he thought it must
be--if I could but look forward--if I had the _right_ to look forward to
his return," she said to herself.

But the evening passed on tranquilly, and to all appearance pleasantly,
without a word or look more than might have been between real brother
and sister. Kenneth talked kindly--tenderly even--of the past; repeated
more than once the pleasure it had been to him to find again his old
friend so little changed, so completely his old friend still. The boys
came in to say good-night, and "good-bye, alas! my lads," added their
tall friend with a sigh. "Don't forget me quite, Hal and Charlie, and
don't let your mother forget me either, eh?" To which the little fellows
replied solemnly, though hardly understanding why he patted their curly
heads with a lingering hand this evening, or why mamma looked grave at
his words.

And Anne bore it all without flinching, and smiled and talked a little
more than usual perhaps, though all the time her heart was bursting, and
Kenneth wondered more than ever if, after all, she _had_ "much heart or
feeling to speak of."

"You will be bringing back a wife with you perhaps," she said once.
"Shall you tell her about your sister Anne, Kenneth?"

Major Graham looked at her earnestly for half an instant before he
replied, but Anne's eyes were not turned towards him, and she did not
see the look. And his words almost belied it.

"Certainly I shall tell her of you," he said, "that is to say, if she
ever comes to exist. At present few things are less probable. Still I
am old enough now never to say, '_Fontaine, je ne boirai jamais de ton
eau._' But," he went on, "I may return to find _you_ married again,
Anne. You are still so young and you are rather lonely."

"No," said Anne with a sudden fierceness which he had never seen in her
before, "I shall _never_ marry again--_never_," and she looked him full
in the face with a strange sparkle in her eyes which almost frightened
him.

"I beg your pardon," he said meekly. And though the momentary
excitement faded as quickly as it had come, and Anne, murmuring some
half-intelligible excuse, was again her quiet self, this momentary
glimpse of a fierier nature beneath gave him food for reflection.

"Can Medway have not been what he seemed on the surface, after all?" he
thought to himself. "What can make her so vindictive against matrimony?"

But it was growing late, and Kenneth had still some last preparations to
make. He rose s