prise. "What does this
mean?"

"I am here," I answered, "to meet you, by your own appointment."

She stepped back again, leaning against the rock. The moonlight shone
full upon her face. There was terror as well as astonishment in her eyes
while they now looked at me.

"I don't understand you," she said. "I have not seen you since you spoke
to me on the bridge."

"Pardon me," I replied. "I have seen you--or the appearance of
you--since that time. I heard you speak. I saw you write."

She looked at me with the strangest expression of mingled resentment and
curiosity. "What did I say?" she asked. "What did I write?"

"You said, 'Remember me. Come to me.' You wrote, 'When the full moon
shines on Saint Anthony's Well.'"

"Where?" she cried. "Where did I do that?"

"In a summer-house which stands by a waterfall," I answered. "Do you
know the place?"

Her head sunk back against the rock. A low cry of terror burst from
her. Her arm, resting on the rock, dropped at her side. I hurriedly
approached her, in the fear that she might fall on the stony ground.

She rallied her failing strength. "Don't touch me!" she exclaimed.
"Stand back, sir. You frighten me."

I tried to soothe her. "Why do I frighten you? You know who I am. Can
you doubt my interest in you, after I have been the means of saving your
life?"

Her reserve vanished in an instant. She advanced without hesitation, and
took me by the hand.

"I ought to thank you," she said. "And I do. I am not so ungrateful as
I seem. I am not a wicked woman, sir--I was mad with misery when I tried
to drown myself. Don't distrust me! Don't despise me!" She stopped; I
saw the tears on her cheeks. With a sudden contempt for herself, she
dashed them away. Her whole tone and manner altered once more. Her
reserve returned; she looked at me with a strange flash of suspicion and
defiance in her eyes. "Mind this!" she said, loudly and abruptly, "you
were dreaming when you thought you saw me writing. You didn't see me;
you never heard me speak. How could I say those familiar words to a
stranger like you? It's all your fancy--and you try to frighten me by
talking of it as if it was a real thing!" She changed again; her eyes
softened to the sad and tender look which made them so irresistibly
beautiful. She drew her cloak round her with a shudder, as if she felt
the chill of the night air. "What is the matter with me?" I heard her
say to herself. "Why do I trust this man in my drea