would know who I am, and it seems your wish
that he should not know. I should like to see you once more, but I
should not like you to see me. I am too much changed; I can see it in my
own face. Good-night. Good-by."

There was no name signed. The initials were J. P., and Crittenden looked
up inquiringly.

"His name was not Blackford; it was Page--Jack Page. He was my cousin,"
she went on, gently. "That is why I never told you. It all happened
while you were at college. While you were here, he was usually out West;
and people thought we were merely cousins, and that I was weaning him
from his unhappy ways. I was young and foolish, but I had--you know the
rest."

The tears gathered in her eyes.

"God pity him!"

Crittenden turned from her and walked to and fro, and Judith rose and
walked up to him, looking him in the eyes.

"No, dear," she said; "I am sorry for him now--sorry, so sorry! I wish I
could have helped him more. That is all. It has all gone--long ago. It
never was. I did not know until I left you here at the stiles that
night."

Crittenden looked inquiringly into her eyes before he stooped to kiss
her. She answered his look.

"Yes," she said simply; "when I sent him away."

Crittenden's conscience smote him sharply. What right had he to ask such
a question--even with a look?

"Come, dear," he said; "I want to tell you all--now."

But Judith stopped him with a gesture.

"Is there anything that may cross your life hereafter--or mine?"

"No, thank God; no!"

Judith put her finger on his lips.

"I don't want to know."

* * * * *

And God was good that Christmas.

The day was snapping cold, and just a fortnight before Christmas eve.
There had been a heavy storm of wind and sleet the night before, and the
negroes of Canewood, headed by Bob and Uncle Ephraim, were searching the
woods for the biggest fallen oak they could find. The frozen grass was
strewn with wrenched limbs, and here and there was an ash or a
sugar-tree splintered and prostrate, but wily Uncle Ephraim was looking
for a yule-log that would burn slowly and burn long; for as long as the
log burned, just that long lasted the holiday of every darky on the
place. So the search was careful, and lasted till a yell rose from Bob
under a cliff by the side of the creek--a yell of triumph that sent the
negroes in a rush toward him. Bob stood on the torn and twisted roots of
a great oak that wind and ice had