ent he forgot that he
wanted to say anything, or that it was necessary to tell her what he
meant.

"Dinah," he said suddenly, taking both her hands between his, "I love
you with my whole heart and soul. I love you next to God who made me."

Dinah's lips became pale, like her cheeks, and she trembled violently
under the shock of painful joy. Her hands were cold as death between
Adam's. She could not draw them away, because he held them fast.

"Don't tell me you can't love me, Dinah. Don't tell me we must part and
pass our lives away from one another."

The tears were trembling in Dinah's eyes, and they fell before she could
answer. But she spoke in a quiet low voice.

"Yes, dear Adam, we must submit to another Will. We must part."

"Not if you love me, Dinah--not if you love me," Adam said passionately.
"Tell me--tell me if you can love me better than a brother?"

Dinah was too entirely reliant on the Supreme guidance to attempt to
achieve any end by a deceptive concealment. She was recovering now from
the first shock of emotion, and she looked at Adam with simple sincere
eyes as she said, "Yes, Adam, my heart is drawn strongly towards you;
and of my own will, if I had no clear showing to the contrary, I could
find my happiness in being near you and ministering to you continually.
I fear I should forget to rejoice and weep with others; nay, I fear I
should forget the Divine presence, and seek no love but yours."

Adam did not speak immediately. They sat looking at each other in
delicious silence--for the first sense of mutual love excludes other
feelings; it will have the soul all to itself.

"Then, Dinah," Adam said at last, "how can there be anything contrary
to what's right in our belonging to one another and spending our lives
together? Who put this great love into our hearts? Can anything be
holier than that? For we can help one another in everything as is good.
I'd never think o' putting myself between you and God, and saying you
oughtn't to do this and you oughtn't to do that. You'd follow your
conscience as much as you do now."

"Yes, Adam," Dinah said, "I know marriage is a holy state for those who
are truly called to it, and have no other drawing; but from my childhood
upwards I have been led towards another path; all my peace and my joy
have come from having no life of my own, no wants, no wishes for myself,
and living only in God and those of his creatures whose sorrows and joys
he has given me to