ine what a clatter of tongues and a ringing of
merry laughter there must have been in the parlor of Mrs. Harris's cozy
little house, as the two compared notes since their separation at Utica,
and as each revealed what had yet been necessarily kept hidden from the
other. Mrs. Harris, good soul, listened to the two rattle-pates on that
first evening, and laughed as merrily as either; but after a time the
good lady stole away, perhaps to her early bed; and then, strangely
enough, the merriment soon ceased, and they were silent. Were their
voices only for others, and did eye speak to eye, lip to lip, and heart
to heart, when they were alone together? One who knew both passed them
closely by without being observed, and arrived at that impression, when
they had stolen away from Mrs. Harris and the Ocean House at Newport, a
month later, on the night of the full moon of August, and were sitting
silent together, on the almost deserted piazza of the Stone Bridge
House, at the extreme north end of Rhode Island, and under the shadow of
Mount Hope, looking at the moon shining in placid beauty on the still
waters of the East River, and thinking of Indian canoes and the romance
of old history, as the little boats of the pleasure-seekers glided in
and out among the wooded islands, and the shouts of merriment rung out
ever and anon on the night air from lips that were bubbling over with
enjoyment.

And this brings us to a matter of no slight embarrassment. If this
narration has a heroine (which may be held as a matter of doubt) that
heroine is Josephine Harris, the wild, impulsive, loving girl, ever
ready for help or mischief, whose madcap pranks have played so important
a part in the fortunes of all. And if we have not been all the while
entirely without a hero, Tom Leslie, the journalist, cosmopolitan, lover
of nature, and strange mixture of boyish gayety and manly experience,
must supply that important place. The meeting of these two oddities has
been narrated, and their lives have seemed to blend together from that
moment; and yet the strange spectacle has been presented, of two who are
talking always and on all subjects, saying no word of love to each other
that reaches the pen of the narrator. There is one long pressure of the
hand on the first day of their meeting--one long, confiding pressure, in
which the two palms might almost grow together; and that is all.
Thenceforth they belong to each other, and yet without a single questi