to the drawing-room, and I will play you to sleep with some of those
grand old German airs. You shall have Mendelssohn or Von Weber, if you
are not in the mood for Beethoven or Chopin," she added, compromising to
my nervous weakness.

She led the way, I followed, to the parlor,--only, however, once there,
and finding it unoccupied, I led, and she listened.

"No music this evening, Frank, for heaven's sake!" I cried, my voice
thick with emotion, as she seated herself at the piano. "I must be
truthful with you. I have been a weak fool; and to you, whom I respect
and admire so thoroughly, I will confess it. Bear with me awhile longer,
then you shall speak," I added, as she rose and came toward me.

"In the first place, since I am a genius," I continued, bitterly, "I
ought to have had a clearer vision. I ought to have seen, that, because
you were the most fascinating, brilliant woman I had ever dreamed of,
the most highly cultured, and planned on the noblest scale,--because you
disinterestedly devoted yourself to my improvement, kindled a spark of
what you were pleased to call genius, and then gave your own life to fan
it into a flame,--I ought to have seen that all this did not necessarily
imply that subtile bond and affinity between us which alone should end
in marriage. But I did not see. I was touched to the heart by your
kindness. I thrilled with pride, when you turned from men of refinement
and intellect, to smile cordially, tenderly, upon me. I longed to be a
suitable companion for one so superior; and I have worked--honestly,
faithfully, have I worked--to become so. But what you grew upon made me
languid. I was satiated with study, weary even of my brush. Metaphysics
and mystical speculation bewilder a mind too weak to trust itself in
their mazes, without the old established guides, the helps to a
childlike faith. I was worn out and sick. Then your presence revived me;
all the doubts which have since become certainties were thrust aside. I
came here; I met Annie Bray; I said some foolish words one day, when we
were walking up here, about being worn out and staying where we were
forever. They were dishonorable words, for they were due first of all to
you; and they have haunted me since like a nightmare. It was Annie
herself who reproved and repelled them. To-day I went there with the
thought of saying good-bye. I was sure that my feeling for you was firm
as a rock; it is only periodically and indefinably, Frank, tha