of midday, find himself in a lovely garden, beside
a beautiful girl, whom he loved devotedly, but who kept him on the
ragged edge of an uncertainty that was stimulating enough, but very
wearing.

_Twenty_

The summer following Colonel French's return to Clarendon was
unusually cool, so cool that the colonel, pleasantly occupied with his
various plans and projects, scarcely found the heat less bearable than
that of New York at the same season. During a brief torrid spell he
took Phil to a Southern mountain resort for a couple of weeks, and
upon another occasion ran up to New York for a day or two on business
in reference to the machinery for the cotton mill, which was to be
ready for installation some time during the fall. But these were brief
interludes, and did not interrupt the current of his life, which was
flowing very smoothly and pleasantly in its new channel, if not very
swiftly, for even the colonel was not able to make things move swiftly
in Clarendon during the summer time, and he was well enough pleased to
see them move at all.

Kirby was out of town when the colonel was in New York, and therefore
he did not see him. His mail was being sent from his club to Denver,
where he was presumably looking into some mining proposition. Mrs.
Jerviss, the colonel supposed, was at the seaside, but he had almost
come face to face with her one day on Broadway. She had run down to
the city on business of some sort. Moved by the instinct of defense,
the colonel, by a quick movement, avoided the meeting, and felt safer
when the lady was well out of sight. He did not wish, at this time, to
be diverted from his Southern interests, and the image of another
woman was uppermost in his mind.

One moonlight evening, a day or two after his return from this brief
Northern trip, the colonel called at Mrs. Treadwells'. Caroline opened
the door. Mrs. Treadwell, she said, was lying down. Miss Graciella had
gone over to a neighbour's, but would soon return. Miss Laura was
paying a call, but would not be long. Would the colonel wait? No, he
said, he would take a walk, and come back later.

The streets were shady, and the moonlight bathed with a silvery glow
that part of the town which the shadows did not cover. Strolling
aimlessly along the quiet, unpaved streets, the colonel, upon turning
a corner, saw a lady walking a short distance ahead of him. He thought
he recognised the figure, and hurried forward; but ere he caught up