ing, half tearfully, if she might wear black, as
ladies sometimes did. But Morris had promptly answered no. His bride, if
she came to him willingly, must not come clad in widow's weeds, for when
she became his wife she would cease to be a widow.

And so the black was laid aside, and Katy, in soft tinted colors, with
her bright hair curling in her neck, looked as girlish and beautiful as
if in Greenwood there were no pretentious monument, with Wilford's name
upon it, nor any little grave in Silverton where Baby Cameron slept. She
had been both wife and mother, but she was quite as dear to Morris as if
she had never borne other name than Katy Lennox, and as he held her for
a moment closely to his heart, he thanked God, who had at last given to
him the idol of his boyhood and the love of his later years. Across
their pathway no shadow was lying, except when they remembered Helen, on
whom the mantle of widowhood had so darkly fallen just as Katy was
throwing it off.

Poor Helen, the tears always crept to Katy's eyes when, she thought of
her, and now as she saw her steal across the road and strike into the
winding path which led to the pasture where the pines and hemlock grew,
she nestled closer to Morris, and whispered:

"Sometimes I think it wrong to be so happy when Helen is so sad. I pity
her so much to-day."

And Helen was to be pitied, for her heart was aching to its very core.
She had tried to keep up through the preparations for Katy's bridal,
tried to seem interested, and even cheerful, while all the time a hidden
agony was tugging at her heart, and life seemed a heavier burden than
she could bear.

All her portion of the work was finished now, and in the balmy
brightness of that warm April afternoon she went into the fields where
she could be alone beneath the soft, summer-like sky, and pour out her
pent-up anguish into the ear of Him who had so often soothed and
comforted her when other aids had failed. Last night, for the first time
since she heard the dreadful news, she had dreamed of Mark, and when she
awoke she still felt the pressure of his lips upon her brow, the touch
of his arm upon her waist, and the thrilling clasp of his warm hand as
it pressed and held her own. But that was a dream, a cruel delusion, and
its memory made the day more dark and dreary as she went more slowly up
the beaten path, pausing once beneath a chestnut tree and leaning her
throbbing head against the shaggy bark as she heard in