rather confirmed this, and as month after month had passed since the first tidings of Newton's engagement, and not a line from Newton himself had arrived, Mr. Stanley justly inferred that his friend had little that was pleasurable to write about. He mentally resolved to see Newton while he was in England, and find out whether the engagement had come to anything or not.

'Look here,' he said, coming into Nesta's drawing-room the evening before he left; 'look here; do you like this?' and as he spoke, he held before her a simple design for a monument, bearing Hugh Arden's name and death. I mean,' he continued, to have a simple monument of this kind put up in the church at home, in Stanley Church; the poor boy shall not pass away and be quite forgotten, and I question whether he had any friends in England who would erect a tablet to his memory.'

'It is very kind of you,' Nesta said, and two or three big tears dropped on the drawing as she bent her head over it.

CHAPTER XV.

ADIEU POUR JAMAIS.

'Human, by birthright of pain, and free of the guild of woe.'

If

ROSA and Heinrich had by some curious chance contrived to meet constantly. Rosa took her work and went to sit in the wood while the children were playing about and making imaginary forts and castles, unassailable by pretended enemies, Heinrich was sure to come suddenly upon them and storm them, and to storm moreover another citadel far less vigorously defended. For ever since Heinrich's return, Rosa had forafter all, she had no

gotten her resolution;

wish to give him up.

Her tender, clinging

nature clung to him more closely than ever; whatever she did, it was with a thought of Heinrich, and with a hope that she might meet him. The first time that he had come upon her after that parting kiss of reconciliation

He

on the night of his arrival, she was less reserved and silent than formerly; the strangeness of the first meeting had passed away, and the old consciousness of being loved by him became daily and hourly strengthened. Had he not himself shown her that he loved her, and was there any reason why she should draw back? bantered her about her letter, and told her she was jealous, and in her heart now she wished that she had never written it. She made pretty modest excuses, and Heinrich listened, holding her hand and looking up into her face, and promising her that she was all in all to him. He meant it when he said it. He really loved the girl, he really enjoyed the hours he spent with her, and gladly prolonged them. Then she would watch him till the trees intercepted her view, or some sudden turn took him completely out of sight, and she would

go back to the Villa and to her work, with a mind rich in happy thoughts, and a heart brimfull of love.

And Heinrich; it was well for her that the tall trees with their dense golden foliage lay between the Mill and the Villa, hiding out the sight of Heinrich when he had left her. Did he forget her when she was out of sight, or what spell was over him when he halted at Dreuser's mill, and spent the evening in the company of Dreuser's Marie? Did no remembrance of the pretty girl in whose face he had looked, and in whose ears he had breathed his words of love, haunt him as he whistled homewards? He did not love Marie, and yet when he found himself in the atmosphere of the Mill, he yielded to the influence around him and talked and jested with her and lingered near her. He heard his name mentioned in connection with her; he was treated as a lover in the house, in fact, as a son. And Marie's land and guldens did what Marie herself could not have done, they kept him ensnared. Who knew anything of the little servant sitting in the nursery of the Villa, thinking of him? Who guessed

the looks of tenderness and love that she was bearing in her memory? Even Heinrich himself forgot them in the atmosphere of the Mill.

The days of Heinrich's furlough were drawing to an end, and Rosa's dreams began to be a little less happy. Not that she ever began to trust him less, that was impossible; but as day after day passed, and his leave approached its expiration, she began to realise that matters were really no further advanced than they had been months before. Yet, each time that he came, or that she met him by chance, the interview was sure to leave her with a light heart, and with hopes that were almost certainty. No one loved him as she did, of that she was sure; and he had told her again and again how she was loved in return. As long as he was there, this assurance was all she craved; but, as the last day came, a thousand fears took possession of her, and robbed her of her peace.

He had promised to come to see her