So
he drove thoughtfully off, and Letty went back to her work with a
singing heart. She was not quite sure that it was right to be happy
again, all at once, but she could not still her blood. To be forgiven,
to find herself free from the haunting consciousness that she could
deceive the creature to whom she held such passionate allegiance--this
was enough to shape a new heaven and a new earth. Her simple household
duties took on the significance of noble ceremonies. She sang as she
went about them, and the words were those of a joyous hymn. She seemed
to be serving in a temple, making it clean and fragrant in the name of
love.

* * * * *

Saturday was a day born of heavenly intentions. Letty ran out behind the
house, where the ground rose abruptly, and looked off, entranced, into
the blue distance. It was the stillest day of all the fall. Not a breath
stirred about her; but in the maple grove at the side of the house,
where the trees had turned early under the chill of an unseasonable
night, yellow leaves were sifting down without a sound. Goldenrod was
growing dull, clematis had ripened into feathery spray, and she knew how
the closed gentians were painting great purple dashes by the side of the
road. "Oh!" she cried aloud, in rapture. It was her wedding day; a year
ago the sun had shone as warmly and benignantly as he was shining now,
and the same haze had risen, like an exhalation, from the hills. She saw
a special omen in it, and felt herself the child of happy fortune, to be
so mothered by the great blue sky. Then she ran in to give David his
breakfast, and tell him, as they sat down, that it was their wedding
morning. As she went, she tore a spray of blood-red woodbine from the
wall, and bound it round her waist.

But David was not ready for breakfast; he was talking with a man at the
barn, and half an hour later came hurrying in to his retarded meal.

"I've got to eat an' run," said he; "Job Fisher kep' me. It's about that
ma'sh. But the time wa'n't wasted. He'll sell ten acres for twenty
dollars less'n he said last week. Too bad to keep you waitin'! You'd
ought to eat yours while 't was hot."

Letty, with a little smile all to herself, sat demurely down and poured
coffee; this was no time to talk of anniversaries. David ate in haste,
and said good-by.

"I'm goin' down the lot to get my withes," said he. "Whilst I'm gone,
you put me up a mite o' luncheon. I sha'n't lay off to