passed over her. Her troubled face grew beautifully still. The shifting
light of terror and suspense vanished from her grand gray eyes, and left
in them the steady inner glow of a high and pure resolve.

There was a moment of silence between them. They both had need of
silence. Julian was the first to speak again.

"Have I satisfied you that her opportunity is still before her?" he
asked. "Do you feel, as I feel, that she has _not_ done with hope?"

"You have satisfied me that the world holds no truer friend to her than
you," Mercy answered, gently and gratefully. "She shall prove herself
worthy of your generous confidence in her. She shall show you yet that
you have not spoken in vain."

Still inevitably failing to understand her, he led the way to the door.

"Don't waste the precious time," he said. "Don't leave her cruelly to
herself. If you can't go to her, let me go as your messenger, in your
place."

She stopped him by a gesture. He took a step back into the room, and
paused, observing with surprise that she made no attempt to move from
the chair that she occupied.

"Stay here," she said to him, in suddenly altered tones.

"Pardon me," he rejoined, "I don't understand you."

"You will understand me directly. Give me a little time."

He still lingered near the door, with his eyes fixed inquiringly on
her. A man of a lower nature than his, or a man believing in Mercy less
devotedly than he believed, would now have felt his first suspicion of
her. Julian was as far as ever from suspecting her, even yet. "Do you
wish to be alone?" he asked, considerately. "Shall I leave you for a
while and return again?"

She looked up with a start of terror. "Leave me?" she repeated, and
suddenly checked herself on the point of saying more. Nearly half the
length of the room divided them from each other. The words which she
was longing to say were words that would never pass her lips unless she
could see some encouragement in his face. "No!" she cried out to him, on
a sudden, in her sore need, "don't leave me! Come back to me!"

He obeyed her in silence. In silence, on her side, she pointed to the
chair near her. He took it. She looked at him, and checked herself
again; resolute to make her terrible confession, yet still hesitating
how to begin. Her woman's instinct whispered to her, "Find courage in
his touch!" She said to him, simply and artlessly said to him, "Give
me encouragement. Give me strength. Let me take you