ud to know
it's mine. He says he feels as if he 'could make a prosperous voyage
now with me aboard as mate, and lots of love for ballast'. I pray he
may, and try to be all he believes me, for I love my gallant captain
with all my heart and soul and might, and never will desert him, while
God lets us be together. Oh, Mother, I never knew how much like heaven
this world could be, when two people love and live for one another!"

"And that's our cool, reserved, and worldly Amy! Truly, love does work
miracles. How very, very happy they must be!" and Jo laid the rustling
sheets together with a careful hand, as one might shut the covers of a
lovely romance, which holds the reader fast till the end comes, and he
finds himself alone in the workaday world again.

By-and-by Jo roamed away upstairs, for it was rainy, and she could not
walk. A restless spirit possessed her, and the old feeling came again,
not bitter as it once was, but a sorrowfully patient wonder why one
sister should have all she asked, the other nothing. It was not true,
she knew that and tried to put it away, but the natural craving for
affection was strong, and Amy's happiness woke the hungry longing for
someone to 'love with heart and soul, and cling to while God let them
be together'. Up in the garret, where Jo's unquiet wanderings ended
stood four little wooden chests in a row, each marked with its owners
name, and each filled with relics of the childhood and girlhood ended
now for all. Jo glanced into them, and when she came to her own,
leaned her chin on the edge, and stared absently at the chaotic
collection, till a bundle of old exercise books caught her eye. She
drew them out, turned them over, and relived that pleasant winter at
kind Mrs. Kirke's. She had smiled at first, then she looked
thoughtful, next sad, and when she came to a little message written in
the Professor's hand, her lips began to tremble, the books slid out of
her lap, and she sat looking at the friendly words, as they took a new
meaning, and touched a tender spot in her heart.

"Wait for me, my friend. I may be a little late, but I shall surely
come."

"Oh, if he only would! So kind, so good, so patient with me always, my
dear old Fritz. I didn't value him half enough when I had him, but now
how I should love to see him, for everyone seems going away from me,
and I'm all alone."

And holding the little paper fast, as if it were a promise yet to be
fulfilled, Jo laid