cently and in order. Let him only
keep his head now--the bravest man need not look too far into
the morrow.

It must be late, he knew. The road into Coombe was deserted. All the
buggies of the country folk returning from evening service had passed
long ago and even the happy young couples indulging in a Sunday night
"after church" flirtation had decorously sought their homes. He looked
at his watch by the clear starlight. It was later even than he had
thought. No need to avoid passing the Elms, now; they would all be
asleep--he might perhaps be able to sleep himself if he knew that no
light burned in Esther's window.

There was no light in the house anywhere. It stood black in the shadow
of its trees. The doctor found himself walking softly. His steps grew
slower, paused. Irresistibly the "spirit in his feet" drew him to the
closed gate from where he could see the black oblong of her window.

"She is asleep," he thought. "Of course she is asleep. Thank God!"

Then, on the instant of dropping his eyes from the window, he saw her.
She was standing quite near, in the shadow of the elm.

"Esther!" The one word leaped from his lips like a cry.

"Yes, it is I," she said.

She offered no word of explanation nor did any need of one occur to
him. Moving from the shadow into the soft starlight she came toward him
like the spirit of the night. But when she paused, so close that only
the gate divided them, he saw that her eyes were wide and dark
with trouble.

"I am so glad you came. I wanted to see you. I--I could not sleep." She
spoke with the direct simplicity of a child, yet nothing could have
shown more plainly that she was a child no longer. All her pretty
girlish hesitation, all her happy shyness had passed away on the breath
of the great awakening. It was a woman who stood there, pale, remote,
with a woman's question in her eyes.

The keen shock of the change in her filled Callandar with rebellious
joy; it would be pain presently, but, just for the moment, love exulted
shamelessly, claiming her own. He tried to answer her but no words came.

"You look very tired." She seemed not to notice his silence. "I must not
keep you. But there is a question I want to ask. Mother told me to-night
that you and she are to be married. Is it true?"

How incredible she was, he thought. How perfect in her direct and simple
dignity. Yet there had crept into her tone a wistfulness which broke
his heart.

"Yes. It is true." He co