k of you a grown up woman. Do you feel any different?
I spose you wouldn't climb a fence nor run through the pasture lot
for anything now. Have you got a lot of new friends? I wish I
could see you. And now Marsh, I want you to write right off and
tell me what to do about comforting Hanford, and if you've any
message to send to him I think it would be real nice. I hope
you've got a good husband and are happy.

"From your devoted and loving school mate,

"MARY ANN FOTHERGILL."

Marcia laid down the letter and buried her face in her hands. To her too
had come a thrust which must search her life and change it. So while David
wrestled with his sorrow Marcia entered upon the knowledge of her own
heart.

There was something in this revelation by Mary Ann of Hanford Weston's
feelings toward her that touched her immeasurably. Had it all happened
before she left home, had Hanford come to her and told her of his love,
she would have turned from him in dismay, almost disgust, and have told
him that they were both but children, how could they talk of love. She
could never have loved him. She would have felt it instantly, and her
mocking laugh might have done a good deal toward saving him from sorrow.
But now, with miles between them, with the wall of the solemn marriage
vows to separate them forever, with her own youth locked up as she
supposed until the day of eternity should perhaps set it free, with no
hope of any bright dream of life such as girls have, could she turn from
even a school boy's love without a passing tenderness, such as she would
never have felt if she had not come away from it all? Told in Mary Ann's
blunt way, with her crude attempts at pathos, it reached her as it could
not otherwise. With her own new view of life she could sympathize better
with another's disappointments. Perhaps her own loneliness gave her pity
for another. Whatever it was, Marcia's heart suddenly turned toward
Hanford Weston with a great throb of gratitude. She felt that she had been
loved, even though it had been impossible for that love to be returned,
and that whatever happened she would not go unloved down to the end of her
days. Suddenly, out of the midst of the perplexity of her thoughts, there
formed a distinct knowledge of what was lacking in her life, a lack she
had never felt before, and probably would not have felt now had she not
t