ple, and went to him as soon
as possible, and was the one asked to see him brought safely to his
home. I did not know, until my return home, two weeks later, that it was
Uncle Ridley's nephew."

After he finished speaking, they rode in silence for a long way, and the
peaceful old horse, finding himself unguided, turned his head homeward,
and jogged off more lively. Olive did not look up again. She was
evidently lost in sad memories, that his words awakened, and he had not
the heart to bring her back to a subject so foreign to her thoughts as
his love. So in silence, they reached home, and, as he helped her from
the buggy, Olive said with trembling lips:

"I'm glad it was you. I loved papa better than any one in the world, and
I can never forget that you saw him last and tried to help him." Then,
after telling her mother and the girls their additional cause for
gratitude to him, she went off to her room, and was not seen again for
some time; for when affected so that tears were her only relief, she
always took them alone.

Roger went that night. He spent the afternoon sitting in Ernestine's
room with them all, and telling over and over the last moments of Mr.
Dering, what he had overheard him saying to another passenger just a few
moments before the accident; just how the blow came, so quick and
painless, and how his last words had been of home, and how they would be
surprised at his sudden departure.

Olive was not present, and fearing that Roger might consider it rude,
Mrs. Dering explained the little habit of taking all her grief alone,
and how the reminding of that sad night had doubtless overcome her. But
Olive came down just before supper, and her face showed plainer than
ever before, its traces of heavy tears, though she said nothing about
it, and seemed to think her absence explained itself to the only one to
whom an explanation was due.

While the girls were busy in the kitchen, and mother was with Ernestine,
they were alone in the sitting-room, and Roger said to her, as they
stood by the window, watching the shadows creep through the yard, and
lift themselves in a misty cloud:

"Olive, have you no other answer for me, before I go?"

"No," said Olive, slowly. "You seem so different to me. In one way, I
love you; I could not help it; and, in another way, you are nothing to
me. I wish you would forget that you ever thought you loved me, and let
me feel as though you were my brother."

"I cannot," he answ