s that I'm angry. Flo, my darling, what a face you
have got. Do come and sit still for a few minutes, or you'll be in a
fever." While Mrs. Fenwick was wiping her girl's brow, and smoothing
her ringlets, Mary walked off to the orchard by herself. There was a
broad green path which made the circuit of it, and she took the round
twice, pausing at the bottom to look at the spot from which she had
tumbled into the river. What a trouble she had been to them all! She
was thoroughly dissatisfied with herself; especially so because she
had fallen into those very difficulties which from early years she
had resolved that she would avoid. She had made up her mind that she
would not flirt, that she would never give a right to any man--or to
any woman--to call her a coquette; that if love and a husband came
in her way she would take them thankfully, and that if they did not,
she would go on her path quietly, if possible, feeling no uneasiness,
and certainly showing none, because the joys of a married life did
not belong to her. But now she had gotten herself into a mess, and
she could not tell herself that it was not her own fault. Then she
resolved again that in future she would go right. It could not but
be that a woman could keep herself from floundering in these messes
of half-courtship,--of courtship on one side, and doubt on the
other,--if she would persistently adhere to some safe rule. Her
rejection of Mr. Gilmore ought to have been unhesitating and certain
from the first. She was sure of that now. She had been guilty of
an absurdity in supposing that because the man had been in earnest,
therefore she had been justified in keeping him in suspense, for his
own sake. She had been guilty of an absurdity, and also of great
self-conceit. She could do nothing now but wait till she should hear
from him,--and then answer him steadily. After what had passed she
could not go to him and declare that it was all over. He was coming
to-night, and she was nearly sure that he would not say a word to her
on the subject. If he did,--if he renewed his offer,--then she would
speak out. It was hardly possible that he should do so, and therefore
the trouble which she had created must remain.

As she thus resolved, she was leaning over the gate looking into the
churchyard, not much observing the graves or the monuments or the
beautiful old ivy-covered tower, or thinking of the dead that were
lying there, or of the living who prayed there; but swear