r of
the joys of the old year, even after '95 came knocking at the door, and
in some odd way a little sprig thereof was found one evening to be
clinging to the top of a cabinet photograph of Mr. Forrest which stood
on the mantel shelf.

It was a sharp, cold January evening, and Jenny Wallen's soft cheek was
glowing, and her eyes sparkling, as she tripped lightly up the stone
steps, let herself into the warm hall-way, and peered into the parlor.
No one was there. A bright coal fire blazed in the open grate. The
pretty room looked cosy and inviting. The library beyond--"Wells's
particular"--was dark. Mrs. Wells, said the maid, from the head of the
kitchen stairs, had been home, but was gone over to the Lambert to meet
Mr. Wells. So Jenny was alone. Some women lose courage at such times.
She seemed to gain it. Drawing off her gloves and throwing aside the
heavy cloak, she stood there in front of the blaze, her eyes fixed upon
that unconscious portrait, her hands extended over the flames. What
speaking eyes the girl had! What would be the words the soft, rosy lips
were framing? With all her soul she was gazing straight into that
unresponsive, soldierly, handsome face. With all her heart she was
murmuring some inarticulate appeal, lavishing some womanly caresses upon
the dumb and senseless picture. Then the little hands were upraised, and
the next instant, frame and all, the shadow was nestled just where the
substance had lain, clasped in those encircling arms, long weeks before.
A moment or two it was held there, the sweet face bending over, the soft
lips murmuring, crooning to it as a mother might to a precious child,
and then it was raised still more, until those lips were pressed upon it
long, long, long and fervently.

Then down went everything with a crash.

In striving to explain matters and set himself right in the eyes of his
lady-love some hours later, Captain Forrest protested that he had had no
intention whatever of spying upon, much less of startling her. They had
speedily discovered at St. Augustine that it was useless trying to bring
back this wayward son and brother, a man of thirty-five, to live without
the heart so unmistakably in the keeping of the girl he'd left behind.
"I have written to her--all you could ask, Floyd, my son," were at last
the mother's words. "Go, and God bless you." And three days later he
surprised Mrs. Wells. "I've just got to go out," said she, after a
while, "and you've simply go