certainly soon hear of Anna's marriage; he would see it in the home
paper, other correspondents in Exeter would write him of it. Alma grew
sick at heart thinking of the complications in front of her.

When Gilbert's letter came she left it for a whole day before she
could summon courage to open it. But it was a harmless epistle after
all; he had not yet heard of Anna's marriage. Alma had at first no
thought of answering it, yet her fingers ached to do so. Now that Anna
was gone, her loneliness was unbearable. She realized how much
Gilbert's letters had meant to her, even when written to another
woman. She could bear her life well enough, she thought, if she only
had his letters to look forward to.

No more letters came from Gilbert for six weeks. Then came one,
alarmed at Anna's silence, anxiously asking the reason for it; Gilbert
had heard no word of the marriage. He was working in a remote district
where newspapers seldom penetrated. He had no other correspondent in
Exeter now; except his mother, and she, not knowing that he supposed
himself engaged to Anna had forgotten to mention it.

Alma answered that letter. She told herself recklessly that she would
keep on writing to him until he found out. She would lose his
friendship anyhow, when that occurred, but meanwhile she would have
the letters a little longer. She could not learn to live without them
until she had to.

The correspondence slipped back into its old groove. The harassed look
which Alma's face had worn, and which Exeter people had attributed to
worry over Anna, disappeared. She did not even feel lonely, and
reproached herself for lack of proper feeling in missing Anna so
little. Besides, to her horror and dismay, she detected in herself a
strange undercurrent of relief at the thought that Gilbert could never
marry Anna now! She could not understand it. Had not that marriage
been her dearest wish for years? Why then should she feel this strange
gladness at the impossibility of its fulfilment? Altogether, Alma
feared that her condition of mind and morals must be sadly askew.
Perhaps, she thought mournfully, this perversion of proper feeling was
her punishment for the deception she had practised. She had
deliberately done evil that good might come, and now the very
imaginations of her heart were stained by that evil. Alma cried
herself to sleep many a night in her repentance, but she kept on
writing to Gilbert, for all that.

The winter passed, and