for--not to enjoy
yourself."

She put a quiet sentence, in that oddly buoyant voice, into the stream
of his words. "Still, you don't say I'd go to hell forever," she
commented.

"Is that your only thought?" he demanded indignantly. "Can't you think
of what's brave and worth while--of what's decent for a big thing like
a soul? A soul that's going on living to eternity--do you want to
blacken that at the start? Can't you forget your little moods and your
despair of the moment?"

"No, I can't." The roses bobbed as she shook her head. The man, in
his heart, knew how it was, and did not wonder. But he must somehow
stop this determination which he had--she said--helped to form. A
thought came to him; he hesitated a moment, and then broke out
impetuously: "Let me do this--let me write to you; I'm not saying
things straight. It's hard. I think I could write more clearly. And
it's unfair not to give me a hearing. Will you promise only this, not
to do it till you've read my letter?"

Slowly the youth, the indomitable brightness in the girl forged to the
front. She looked at him with the dawn of a smile in her eyes, and he
saw all at once, with a passing vision, that her eyes were very blue
and that her hair was bright and light--a face vivid and responsive.

"Why, yes. There's no particular reason for to-night. I can wait.
But I'm going home to-morrow, to my uncle's place at Forest Gate. I'll
never be here again. The people I'm with are going away to live next
month. I'll never see you again. You don't know my name." She
considered a moment. "I'd rather not have you know it. You may write
to--" She laughed. "I said I was just a date--you may write to August
First, Forest Gate, Illinois. Say care of, care of--" Again she
laughed. "Oh, well, care of Robert Halarkenden. That will reach me."

Quite gravely the man wrote down the fantastic address. "Thank you. I
will write at once. You promised?"

"Yes." She put out her hand. "You've been very good to me. I shall
never see you again. Good-by."

"Good-by," he said, and the room was suddenly so still, so empty, so
dark that it oppressed him.

WARCHESTER,
St. Andrew's Parish House,
August 5th.

This is to redeem my promise. When we talked that afternoon, it seemed
to me that I should be able to write the words I could not say. Every
day since then I have said "Tomorrow I shall be able to tell her
clearly." The clearness has not