nly son would have been sadly neglected.

April was gone; May came in, bringing the anniversary of Rose's
ill-starred marriage and finding her in that worst widowhood, a day of
ceaseless tears and regrets to the unhappy, deserted wife. The bright
May days went by, one after another, passing as wretched days and more
wretched nights do pass somehow; and June had taken its place. In all
this long, long time, no letter had come for Rose. How she watched and
waited for it; how she had strained her eyes day after day to catch
sight of the postman; how her heart leaped up and throbbed when she saw
him approach, and sank down in her breast like lead as he went by, only
those can know who have watched and waited like her. A sickening sense
of despair stole over her at last. They had forgotten her; they hated
and despised her, and left her to her fate. There was nothing for it but
to go to the alms-house and die, like any other pauper.

She had been mad when she fancied they could forgive her. Her sins had
been too great. All the world had deserted her, and the sooner she was
dead and out of the way the better.

She sat in the misty June twilight thinking this, with a sad, hopeless
kind of resignation. It was the fifth of June. Could she forget that
this very day twelvemonth was to have been her wedding-day? Poor
Jules--poor Kate! Oh, what a wretch she had been!

She covered her face with her hands, tears falling like rain through her
thin fingers.

"I wonder if they will be sorry for me, and forgive me, when they hear I
am dead?" she thought. "Oh, how I live, and live; when other women would
have died long ago with half this trouble. Only nineteen, and with
nothing left to wish for but death."

There was a tap at the door. Before she could speak it was opened, and
Jane, the brisk, came rustling in.

"There's a gentleman down-stairs, Mrs. Stanford, asking to see you."

Rose sprang up, her lips apart, her eyes dilating.

"To see me! A gentleman! Jane, is it Mr. Stanford?"

Jane shook her head.

"Not a bit like Mr. Stanford, ma'am; not near so 'andsome, though a very
fine-looking gentleman. He said, to tell you as 'ow a friend wanted to
see you."

A friend! Oh, who could it be? She made a motion to Jane to show him
up--she was too agitated to speak. She stood with her hands clasped over
her beating heart, breathless, waiting.

A man's quick step flew up the stairs; a tall figure stood in the
doorway, hat in hand.