e war, and had been sorry when she became too
old to play about the shop.

He never spoke to her of love,--indeed, he never thought of his passion
in such a light. There would have been no legal barrier to their union;
there would have been no frightful menace to white supremacy in the
marriage of the negro and the octoroon: the drop of dark blood bridged
the chasm. But Frank knew that she did not love him, and had not hoped
that she might. His was one of those rare souls that can give with
small hope of return. When he had made the scar upon her arm, by the
same token she had branded him her slave forever; when he had saved her
from a watery grave, he had given his life to her. There are depths of
fidelity and devotion in the negro heart that have never been fathomed
or fully appreciated. Now and then in the kindlier phases of slavery
these qualities were brightly conspicuous, and in them, if wisely
appealed to, lies the strongest hope of amity between the two races
whose destiny seems bound up together in the Western world. Even a
dumb brute can be won by kindness. Surely it were worth while to try
some other weapon than scorn and contumely and hard words upon people
of our common race,--the human race, which is bigger and broader than
Celt or Saxon, barbarian or Greek, Jew or Gentile, black or white; for
we are all children of a common Father, forget it as we may, and each
one of us is in some measure his brother's keeper.

XIX

GOD MADE US ALL

Rena was convalescent from a two-weeks' illness when her brother came
to see her. He arrived at Patesville by an early morning train before
the town was awake, and walked unnoticed from the station to his
mother's house. His meeting with his sister was not without emotion:
he embraced her tenderly, and Rena became for a few minutes a very
Niobe of grief.

"Oh, it was cruel, cruel!" she sobbed. "I shall never get over it."

"I know it, my dear," replied Warwick soothingly,--"I know it, and I'm
to blame for it. If I had never taken you away from here, you would
have escaped this painful experience. But do not despair; all is not
lost. Tryon will not marry you, as I hoped he might, while I feared
the contrary; but he is a gentleman, and will be silent. Come back and
try again."

"No, John. I couldn't go through it a second time. I managed very
well before, when I thought our secret was unknown; but now I could
never be sure. It would be borne on ever