ceived that Stephen had spoken at random.

"Oh, yes, certainly,--certainly. I should have known," said Stephen, still
with a preoccupied air, and rising to go. "I thank you for letting me come
into this beautiful room with you. I shall always think of your face
framed in evergreens, and with flickering firelight on it."

"You are not going away, are you, Mr. White?" asked Mercy, mischievously.

"Oh, no, certainly not. I never go away. How could I go away? Why did you
ask?"

"Oh," laughed Mercy, "because you spoke as if you never expected to see my
face after to-night. That's all."

Stephen smiled. "I am afraid I seem a very absent-minded person," he said.
"I did not mean that at all. I hope to see you very often, if I may.
Good-night."

"Good-night, Mr. White. We shall be very glad to see you as often as you
like to come. You may be sure of that; but you must come earlier, or you
will find us all asleep. Good-night."

Stephen spent another half-hour pacing up and down in the snowy path in
front of the house. He did not wish to go in until his mother was asleep.
Very well he knew that it would be better that she did not see his face
that night. When he went in, the house was dark and still. As he passed
his mother's door, she called, "Steve!"

"All right, mother. They'll come," he replied, and ran swiftly up to his
own room.

During this half-hour, Mercy had been sitting in her low chair by the
fire, looking steadily into the leaping blaze, and communing very sternly
with her own heart on the subject of Stephen White. Her pitiless honesty
of nature was just as inexorable in its dealing with her own soul as with
others; she never paltered with, nor evaded an accusation of, her
consciousness. At this moment, she was indignantly admitting to herself
that her conduct and her feeling towards Stephen were both deserving of
condemnation. But, when she asked herself for their reason, no answer came
framed in words, no explanation suggested itself, only Stephen's face rose
up before her, vivid, pleading, as he had looked when he said, "Never
again, Mrs. Philbrick?" and as she looked again into the dark blue eyes,
and heard the low tones over again, she sank into a deeper and deeper
reverie, from which gradually all self-accusation, all perplexity, faded
away, leaving behind them only a vague happiness, a dreamy sense of joy.
If lovers could look back on the first quickening of love in their souls,
how precious would be