e meadows and
the swans on the pond. The willows, as if exhausted by the heat, seemed
to bend under the stream, and their eyes followed the lines of the woods
and looked into the burning blue of the sky, striving to read the secret
there. A rim of moist earth under their feet, and above their heads the
infinite blue! The stillness of the summer was in every blade of grass,
in every leaf, and the pond reflected the sky and willows in hard,
immovable reflections. An occasional ripple of the water-fowl in the
reeds impressed upon them the mystery of Nature's indifference to human
suffering.

"In that house behind that colonnade she lies dead. Good God! isn't it
awful! We shall never see her. But you think we shall?"

"Owen, dear, let as avoid all discussion. She was a good woman. She was
very good to me."

"I haven't told you that it was by her wish that I sent for you. She
wanted to ask you to promise to marry me.... I told her that I had asked
you, and that in a way we were engaged. I could not say more. You seemed
unsettled, you seemed to wish to get out of your promise--is not that
so?"

Evelyn thought of the scene by Lady Asher's bedside that an accident had
saved her from. Marriage was more than ever impossible. What should she
have said if Lady Asher had not died before she arrived? The dying
woman's eyes, the dying woman's voice! Good heavens! what would she have
said? But she had considered nothing. After glancing at the telegram,
she had told Merat to pack a few clothes, and had rushed away. She
pondered the various excuses she might have sent. She might have said
she was not in when the telegram came, she had only just caught the
train as it was; if she had not got the telegram before eleven o'clock
she would have been safe. But all that was past now, Lady Asher had died
before she arrived. It were better that she had died--anything were
better rather than that scene should have taken place; for she could not
have promised to marry Owen. What would she have done? Refused while
looking into her dying eyes, or run out of the room?

"You don't answer me, Evelyn."

"Owen, don't press me. Enough has been said on that subject. This is no
time to discuss such questions."

"But it is Evelyn--it was her dearest wish.... Is it then impossible?
Have you entirely ceased to care?"

"No, Owen, I'm very fond of you. But you don't really want to marry me,
it is because your mother wished it."

His face changed expre