he remembered that
girls used to copy when she went to school, and they worked so hard now
that it really was somewhat excusable.

"You would think it was serious if you heard Ruth denounce it," was
Julia's reply. "She could never say enough against it, and pretended to
be so much better than any of us. To think of her having looked over me!
I couldn't have believed it!"

Ernest made no remark, though he listened attentively to the
conversation.

The visit to Miss Elgin, which Mrs. Woburn did not consider necessary,
was a very trying ordeal. _She_ certainly did not make light of the
matter, although she did not think it would be advisable to tell the
girls; it would be sufficient for them to know that Ruth was under her
displeasure.

"I feared at first that there was something wrong," she said, "but I
could not doubt your word, Ruth; I have always trusted to your high
principle and honour. Henceforth I must act differently, and you must
not expect to be trusted."

There was no palliation of the offence, which she surveyed from her high
stand-point of justice alone.

"Now, Ruth, your troubles are over," said her aunt gaily as they
returned home.

"Over! Are they?" she sighed wearily to herself, "when I have to write
home, and to live next term under Miss Elgin's displeasure, and all my
life with the remembrance of this behind me!"

It was a great trial to have to write home to dispel her mother's fond
hopes and her father's pride in her; to tell them that their Ruth was
not the frank, open, truth-loving girl they had always believed her; to
prove to them that one of their children could stoop to equivocation and
deceit. Yes, it was a hard and bitter task, and she shed a good many
tears over it as she wrote, almost oblivious of everything else in the
little study, where the traces of the fire still remained.

Presently she raised her head, and saw Ernest looking at her--not
curiously, but with a kind, compassionate gaze.

"Ruth," he said, in a low tone, "I am awfully sorry for you, but I can't
understand why you should be so unhappy _now_."

"I shall always be wretched," said Ruth bitterly; "all my life, I
expect."

"I--I thought when first you came here that you were a Christian," said
the boy timidly.

"I thought so too," sobbed Ruth, "but I suppose I was wrong. Everything
goes wrong here, and that happy time is so far away."

"But if you have confessed to God, and have His forgiveness, the
happiness