ent her mornings in collecting flowers outside the city. His
imagination dwelt tenderly upon her slim, young figure and mourning face
passing through far-away fields and along the margins of lonely creeks
in search of some new bloom which grudging Nature might yield her for
her sorrowful needs. Meanwhile he determined that the shrine of her
devotion should not want richer offerings. There was a hot-house on the
way from his home to the cemetery, and he now stopped there occasionally
of a morning and bought a few roses to lay upon the mound. This
continued for a fortnight. He noticed that his offerings were left to
wither undisturbed, though the little bunches of field flowers were
daily renewed as before.

In spite of the funereal nature of his occupation his spirits in these
days were extraordinarily high. His life, so lately escaped from the
shadows of death, seemed to enjoy a rejuvenescence and to put forth
fresh blossoms in the summer air. As he sat under the cedars and
listened to the buzzing of the flies that frequented the shade, the
unending sound grew to be an assurance of earthly immortality. His new
lease of existence prolonged itself into a fee simple, and even in
presence of the monuments of decay his future, filled with bright hazy
dreams, melted softly into eternity. But one morning as he approached
the little grave-lot with his accustomed offerings he looked up and saw
the young girl standing before him. Her eyes were fixed on the flowers
in his hand. He colored guiltily and stood still, like a boy caught
robbing an orchard. She looked both surprised and embarrassed, but said
at once, "If you are the gentleman who has been putting flowers on my
brother's grave, I thank you for his sake, but--"

She paused, and he broke in: "I ought to explain, Miss Pinckney, that I
have a better right than you think, perhaps, to bring these flowers
here: I was a fellow-student with your brother in the medical school."

Her expression changed immediately. "Oh, did you know my brother?" she
asked eagerly.

He felt like a wretched hypocrite as he answered, "Yes, I knew him,
though not intimately exactly. But I took--I take--a very strong
interest in him."

"Every one loved Henry who knew him," she said, "but his class have all
been graduated and gone away, and he made few friends, because he was so
shy. No one comes near him now but me."

He was silent. She walked to the grave, and he followed, and they stood
there w