The Laurel Bush: An Old-Fashioned Love Story Read online

  Chapter 2.

  The "every day" on which Mr. Roy had reckoned for seeing his friend, orwhatsoever else he considered Miss Williams to be, proved a failure. Heryoungest pupil fell ill, and she was kept beside him, and away from theschool-room, until the doctor could decide whether the illness wasinfectious or not. It turned out to be very trifling--a most trivialthing altogether, yet weighted with a pain most difficult to bear, asense of fatality that almost overwhelmed one person at least. What theother felt she did not know. He came daily as usual; she watched himcome and go, and sometimes he turned and they exchanged a greeting fromthe window. But beyond that, she had to take all passively. What couldshe, only a woman, do or say or plan? Nothing. Women's business is tosit down and endure.

  She had counted these days--Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,Saturday--as if they had been years. And now they were all gone, hadfled like minutes, fled emptily away. A few fragmentary facts she hadhad to feed on, communicated by the boys in their rough talk.

  "Mr. Roy was rather cross today."

  "Not cross, Dick--only dull."

  "Mr. Roy asked why David did not come in to lessons, and said he hoped hewould be better by Saturday."

  "Mr. Roy said good-by to us all, and gave us each something to rememberhim by when he was out in India. Did Miss Williams know he was going outto India? Oh, how jolly!"

  "Yes, and he sails next week, and the name of his ship is the _Queen ofthe South_, and he goes by Liverpool instead of Southampton, because itcosts less; and he leaves St. Andrews on Monday morning."

  "Are you sure he said Monday morning?" For that was Saturday night.

  "Certain, because he has to get his outfit still. Oh, what fun it mustbe!"

  And the boys went on, greatly excited, and repeating everything Mr. Royhad told them--for he had made them fond of him, even in those fewmonths--expatiating with delight on his future career, as a merchant orsomething, they did not quite know what; but no doubt it would be farnicer and more amusing than stopping at home and grinding forever onhorrid books. Didn't Miss Williams think so?

  Miss Williams only smiled. She knew how all his life he had loved "thosehorrid books," preferring them to pleasure, recreation, almost to dailybread; how he had lived on the hope that one day he--born only a farmer'sson--might do something, write something. "I also am of Arcadia." Hemight have done it or not--the genius may or may not have been there; butthe ambition certainly was. Could he have thrown it all aside? And Why?

  Not for mere love of money; she knew him too well for that. He was athorough book-worm, simple in all his tastes and habits--simple almost topenuriousness; but it was a penuriousness born of hard fortunes, and henever allowed it to affect any body but himself. Still, there was nodoubt he did not care for money, or luxury, or worldly position--any ofthe things that lesser men count large enough to work and struggle anddie for. To give up the pursuits he loved, deliberately to chooseothers, to change his whole life thus, and expatriate himself, as itwere, for years--perhaps for always--why did he do it, or for whom?

  Was it for a woman? Was it for her? If ever, in those long empty daysand wakeful nights, this last thought entered Fortune's mind, she stifledit as something which, once to have fully believed and then disbelievedwould have killed her.

  That she should have done the like for him--that or any thing elseinvolving any amount of heroism or self-sacrifice--well, it was natural,right; but that he should do it for her? That he should change his wholepurpose of life that he might be able to marry quickly, to shelter in hisbosom a poor girl who was not able to fight the world as a man could,the thing--not so very impossible, after all--seemed to her almostincredible! And yet (I am telling a mere love story, remember--afoolish, innocent love story, without apologizing for either the folly orthe innocence) sometimes she was so far "left to herself," as the Scotchsay, that she did believe it: in the still twilights, in the wakefulnights, in the one solitary half hour of intense relief, when, all herboys being safe in bed, she rushed out into the garden under the silentstars to sob, to moan, to speak out loud words which nobody couldpossibly hear.

  "He is going away, and I shall never see him again. And I love himbetter than any thing in all this world. I couldn't help it--he couldn'thelp it. But, oh! It's hard--hard!"

  And then, altogether breaking down, she would begin to cry like a child.She missed him so, even this week, after having for weeks and months beenwith him every day; but it was less like a girl missing her lover--whowas, after all, not her lover--than a child mourning helplessly forthe familiar voice, the guiding, helpful hand. With all the rest ofthe world Fortune Williams was an independent, energetic woman,self-contained, brave, and strong, as a solitary governess had need tobe; but beside Robert Roy she felt like a child, and she cried for himlike a child,

  "And with no language but a cry."

  So the week ended and Sunday came, kept at Mrs. Dalziel's like the ScotchSundays of twenty years ago. No visitor ever entered the house, whereinall the meals were cold and the blinds drawn down, as if for a funeral.The family went to church for the entire day, St. Andrews being too faroff for any return home "between sermons." Usually one servant was leftin charge, turn and turn about; but this Sunday Mrs. Dalziel, having putthe governess in the nurse's place beside the ailing child, thoughtshrewdly she might as well put her in the servant's place too, and lether take charge of the kitchen fire as well as of little David. BeingEnglish, Miss Williams was not so exact about "ordinances" as a Scotchwoman would have been; so Mrs. Dalziel had no hesitation in asking her toremain at home alone the whole day in charge of her pupil.

  Thus faded, Fortune thought, her last hope of seeing Robert Roy again,either at church--where he usually sat in the Dalziel pew, by the oldlady's request, to make the boys "behave"--or walking down the street,where he sometimes took the two eldest to eat their "piece" at hislodgings. All was now ended; yet on the hope--or dread--of this lastSunday she had hung, she now felt with what intensity, till it was gone.

  Fortune was the kind of woman who, were it given her to fight, couldfight to the death, against fate or circumstances; but when her part wassimply passive, she could also endure. Not, as some do, with angry griefor futile resistance, but with a quiet patience so complete that only avery quick eye would have found out she was suffering at all.

  Little David did not, certainly. When hour after hour, she sat by hissofa, interesting him as best she could in the dull "good" books whichalone were allowed of Sundays, and then passing into word-of-mouthstories--the beautiful Bible stories over which her own voice trembledwhile she told them--Ruth, with her piteous cry, "Whither thou goest, Iwill go; where thou diest, I will die, and there will I be buried;"Jonathan, whose soul "clave to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved himas his own soul"--all these histories of passionate fidelity and agonizedparting--for every sort of love is essentially the same--how they went toher heart.

  Oh, the awful quietness of that Sunday, that Sabbath which was not rest,in which the hours crawled on in sunshiny stillness, neither voices norsteps nor sounds of any kind breaking the death-like hush of everything.At length the boy fell asleep; and then Fortune seemed to wake up for thefirst time to the full consciousness of what was and what was about tobe.

  All of a sudden she heard steps on the gravel below; then the hall bellrang through the silent house. She knew who it was even before sheopened the door and saw him standing there.

  "May I come in? They told me you were keeping house alone, and I said Ishould just walk over to bid you and Davie good-by."

  Roy's manner was grave and matter-of-fact--a little constrained, perhaps,but not much--and he looked so exceedingly pale and tired that; withoutany hesitation, she took him into the school-room, where they weresitting, and gave him the arm-chair by Davie's sofa.

  "Yes, I own to being rather overdone; I have had so much to arrange, forI must leave here tomorrow, as I think you know."

  "The boys told me."
r />   "I thought they would. I should have done it myself, but every day Ihoped to see you. It was this fellow's fault, I suppose," pattingDavie's head. "He seems quite well now, and as jolly as possible. Youdon't know what it is to say 'Good-by,' David, my son." Mr. Roy, whoalways got on well with children, had a trick of calling his youngerpupils "My Son."

  "Why do you say 'good-by' at all, then!" asked the child, a mischievousbut winning young scamp of six or seven, who had as many tricks as amonkey or a magpie. In fact, in chattering and hiding things he wasnearly as bad as a magpie, and the torment of his governess's life; yetshe was fond of him. "Why do you bid us good-by, Mr. Roy? Why don't youstay always with Miss Williams and me?"

  "I wish to God I could."

  She heard that, heard it distinctly, though it was spoken beneath hisbreath; and she felt the look, turned for one moment upon her as shestood by the window. She never forgot either--never, as long as shelived. Some words, some looks, can deceive, perhaps quite unconsciously,by being either more demonstrative than was meant, or the exaggeration ofcoldness to hide its opposite; but sometimes a glance, a tone, betrays,or rather reveals, the real truth in a manner that nothing afterward canever falsify. For one instant, one instant only, Fortune felt sure,quite sure, that in some way or other she was very dear to Robert Roy.If the next minute he had taken her into his arms, and said or looked thewords which, to an earnest-minded, sincere man like him, constitute apledge for life, never to be disannulled or denied, she could have hardlyhave felt more completely his own.

  But he did not say them; he said nothing at all; sat leaning his head onhis hand, with an expression so weary, so sad, that all the coaxing waysof little Davie could hardly win from him more than a faint smile. Helooked so old, too, and he was but just thirty. Only thirty--onlytwenty-five; and yet these two were bearing, seemed to have borne foryears, the burden of life, feeling all its hardships and none of itssweetnesses. Would things ever change? Would he have the courage (it washis part, not hers) to make them change, at least in one way, by bringingabout that heart-union which to all pure and true natures is consolationfor every human woe?

  "I wonder," he said, sitting down and taking David on his knee--"Iwonder if it is best to bear things one's self, or to let another sharethe burden?"

  Easily--oh, how easily!--could Fortune have answered this--have told himthat, whether he wished it or not, two did really bear his burdens, andperhaps the one who bore it secretly and silently had not the lightestshare. But she did not speak: it was not possible.

  "How shall I hear of you Miss Williams?" he said, after a long silence."You are not likely to leave the Dalziel family?"

  "No," she answered; "and if I did, I could always be heard of, theDalziels are so well known hereabouts. Still, a poor wandering governesseasily drops out of people's memory."

  "And a poor wandering tutor too. But I am not a tutor any more, and Ihope I shall not be poor long. Friends can not lose one another; suchfriends as you and I have been. I will take care we shall not do it,that is, if--but never mind that. You have been very good to me, and Ihave often bothered you very much, I fear. You will be almost glad toget rid of me."

  She might have turned upon him eyes swimming with tears--woman'stears--that engine of power which they say no man can ever resist; but Ithink, if so, a woman like Fortune would have scorned to use it. Thosepoor weary eyes, which could weep oceans alone under the stars, wereperfectly dry now--dry and fastened on the ground, as she replied, in agrave steady voice,

  "You do not believe that, else you would never have said it."

  Her composure must have surprised him, for he looked suddenly up, thenbegged her pardon. "I did not hurt you, surely? We must not part withthe least shadow of unkindness between us."

  "No." She offered her hand, and he took it--gently, affectionately, butonly affectionately. The one step beyond affection, which leads intoanother world, another life, he seemed determined not to pass.

  For at least half an hour he sat there with David on his knee, or risingup restlessly to pace the room with David on his shoulder; but apparentlynot desiring the child's absence, rather wishing to keep him as a sort ofbarrier. Against what?--himself? And so minute after minute slipped by;and Miss Williams, sitting in her place by the window, already saw,dotting the Links, group after group of the afternoon church-goerswandering quietly home--so quietly, so happily, fathers and mothers andchildren, companions and friends--for whom was no parting and no pain.

  Mr. Roy suddenly took out his watch. "I must go now; I see I have spentall but my last five minutes. Good-by, David, my lad; you'll be a bigman, maybe, when I see you again. Miss Williams" (standing before herwith an expression on his face such as she had never seen before),"before I go there was a question I had determined to ask you--a purelyethical question which a friend of mine has been putting to me, and Icould not answer; that is, I could from the man's side, the worldly side.A woman might think differently."

  "What is it?"

  "Simply this. If a man has not a half-penny, ought he to ask a woman toshare it? Rather an Irish way of putting the matter," with a laugh, notwithout bitterness, "but you understand. Ought he not to wait till hehas at least something to offer besides himself: Is it not mean,selfish, cowardly, to bind a woman to all the chances or mischances ofhis lot, instead of fighting it out alone like a man: My friend thinksso, and I--I agree with him."

  "Then why did you ask me."

  The words, though low and clear, were cold and sharp--sharp with almostunbearable pain. Every atom of pride in her was roused. Whether he lovedher and would not tell her so, or loved some other woman and wished herknow it, it was all the same. He was evidently determined to go awayfree and leave her free; and perhaps many sensible men or women would sayhe was right in so doing.

  "I beg your pardon," he said, almost humbly. "I ought not to have spokenof this at all. I ought just to have said 'Good-by,' and nothing more."And he took her hand.

  There was on it one ring, not very valuable, but she always liked to wearit, as it had belonged to her mother. Robert Roy drew it off, and put itdeliberately into his pocket.

  "Give me this; you shall have it back again when I am dead, or you aremarried, whichever happens first. Do you understand?"

  Putting David aside (indeed, he seemed for the first time to forget theboy's presence), he took her by the two hands and looked down into herface. Apparently he read something there, something which startled him,almost shocked him.

  Irresolute, alas! Too late; for just then all the three Dalziel boysrushed into the house and the school-room, followed by their grandmother.The old lady looked a good deal surprised, perhaps a little displeased,fro on to the other.

  Mr. Roy perceived it, and recovered himself in an instant, letting goFortune's hands and placing himself in front of her, between her and Mrs.Dalziel. Long afterward she remembered that trivial act--remembered itwith the tender gratitude of the protected toward the protector, ifnothing more.

  "You see, I came, as I told you I should, if possible, to bid MissWilliams good-by, and wee Davie. They both kindly admitted me, and wehave had half an hour's merry chat, have we not Davie? Now, my man,good-by." He took up the little fellow and kissed him, and thenextended his hand. "Good-by, Miss Williams. I hope your little pupilswill value you as you deserve."

  Then, with a courteous and formal farewell to the old lady, and a mostuproarious one from the boys, he went to the door, but turned round,saying to the eldest boy, distinctly and clearly--though she was at thefarther end of the room, she heard, and was sure he meant her to hearevery word:

  "By-the-by, Archy, there is something I was about to explain to MissWilliams. Tell her I will write it. She is quite sure to have a letterfrom me tomorrow--no, on Tuesday morning."

  And so he went away, bravely and cheerily, the boys accompanying him tothe gate, and shouting and waving their hats to him as he crossed theLinks, until their grandmother reprovingly sugge
sted that it was Sunday.

  "But Mr. Roy does not go off to India every Sunday. Hurrah! I wish wewere all going too. Three cheers for Mr. Roy." "Mr. Roy is a very finefellow, and I hope he will do well," said Mrs. Dalziel, touched by theirenthusiasm; also by some old memories, for, like many St. Andrews folk,she was strongly linked with India, and had sent off one-half of hernumerous family to live or die there. There was something like a tear inher old eyes, though not for the young tutor; but it effectually kept herfrom either looking at or thinking of the governess. And she forgot themboth immediately. They were merely the tutor and the governess.

  As for the boys, they chattered vehemently all tea-time about Mr. Roy,and their envy of the "jolly" life he was going to; then their mindsturned to their own affairs, and there was silence.

  The kind of silence, most of us know it, when any one belonging to ahousehold, or very familiar there, goes away on a long indefiniteabsence. At first there is little consciousness of absence at all; weare so constantly expecting the door to be opened for the customarypresence that we scarcely even miss the known voice, or face, or hand.By-and-by, however, we do miss it, and there comes a general, loud,shallow lamentation which soon cures itself, and implies an easy andcomfortable forgetfulness before long. Except with some, or possiblyonly one, who is, most likely the one who has never been heard to utter aword of regret, or seen to shed a single tear.

  Miss Williams, now left sole mistress in the school room, gave herlessons as usual there that Monday morning, and walked with all four boyson the Links all afternoon. It was a very bright day, as beautiful asSunday had been, and they communicated to her the interesting facts,learned at golfing that morning, that Mr. Roy and his portmanteau hadbeen seen at Leuchars on the way to Burntisland, and he would likely havea good crossing, as the sea was very calm. There had lately been someequinoctial gales, which had interested the boys amazingly, and theycalculated with ingenious pertinacity whether such gales were likely tooccur again when Mr. Roy was in the Bay of Biscay, and, if his ship werewrecked, what he would be supposed to do. They were quite sure that hewould conduct himself with great heroism, perhaps escape on a singleplank, or a raft made by his own hands, and they consulted Miss Williams,who of course was peripatetic cyclopedia of all scholastic information,as to which port in France of Spain he was likely to be drifted to,supposing this exciting event did happen.

  She answered their questions with her usual ready kindliness. She feltlike a person in a dream, yet a not unhappy dream, for she still heardthe voice, still felt the clasp of the strong, tender, sustaining hands.And tomorrow would be Tuesday.

  Tuesday was a wet morning. The bright days were done. Soon after dawnFortune had woke up and watched the sunrise, till a chill fog crept overthe sea and blotted it out; then gradually blotted out the land also, theLinks, the town, every thing. A regular St. Andrews "haar;" and St.Andrews people know what that is. Miss Williams had seen it once ortwice before, but never so bad as this--blighting, penetrating, and sodense that you could hardly see your hand before you.

  But Fortune scarcely felt it. She said to herself, "Today is Tuesday,"which meant nothing to any one else, every thing to her. For she knewthe absolute faithfulness, the careful accuracy, in great things andsmall, with which she had to do. If Robert Roy said, "I will write onsuch a day," he was as sure to write as that the day would dawn; that is,so far as his own will went; and will, not circumstance, is the strongestagent in this world.

  Therefore she waited quietly for the postman's horn. It sounded at last.

  "I'll go," cried Archy. "Just look at the haar! I shall have to gropemy way to the gate."

  He came back, after what seemed an almost endless time, rubbing his headand declaring he had nearly blinded himself by running right into thelaurel bush.

  "I couldn't see for the fog. I only hope I've left none of the lettersbehind. No, no; all right. Such a lot! It's the Indian mail. There'sfor you, and you, boys." He dealt them out with a merry, careless hand.

  There was no letter for Miss Williams--a circumstance so usual thatnobody noticed it or her, as she sat silent in her corner, while thechildren read noisily and gaily the letters from their far-away parents.

  _Her_ letter--what had befallen it? Had he forgotten to write? ButRobert Roy never forgot any thing. Nor did he delay any thing that hecould possibly do at the time he promised. He was one of the very fewpeople in this world who in small things as in great are absolutelyreliable. It seemed so impossible to believe he had not written, when hesaid he would, that as a last hope, she stole out with a plaid over herhead and crept through the sidewalks of the garden, almost groping herway through the fog, and, like Archy, stumbling over the low boughs ofthe laurel bush to the letter-box it held. Her trembling hands felt inevery corner, but no letter was there.

  She went wearily back; weary at heart, but patient still. A love likehers, self-existent and sufficient to itself, is very patient, quiteunlike the other and more common form of the passion; not love, but adiseased craving to be loved, which causes a thousand imaginary miseriesand wrongs. Sharp was her pain, poor girl; but she was not angry, andafter her first stab of disappointment her courage rose. All was wellwith him; he had been seen cheerily starting for Edinburgh; and her owntemporary suffering was a comparatively a small thing. It could notlast: the letter would come tomorrow.

  But it did not, nor the next day, nor the next. On the fourth day herheart felt like to break.

  I think, of all pains not mortal, few are worse than this small silentagony of waiting for the post; letting all the day's hope climax upon asingle minute, which passes by, and the hope with it, and then comesanother day of dumb endurance, if not despair. This even with ordinaryletters upon which any thing of moment depends. With others, such asthis letter of Robert Roy's--let us not speak of it. Some may imagine,others may have known, a similar suspense. They will understand why,long years afterward, Fortune Williams was heard to say, with a quiver ofthe lip that could have told its bitter tale, "No; when I have a letterto write, I never put off writing it for single day."

  As these days wore on--these cruel days, never remembered without ashiver of pain, and of wonder that she could have lived through them atall--the whole fabric of reasons, arguments, excuses, that she had builtup, for him and herself, gradually crumbled away. Had she altogethermisapprehended the purport of his promised letter? Was it just someordinary note, about her boys and their studies perhaps, which, afterall, he had not thought it worthwhile to write? Yet surely it was worthwhile, if only to send a kindly and courteous farewell to a friend, afterso close an intimacy and in face of so indefinite a separation.

  A friend? Only a friend? Words may deceive, eyes seldom can. And therehad been love in his eyes. Not mere liking, but actual love. She hadseen it, felt it, with that almost unerring instinct that women have,whether they return the love or not. In the latter case, they seldomdoubt it; in the former, they often do.

  "Could I have been mistaken?" she thought, with a burning pang of shame."Oh, why did he not speak--just one word? After that, I could have borneany thing."

  But he had not spoken, had not written. He had let himself drop out ofher life as completely as a falling star drops out of the sky, a shipsinks down in mid-ocean, or--any other poetical simile, used under suchcircumstances by romantic people.

  Fortune Williams was not romantic; at least, what romance was in her laydeep down, and came out in act rather than word. She neither wept norraved nor cultivated any external signs of a breaking heart. A littlepaler she grew, a little quieter, but nobody observed this: indeed, itcame to be one of her deepest causes of thankfulness that there wasnobody to observe any thing--that she had no living soul belonging toher, neither father, mother, brother, nor sister, to pity her or to blamehim; since to think him either blamable or blamed would have been thesharpest torture she could have known.

  She was saved that and some few other things by being only a governess,
instead of one of Fate's cherished darlings, nestled in a family home.She had no time to grieve, except in the dead of night, when "the rainwas on the roof." It so happened that, after the haar, there set in aseason of continuous, sullen, depressing rain. But at night-time, andfor the ten minutes between post hour and lesson hour--which shegenerally passed in her own room--if her mother, who died when she wasten-years old, could have seen her, she would have said, "My poor child."

  Robert Roy had once involuntarily called her so, when by accident one ofher rough boys hurt her hand, and he himself bound it up, with theindescribable tenderness which the strong only know how to show or feel.Well she remembered this; indeed, almost every thing he had said or donecame back upon her now--vividly, as we recall the words and looks of thedead--mingled with such a hungering pain, such a cruel "miss" of him,daily and hourly, his companionship, help, counsel, every thing she hadlacked all her life, and never found but with him and from him. And hewas gone, had broken his promise, had left her without a single farewellword.

  That he had cared for her, in some sort of way, she was certain; for hewas one of those who never say a word too large--nay, he usually saidmuch less than he felt. Whatever he had felt for her--whetherfriendship, affection, love--must have been true. There was in hisnature intense reserve, but no falseness, no insincerity, not an atom ofpretense of any kind.

  If he did not love her, why not tell her so? What was there to hinderhim? Nothing, except that strange notion of the "dishonorableness" ofasking a woman's love when one has nothing but love to give her inreturn. This, even, he had seemed at the last to have set aside, as ifhe could not go away without speaking. And yet he did it.

  Perhaps he thought she did not care for him? He had once said a manought to feel quite sure of a woman before he asked her. Also, that heshould never ask twice, since, if she did not know her own mind then, shenever would know it, and such a woman was the worst possible bargain aman could make in marriage.

  Not know her own mind! Alas, poor soul, Fortune knew it only too well.In that dreadful fortnight it was "borne in upon her," as pious peoplesay, that though she felt kindly to all human beings, the one human beingwho was necessary to her--without whom her life might be busy, indeed,and useful, but never perfect, an endurance instead of joy--was thisyoung man, as solitary as herself, as poor, as hard-working; good,gentle, brave Robert Roy.

  Oh why had they not come together, heart to heart--just they two, soalone in the world--and ever after belonged to one another, even thoughit had been years and years before they were married?

  "If only he had love me, and told me so!" was her bitter cry. "I couldhave waited ever so hardly, and quite alone, if only I might have had aright to him, and been his comfort, as he was mine. But now--now--"

  Yet still she waited, looking forward daily to that dreadful post hour;and when it had gone by, nerving herself to endure until tomorrow. Atlast hope, slowly dying, was killed outright.

  One day at tea-time the boys blurted out, with happy carelessness, theirshort-lived regrets for him being quite over, the news that Mr. Roy hadsailed.

  "Not for Calcutta, but Shanghai, a much longer voyage. He can't be heardof for a year at least, and it will be many years before he comes back.I wonder if he will come back rich. They say he will: quite a nabob,perhaps, and take a place in the Highlands, and invite us all--you too,Miss Williams. I once asked him, and he said, 'Of course.' Stop, youare pouring my tea over into the saucer."

  This was the only error she made, but went on filling the cups with asteady hand, smiling and speaking mechanically, as people can sometimes.When the tea was quite over, she slipped away into her room, and wasmissing for a long time.

  So all was over. No more waiting for that vague "something to happen."Nothing could happen now. He was far away across the seas, and she mustjust go back to her old monotonous life, as if it had never been anydifferent--as if she had never seen his face nor heard his voice, neverknown the blessing of his companionship, friendship, love, whatever itwas, or whatever he had meant it to be. No, he could not have loved her;or to have gone away would have been--she did not realize whether rightor wrong--but simply impossible.

  Once, wearying herself with helpless conjectures, a thought, sudden andsharp as steel, went through her heart. He was nearly thirty; few livesare thus long without some sort of love in them. Perhaps he was alreadybound to some other woman, and finding himself drifting into too pleasantintimacy with herself, wished to draw back in time. Such things hadhappened, sometimes almost blamelessly, though most miserably to allparties. But with him it was not likely to happen. He was too clearsighted, strong, and honest. He would never "drift" into anything. Whathe did would be done with a calm deliberate will, incapable of theslightest deception either toward others or himself. Besides, he had atdifferent times told her the whole story of his life, and there was nolove in it; only work, hard work, poverty, courage, and endurance, likeher own.

  "No, he could never have deceived me, neither me nor any one else," sheoften said to herself, almost joyfully, though the tears were runningdown. "What ever it was, it was not that. I am glad--glad. I had farrather believe he never loved me than that he had been false to anotherwoman for my sake. And I believe in him still; I shall always believe inhim. He is perfectly good, perfectly true. And so it does not muchmatter about me."

  I am afraid those young ladies who like plenty of lovers, who expect tobe adored, and are vexed when they are not adored, and most noblyindignant when forsaken, will think very meanly of my poor FortuneWilliams. They may console themselves by thinking she was not a younglady at all--only a woman. Such women are not too common, but they existoccasionally. And they bear their cross and dree their weird (i.e.,endure); but their lot, at any rate, only concerns themselves, and hasone advantage, that it in no way injures the happiness of other people.

  Humble as she was, she had her pride. If she wept, it was out of sight.If she wished herself dead, and a happy ghost, that by any means shemight get near him, know where he was, and what he was doing, thesedreams came only when her work was done, her boys asleep. Day neverbetrayed the secrets of the night. She set to work every morning at herdaily labors with a dogged persistence, never allowing herself a minute'sidleness wherein to sit down and mourn. And when, despite her will, shecould not conquer the fits of nervous irritability that came over her attimes--when the children's innocent voices used to pierce her likeneedles, and their incessant questions and perpetual company were almostmore than she could bear--still, even then, all she did was to run awayand hide herself for a little, coming back with a pleasant face and asmooth temper. Why should she scold them, poor lambs? They were all shehad to love, or that loved her. And they did love her, with all theirboyish hearts.

  One day, however--the day before they all left St. Andrews for England,the two elder to go to school, and the younger ones to return with her totheir maternal grand-mother in London--David said something which woundedher, vexed her, made her almost thankful to be going away.

  She was standing by the laurel bush, which somehow had for her a strangefascination, and her hand was on the letter-box which the boys and Mr.Roy had made. There was a childish pleasure in touching it or any thinghe had touched.

  "I hope grandmamma won't take away that box," said Archy. "She ought tokeep it in memory of us and Mr. Roy. How cleverly he made it! Wasn't heclever now, Miss Williams?"

  "Yes," she answered and no more.

  "I've got a better letter-box than yours," said little Davie,mysteriously. "Shall I show it to you, Miss Williams? And perhaps,"with a knowing look--the mischievous lad! and yet he was more loving andlovable than all the rest, Mr. Roy's favorite, and hers--"perhaps youmight even find a letter in it. Cook says she has seen you many a timewatching for a letter from your sweetheart. Who is he?"

  "I have none. Tell cook she should not talk such nonsense to littleboys," said the governess, gravely. But she felt hot from head to foo
t,and turning, walked slowly in-doors. She did not go near the laurel bushagain.

  After that, she was almost glad to get away, among strange people andstrange places, where Robert Roy's name had never been heard. Thefamiliar places--hallowed as no other spot in this world, could everbe--passed out of sight, and in another week her six months' happy lifeat St. Andrews had vanished, "like a dream when one awaketh."

  Had she awaked? Or was her daily, outside life to be henceforth thedream, and this the reality?