round in front of him, burst into sharp,
excited screams of pleasure, ran up to the church door and barked
furiously there, then ran back and jumped again upon his friend. The man
caught the dog as it stood up with its forepaws upon his chest, patted
it, and laughed. Suddenly he ceased laughing, and stood stock-still with
his eyes towards the open door of the church. In the doorway Ethne
Eustace was standing. He put the dog down and slowly walked up the path
towards her. She waited on the threshold without moving, without
speaking. She waited, watching him, until he came close to her. Then she
said simply:--

"Harry."

She was silent after that; nor did he speak. All the ghosts and phantoms
of old thoughts in whose company he had travelled the whole of that day
vanished away from his mind at her simple utterance of his name. Six
years had passed since his feet crushed the gravel on the dawn of a June
morning beneath her window. And they looked at one another, remarking
the changes which those six years had brought. And the changes,
unnoticed and almost imperceptible to those who had lived daily in their
company, sprang very distinct to the eyes of these two. Feversham was
thin, his face was wasted. The strain of life in the House of Stone had
left its signs about his sunken eyes and in the look of age beyond his
years. But these were not the only changes, as Ethne noticed; they were
not, indeed, the most important ones. Her heart, although she stood so
still and silent, went out to him in grief for the great troubles which
he had endured; but she saw, too, that he came back without a thought of
anger towards her for that fourth feather snapped from her fan. But she
was clear-eyed even at this moment. She saw much more. She understood
that the man who stood quietly before her now was not the same man whom
she had last seen in the hall of Ramelton. There had been a timidity in
his manner in those days, a peculiar diffidence, a continual expectation
of other men's contempt, which had gone from him. He was now quietly
self-possessed; not arrogant; on the other hand, not diffident. He had
put himself to a long, hard test; and he knew that he had not failed.
All that she saw; and her face lightened as she said:--

"It is not all harm which has come of these years. They were not
wasted."

But Feversham thought of her lonely years in this village of
Glenalla--and thought with a man's thought, unaware that nowhere else
woul