obey you. I will not incur your curse, still less will I deceive Walter. Thank God, the time comes when you and I will go before Him together, and the wrongs of earth shall be righted by the immaculate justice of Heaven."

Mary Grant would fain have soothed her, but she seemed sufficient unto herself. Calmly she walked into the parlor and took her seat by the open window, where she could watch the road leading down the hill.

Soon she saw him coming-the young lover who could remain away from his betrothed no longer. Joyously he walked, with quick step and erect head. Hope was holding a cup to his lips beaded to the brim with bubbling drops of joy. She must dash it from them-she who loved him best, whom he best loved. She clasped her hands over her eyes, and prayed-a short, silent prayer which Heaven would answer. She heard his step upon the door-stone. He opened the little front door without knocking. He came to her He drew her close, close, as one who had a right to hold her on his heart forever, and she was silent: she could not break the spell.

At last she started from his arms-she stood before him with her white face and gleaming eyes.

"Walter!" she cried, eagerly, "you know I love you. You never can doubt that. I am very young; I have had no other fancies, no other dreams. You won all my heart. Hear me, Walter! I am yours-I will be yours till I die. Never shall any other man speak words of love to Elinor Trumbull. I give you all. I am yours-yours-yours-on earth and in heaven. But I can not be your wife. My grandfather has forbidden it. You yourself will counsel

me to obedience. It is harder for me than for you. You have the great world to flee to-your high calling to follow. I must stay here-here, where light, and hope, and love came to my life-where they will go out, and leave me alone in the darkness. God forgive me, Walter, but death were better."

She had spoken with wild energy. She sank back exhausted now in her chair. Walter Fairfield stood struck dumb for the moment with sheer wonder. At length he faltered,

"You can not mean it; you do not know what you are saying, Elinor. Your grandfather may object to our marrying while you are still so young, but he can not mean that you must never be my wife."

The door had been open all this time between the parlor and the kitchen, and now Moses Grant himself came forward. The anger had passed away from his face, leaving a look of pity blent with stern resolve. He said gravely,

"I like you, Mr. Fairfield. I had not thought any one else could so fill Parson Blake's place in my love as you have filled it. If I could, Heaven knows I would gladly give you this girl, but it can not be. In all truthfulness, you must not marry her-you must never marry her. I, her grandfather, forbid it before the God whose servant you are. You will not dare to disobey me. It will go hard with you both; but if you knew the reason, you would thank me. It is my fault. I should not have put you in each other's way; but I thought she was only a child.”

"Elder Grant," the young man said, respectfully, "will you come out of doors with me? I would like to speak to you for a few moments quite alone."

The particulars of that interview were never known, but the result was decisive. In a little while the young man came alone into the room where Elinor still sat by the open window. He closed the door. He went up to her and took her, for the last time, in his arms.

"The hand of God is in it, Elinor, as it is in every earthly thing, though we can not see it now. We must submit. Thank God, my beloved, that after life comes death, and after death heaven. And yet, how can I give you up, my poor, innocent darling-my one love?" And his voice broke down into low, agonized sobs-a strong man's sobs, very pitiful to hear.

That last half hour of love, and torture, and despair -that parting which they both felt was eternal-I may not dwell on it. When Walter Fairfield passed out of the wicket gate and walked up the hill along the winding road, Elinor Trumbull watched him with eyes in which there were no tears, with a pale face on which shone a hope purer than earthly love, holier than earthly happiness-a hope born in tears, in anguish, in desolation-of a meeting where all that remains of sorrow is the wings by which it has borne the soul upward-in the city without foundation, eternal in the heavens.

They parted on Saturday, and the next day more than one strong heart in Mayfield was moved to tears as the young minister read his mysterious, unexplained resignation of the pastoral charge. He had become strangely dear to them, this young man, whose coming had seemed such a doubtful experiment. He was not their father in the Lord as Parson Blake had been, but they cherished him equally in another way. He

was their very own. He had come to them first. They were to him almost like a first love, the parish in whose service he had been first installed into the ministry. They had hoped he would live and die among them, and now they must give him up. There was scarcely a dry eye among the many which rested upon his face this last Sunday. Moses Grant sat, with sorrowful yet composed mien, in his accustomed seat, with his quiet old wife by his side, but Elinor's voice did not flood the church with its melody; Walter Fairfield preached his last sermon in Mayfield without the silent encouragement of her eyes.

The next morning, when he rode by the red house in the hollow on his way to take the stage at Cornwall, he gazed in vain at the windows. No small hand fluttered among the roses, no gentle face looked out from between the muslin curtains. It cost him much then not to spring from the wagon and seek one last farewell, one more blessing; but, for her sake, he rode on and made no sign.

And where was Elinor? Looking forth, herself unseen, from her chamber window, straining her eyes to catch one last glimpse of his too dear face, praying for him in her self-abnegation, praying that his life might be very full of joy, though over her own, with all the promised hopes of its future, rose, like the lettering on a monument, the one sorrowful inscription -"Never more."

There came a new minister to Mayfield, a worthy man, who dwelt quietly in the parsonage with his wife and his six children. He had not old Parson Blake's place in their hearts, consecrated by the memories of a lifetime, nor had they pride in his eloquence and tenderness for his youth and enthusiasm, as during Walter Fairfield's brief sojourn among them; still there was mutual good feeling between pastor and people, and, save in one quiet household, all things went on as before.

This autumn and the winter which followed were a very trying time to Elinor Trumbull. She had a strong consciousness of duty. Earnestly she strove to be in all things the same to her grandparents as before her brief, bright dream of love; but something was wanting. The fullness of the old content would never come back again. For the second time in the red house in the hollow was a buried name. Walter Fairfield was never mentioned there. Mary Grant had once commenced to say a few words of comfort to her granddaughter, but the expression on Elinor's face stopped her it was so full of hopeless suffering. After that she only silently pitied the sorrow she had no power to soothe.

Elinor never uttered a single complaint. She performed all the little housewifely duties which had formerly fallen to her share: she went regularly to the church on the hill-top-listened quietly to the new pastor's preaching. But Mary Grant's tears fell as she