ait for Mercy this
morning on a street he knew she must pass on her way to market. He did not
define to himself any motive for this act, except the simple longing to
see her face. He had not said to himself what he would do, or what words
he would speak, or even that he would speak at all; but one look at her
face he must have, and he had though to himself distinctly in making this
plan, "Here is one way in which I can see her every day, and my mother
never know any thing about it."

When Mrs. White saw Mercy set off for her usual morning walk, a half hour
or more after Stephen had left the house, she thought, as she had often
though before on similar occasions, "Well, she won't overtake Stephen
this time. I dare say she planned to." Light-hearted Mercy, meantime, was
walking on with her own swift, elastic tread, and thinking warmly and
shyly of the look with which Stephen had bade her good-by the day before.
She was walking, as was her habit, with her eyes cast down, and did not
observe that any one approached her, until she suddenly heard Stephen's
voice saying, "Good-morning, Mrs. Philbrick." It was the second time that
he had surprised her in a reverie of which he himself was the subject.
This time the surprise was a joyful one; and the quick flush of rosy color
which spread over her cheeks was a flush of gladness,--undisguised and
honest gladness.

"Why, Mr. White," she exclaimed, "I never thought of seeing you. I thought
you were always in your office at this time."

"I waited to see you this morning," replied Stephen, in a tone as simply
honest as her own. "I wanted to speak to you."

Mercy looked up inquiringly, but did not speak. Stephen smiled.

"Oh, not for any particular thing," he said: "only for the pleasure of
it."

Then Mercy smiled, and the two looked into each other's faces with a joy
which neither attempted to disguise. Stephen took Mercy's basket from her
arm; and they walked along in silence, not knowing that it was silence, so
full was it of sweet meanings to them in the simple fact that they were
walking by each other's side. The few words they did speak were of the
purposeless and irrelevant sort in which unacknowledged lovers do so
universally express themselves in their earlier moments alone together,--a
sort of speech more like birds chirping than like ordinary language. When
they parted at the door of Stephen's office, he said,--

"I think you always come to the village about this time