he house, since it's his," I replied. "But there is one
thing I'll not stand; if he ever comes between me and you, he'll have
to go; I'll present him to Mrs. Walters."

I was not aware of the expression with which I stood looking down upon
my son, but Georgiana must have noticed it.

"And what if he supplants me some day?" she asked, suddenly serious,
and with an old fear reviving.

"Oh, Georgiana!" I cried, kneeling by the bedside and putting my arms
around her, "you know that as long as we are in this world I am your
lover."

"No longer?" she whispered, drawing me closer.

"Through eternity!"

By-and-by I went out to the strawberry-bed. The season was too
backward. None were turning. With bitter disappointment I searched
the cold, wet leaves, bending them apart for the sight of as much as
one scarlet lobe, that I might take it in to her if only for
remembrance of the day. At last I gathered a few perfect leaves and
blossoms, and presented them to her in silence on a plate with a waiter
and napkin.

She rewarded me with a laugh, and lifted from the plate a spray of
blossoms.

"They will be ripe by the time I am well," she said, the sunlight of
memory coming out upon her face. Then having touched the wet blossoms
with her finger-tips, she dropped them quickly back into the plate.

"How cold they are!" she said, as a shiver ran through her. At the
same time she looked quickly at me, her eyes grown dark with dread.

I set the plate hastily down, and she put her hands in mine to warm
them.

VII

A month has gone by since Georgiana passed away.

To-day, for the first time, I went back to the woods. It was pleasant
to be surrounded again by the ever-living earth that feels no loss and
has no memory; that was sere yesterday, is green to-day, will be sere
again to-morrow, then green once more; that pauses not for wounds and
wrecks, nor lingers over death and change; but onward, ever onward,
along the groove of law, passes from its red origin in universal flame
to its white end in universal snow.

And yet, as I approached the edge of the forest, it was as though an
invisible company of influences came gently forth to meet me and sought
to draw me back into their old friendship. I found myself stroking the
trunks of the trees as I would throw my arm around the shoulders of a
tried comrade; I drew down the branches and plunged my face into the
new leaves as into a tonic stream.

Yesterday a win