toward him, and looked at him steadily as she nodded her head
again and again. She rose to go, saying, "We mustn't stay here any
longer."

He caught her hand to stop her, and said, "Ellen--Ellen, promise me
just one thing." She looked her question. He cried, "That you won't
forget--just that you won't forget."

She took his hand and stood before him as he sat, hoping to stay her.
She answered: "Not as long as I live, John Barclay. Oh, not as long as
I live." Then she exclaimed: "Now--" and her voice changed, "we just
must go, John; Molly's gone, and it's getting late." She helped him
limp over the rocks and up the steep road, but when they reached the
level, she dropped his hand, and they walked home slowly, looking back
at the moon, so that they might not overtake the other couple. Once or
twice they stopped and sat on lumber piles in the street, talking of
nothing, and it was after ten o'clock when they came to the gate. The
girl looked anxiously up the walk toward the house. "They've come and
gone," she said. She moved as if to go away.

"I wish you wouldn't go right in," he begged.

"Oh--I ought to," she replied. They were silent. The roar of the
water over the dam came to them on the evening breeze. She put out her
hand.

"Well," he sighed as he rested his lame foot, and started,
"well--good-by."

She turned to go, and then swiftly stepped toward him, and kissed him,
and ran gasping and laughing up the walk.

The boy gazed after her a moment, wondering if he should follow her,
but while he waited she was gone, and he heard her lock the door after
her. Then he limped down the road in a kind of swoon of joy. Sometimes
he tried to whistle--he tried a bar of Schubert's "Serenade," but
consciously stopped. Again and again under his breath as loud as he
dared, he called the name "Ellen" and stood gazing at the moon, and
then tried to hippety-hop, but his limp stopped that. Then he tried
whistling the "Miserere," but he pitched it too high, and it ran out,
so he sang as he turned across the commons toward home, and that
helped a little; and he opened the door of his home singing, "How can
I leave thee--how can I bear to part?" The light was burning in the
kitchen, and he went to his mother and kissed her. His face was aglow,
and she saw what had happened to him. She put him aside with, "Run on
to bed now, sonny; I've got a little work out here." And he left her.
In the sitting room only the moon gave light. He s