gs? Perhaps not quite, for yonder in the churchyard there
was a grave, and within the church a monument in white marble, that was
wonderfully like one who had loved him and whom he had loved, though
time and trouble had written a strange difference on her face. Also, he
had failed: he had kept his oath indeed and fought on till the end was
won, but himself he had not won it. What now was his had once belonged
to his successful rival, who doubtless little dreamed of the payment
that would be exacted from him by the decree of fate.

And was Juanna happy? She knew well that Leonard loved her truly;
but oh! it was cruel that she who had shared the struggles should be
deprived of her reward--that it should be left to another, who if not
false had at least been weak, to give to her husband that which she had
striven so hard to win--that which she had won--and lost. And harder
still was it that in this ancient place which would henceforth be her
home, by day and by night she must feel the presence of the shadow of a
woman, a woman sweet and pale, who, as she believed, stood between her
and that which she desired above all things--the complete and absolute
possession of her husband's heart.

Doubtless she overrated the trouble; men and women do not spend their
lives in brooding upon the memories of their first loves--if they did,
this would be a melancholy world. But to Juanna it was real enough,
and remained so for some years. And if a thing is true to the heart, it
avails little that reason should give it the lie.

In short, now in the hour of their full property, Leonard and Juanna
were making acquaintance with the fact that fortune never gives with
both hands, as the French say, but loves to rob with one while she
bestows with the other. To few is it allowed to be completely miserable,
to none to be completely happy. Their good luck had been so overwhelming
in many ways, that it would have partaken of the unnatural, and might
well have excited their fears for the future, had its completeness been
unmarred by these drawbacks which, such as they were, probably they
learned to disremember as the years passed over them bringing them new
trials and added blessings.

Perhaps a peep into the future will tell us the rest of the story
of Leonard and Juanna Outram better and more truly than any further
chronicling of events.

Ten years or so have gone by and Sir Leonard, now a member of Parliament
and the Lord-Lieutenant of his