ver and the wide sky. Even the beauty of the night seemed to mock
her. The big, bright stars, which used to twinkle in such a friendly
fashion, now gleamed coldly at her; the light breeze rustling in the
leaves was like so many spiteful whispers telling her secret. She had
plucked a red lily that grew outside her tent door as she came out, and
sat twirling it in her fingers. In an incredibly short time it whithered
and let its petals droop. Agony gazed at it superstitiously. An old
nurse had once told her that a flower would wither in the hand of a
person who had told a lie. The idle tale came back to her now. Was it
perhaps true after all? Did she have a withering touch now?

The things Miss Amesbury had said to her at sunset on the river the day
before came back with startling force. "We carry our destiny in our own
hands. We are what we make ourselves. Whatever kind of bud we are, just
such a flower we will be. You are setting your face now in the direction
in which you are going to travel. To be a noble woman you must have been
a noble girl. The Future is only a great many Nows added up. Every
worthy action you perform now will make it easier to perform another one
later on, and every unworthy one will do the same thing. If your lamp is
dim you can't light the way for others...."

Agony looked at herself pitilessly and shuddered. Was this the road she
was going to travel; was this the direction in which she had set her
face? Cheat, deceiver, that was what she was. The winds whispered it;
the river babbled it; the very stars seemed to twinkle it. Agony closed
her eyes, and put her hands over her ears to shut out the little
insinuating sounds; and in the silence her very heart beats throbbed it,
rhythmically, pitilessly.

* * * * *

In the hour before dawn Miss Amesbury sat up in bed, under the
impression that someone had called her name. Yes, there was someone on
her balcony; in the dim light she could make out a drooping figure
beside her bed.

"Miss Amesbury," faltered a low, but familiar voice.

"Why Agony, child!" exclaimed Miss Amesbury, now well awake and
recognizing her visitor. "What is the matter? Are you sick?"

"Yes," replied Agony quietly, "sick of deceiving people."

And there, in the dim light, she told her whole story, the story of
vaulting ambition and timely temptation, of action in haste and
repentance at weary leisure.

"So that was it," Miss Amesbury exclai