that
grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach
through many trials and dangers; which some seem to show for a while and
then lose; which too many never reach while they wear the robes of earth,
but which speaks of the kingdom of heaven already begun in the heart of a
child of earth. He told her simply the story of the occurrences which
had brought them together in the old house, with the message the lawyer
was to deliver to its inmates. He wished to prepare her for what might
have been too sudden a surprise.

But Myrtle was not wholly unprepared for some such revelation. There was
little danger that any such announcement would throw her mind from its
balance after the inward conflict through which she had been passing.
For her lover had left her almost as soon as he had told her the story of
his passion, and the relation in which he stood to her. He, too, had
gone to answer his country's call to her children, not driven away by
crime and shame and despair, but quitting all--his new-born happiness,
the art in which he was an enthusiast, his prospects of success and
honor--to obey the higher command of duty. War was to him, as to so many
of the noble youth who went forth, only organized barbarism, hateful but
for the sacred cause which alone redeemed it from the curse that blasted
the first murderer. God only knew the sacrifice such young men as he
made.

How brief Myrtle's dream had been! She almost doubted, at some moments,
whether she would not awake from it, as from her other visions, and find
it all unreal. There was no need of fearing any undue excitement of her
mind after the alternations of feeling she had just experienced. Nothing
seemed of much moment to her which could come from without,--her real
world was within, and the light of its day and the breath of its life
came from her love, made holy by the self-forgetfulness on both sides
which was born with it.

Only one member of the household was in danger of finding the excitement
more than she could bear. Miss Cynthia knew that all Murray Bradshaw's
plans, in which he had taken care that she should have a personal
interest, had utterly failed. What he had done with the means of revenge
in his power,--if, indeed, they were still in his power,--she did not
know. She only knew that there had been a terrible scene, and that he
had gone, leaving it uncertain whether he would ever return. It was with
fear and trembling that