
tried him, I have sounded him, I have made you
jealous for your own good. He is noble, he is
worth a woman's devotion. He—"

"Stop, Sylvia!" cried I. " I will not hear
another word;" and I pressed my hands over
my ears.

She seized my wrists in her strong white
fingers, and brought down my hands, and held
them one upon another in my lap.

"You must release Luke," she said,
vehemently, looking in my face with passionate eyes,
half craving, half commanding.

"Impossible!" I said. " The engagement
cannot be broken. As for the rest, Major
Hatteraick is nothing to me, and I am nothing to
him. You imagine a hundred foolish things.
Go away to your bed."

I never saw such a look of utter scorn as
came into her face as I spoke. She drew away
her hands from mine, and half turned her back
upon me during some moments of silence. But
atterwards she turned to me, softened again,
and began speaking sweetly and sorrowfully.

"Mattie dear," she said, " I am older than
you, and I have more experience of people and
things. What is your reason for acting so
strangely? Luke is rich; Mark is a little poor,
they say. Is that it? Do you think of those
things? I did once; I do not now. It is a
great mistake when women do not know at first
what women are made of. If one is content at
her heart, what a little thing will make her
happiness—a step on the floor, a voice up-stairs. I
have seen a poor wife sing for joy over a tattered
jacket. If a woman has given the salt out of
her life, what will satisfy her? Not jewels nor
fine dresses, not gaieties nor luxuries. Take the
joy, Mattie, that is waiting for you, and turn
your back on the emptiness, the thorns, the
heart-sickness. Mattie dear—"

Her voice melted away, and her fingers
coaxed themselves in among mine again. But
the woe that had gathered to my heart made