"you needn't wait till next Sunday to bring her your
words of cheer."

In a minute my darling was crying on my shoulder. I could understand
the outburst, and was glad of it.

All athrill with new emotions, new purposes, an eternity of love, she
had come to church to be reminded that earth was naught, that the
trials and tempests here would come to an end some day, and after, to
the patiently victorious, would come the hymns of praise. _Earth_ was
very full that morning to her and me; _earth_ was a place for
worshipful harmonies; and yet the strong contrast with the poor
patient sufferer who had passed into church with us was too much for
Bessie: she craved an expression that should comprehend alike her
sorrow and our abundant joy.

The tempest of tears passed by, and we had bright skies again. Poor
Mrs. Sloman's dinner waited long that day; and it was with a guilty
sense that she was waiting too that we went down the hill at a
quickened pace when the church clock, sounding up the hillside, came
like a chiding voice.

And a double sense of guiltiness was creeping over me. I must return
to New York to-morrow, and I had not told Bessie yet of the longer
journey I must make so soon. I put it by again and again in the short
flying hours of that afternoon; and it was not until dusk had fallen
in the little porch, as we sat there after tea, and I had watched the
light from Mrs. Sloman's chamber shine down upon the honeysuckles and
then go out, that I took my resolution.

"Bessie," I said, leaning over her and taking her face in both my
hands, "I have something to tell you."

CHAPTER III.

"I have something to tell you;" and without an instant's pause I went
on: "Mr. D---- has business in England which cannot be attended to by
letter. One of us must go, and they send me. I must sail in two
weeks."

It was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky, and Bessie gave a little gasp
of surprise: "So soon! Oh, Charlie, take me with you!" Realizing in
the next instant the purport of the suggestion, she flung away from my
hands and rushed into the parlor, where a dim, soft lamp was burning
on the table. She sat down on a low chair beside it and hid her face
on the table in her hands.

Like a flash of lightning all the possibilities of our marriage before
many days--arranging it with Mrs. Sloman, and satisfying my partners,
who would expect me to travel fast and work hard in the short time
they had allotted for the journey,--