e had gone to the very gates and waited like a beggar
outside, lest he should miss her by any chance, and the end of his
waiting had been that he had caught a glimpse of the bright, warm room,
and the piano, and Dolly with Gowan bending over her as if she had no
other lover in the world. He told it all in a burst, clenching his hand
and scarcely stopping for breath; but when he ended he dashed the letter
down, pushed his chair round, and dropped his head on his folded arms on
the table, with a wild, tearing sob.

"It is no fault of hers," he cried, "and it was only the first sting
that made me reproach her. I shall never do it again. She is only in the
right, and that fellow is in the right when he tells himself that he
can take better care of her and make her happier than I can. I will be a
coward no longer,--not an hour longer. I will give her up to-night. She
will learn to love him--he is a gentleman at least--if I were in
his place I should never fear that she would not learn in time, and
forget--and forget the poor, selfish beggar who would have died for her,
and yet was not man enough to control the jealous rage that tortured
her. I 'll give her up. I'll give it all up--but, oh! my God! Dolly,
the--the little house, and--and the dreams I have had about it!"

Aimee was almost in despair. This was not one of his ordinary moods;
this was the culminating point,--the culmination of all his old
sufferings and pangs. He had been working slowly toward this through
all the old unhappiness and self-reproach. The constant droppings of the
bygone years had worn away the stone at last, and he could not bear much
more. Aimee was frightened now. Her habit of forethought showed her
all this in a very few seconds. His nervous, highly strung, impassioned
temperament had broken down at last. Another blow would be too much for
him. If she could not manage to set him right now and calm him, and if
things went wrong again, she was secretly conscious of feeling that the
consequences could not be foreseen. There was nothing wild and rash and
wretched he might not do.

She got up and went to him, and leaned upon the table, clasping her
cool, firm little hand upon his hot, desperate one. A woman of fifty
could not have had the power over him that this slight, inexperienced
little creature had. Her childish face caught color and life and
strength in her determination to do her best for these two whom she
loved so well. Her small-boned, fr