dden them; they were shut down into
night and oblivion, with the dust of what had once been a faithful
heart.

Fred Walker had been as one short-sighted, who only sees things close at
hand, but sees them clearly.

Emily was very long-sighted, but in a vast range of vision are
comprehended many things that the keenest eyes cannot wholly define, and
some that are confused with their own shadows.

Things near she saw as plainly as he had done, but the wondrous wide
distance drew her now and again away from these. The life of to-day
would sometimes spend itself in gazing over the life in her whole day.
Her life, as she felt it, yearning and passioning, would appear to
overflow the little cup of its separation, or take reflections from
other lives, till it was hardly all itself, so much as a small part of
the great whole, God's immortal child, the wonderful race of mankind,
held in the hand of its fashioner, and conscious of some yearning, the
ancient yearning towards its source.

Emily moved slowly home again, and felt rather sensitive about the
proposed luncheon at John Mortimer's house. She wished she had managed
to spare him from being obliged to give the invitation. She even
considered whether Justina could be induced to go alone. But there was
no engagement that could be pleaded as a reason for absenting herself.
What must be done was before they went, to try, without giving needless
pain, to place the matter in a truer light. This would only be fair to
poor Justina.

Emily scarcely confessed to her own heart that she was glad of what Miss
Christie had said. She was not, from any thought that it could make the
least difference to herself, but, upon reflection, she felt ashamed of
how John Mortimer had been wooed, and of how he had betrayed by his
smile that he knew it.

That day was a Tuesday, the luncheon was to take place on Saturday, but
on Friday afternoon Emily had not found courage or occasion to speak to
her friend. The more she thought about it, the more difficult and
ungracious the matter seemed.

Such was the state of things. Miss Christie was still up-stairs, Justina
was seated at work in the drawing-room, and Emily, arrayed in a lilac
print apron, was planting some fresh ferns in her _jardiniere_ when the
door was opened, and the servant announced Mr. Mortimer. Emily was
finishing her horticulture, and was not at all the kind of person to be
put out of countenance on being discovered at any occupat