unkind, Aunty--unkind."

Hope was almost sobbing.

"Has he once said he was sorry?" asked Mrs. Simcoe. "Has he told you so
this morning?"

"Of course he is sorry, Aunty. How could he help it? Do you suppose he
is a brute? Do you suppose he hasn't ordinary human feeling? Why do you
treat him so?"

Hope asked the question almost fiercely.

Mrs. Simcoe sat profoundly still, and said nothing. Her face seemed to
grow even more rigid as she sat. But suddenly turning to the proud young
girl who stood at her side, her bosom heaving with passion, she drew her
toward her by both hands, pulled her face down close to hers, and kissed
her.

Hope sank on her knees by the side of Mrs. Simcoe's chair. All the pride
in her heart was melted, and poured out of her eyes. She buried her face
upon Mrs. Simcoe's shoulder, and her passion wept and sobbed itself away.
She did not understand what it was, nor why. A little while before, upon
the lawn, she had been so happy. Now it seemed as if her heart were
breaking. When she grew calmer, Mrs. Simcoe, holding the fair face
between her hands, and tenderly kissing it once more, said, slowly,

"Hope, my child, we must all walk the path alone. But you, too, will
learn that our human affections are but tents of a night."

"Aunty, Aunty, what do you mean?" asked Hope, who had risen as the other
was speaking, and now stood beside her, pale and proud.

"I mean, Hope, that you are in love with Abel Newt."

Hope's hands dropped by her side. She stepped back a little. A feeling of
inexpressible solitude fell upon her--of alienation from her grandfather,
and of an inexplicable separation from her old nurse--a feeling as if she
suddenly stood alone in the world--as if she had ceased to be a girl.

"Aunty, is it wrong to love him?"

Before Mrs. Simcoe could answer there was a knock at the door. It was
Hiram, who announced the victim of yesterday's battle, waiting in the
parlor to say a word to Miss Wayne.

"Yes, Hiram." He bowed and withdrew. Hope Wayne stood at the window
silent for a little while, then, with the calm, lofty air--calmer and
loftier than ever--she went down and found Gabriel Bennet. He had come to
thank her--to say how much better he was--how sorry that he should have
been so disgraced as to have been fighting almost before her very eyes.

"I suppose I was very foolish and furious," said he. "Abel ran against
me, and I got very angry and struck him. It was wrong; I know it wa