now a matter
of wonder to me what caused me to act as I did, against my own feelings.
He held out his hand, saying: 'Let us at least part as friends, Miss
Adams.' I gave him my hand, saying lightly: 'I hope, Mr. Blake, you
won't be like the boy who ran away from home and came back to stay the
first night.' I turned and walked toward my own door, and he went away
without speaking another word. I watched him in the clear moonlight till
a turn in the road hid him from my view. Had I entertained the slightest
idea that he would fulfil his threat of going away, I know I should have
acted differently; and it was not till I learned, the next day, that he
had left Fulton and gone no one knew whither, that I realized what I had
done. I knew not whether his parents had a suspicion of the cause of his
sudden departure, if they had they never named it to me. I told my
sorrow to no one but my mother, but Nathan always said he knew well
enough without being told by any one. I can tell you, Walter, my sin did
not go unpunished; for, inconsistent as my conduct has been, I loved
Joshua Blake with a deep affection, and when my tortured mind pictured
him as a wandering exile from his home, through my absurd and foolish
conduct, you may be sure he did not suffer alone. And if I hadn't turned
kind of cross and crusty, I am afraid I should have gone crazy, and it
was certainly better to be cross than crazy. That is twenty-five years
ago. As I was employed in the garden one morning a few weeks ago, an
acquaintance from the village passing by said to me: 'Have you heard
the news, Miss Adams, that has almost turned every one's head over at
Fulton: Joshua Blake, whom every one had given up for dead years ago,
has come home.' I grew cold as ice, and I never could tell how I reached
the house. I could hardly believe it, and yet something told me it was
true, and that very evening he came over here; but, instead of the youth
who went away, I saw, a middle-aged man with gray-hair, which Nathan
said was an improvement, allowing that some gray looked better than all
red. It sounds foolish enough for young people to talk love, but for old
people like Joshua Blake and I, it is unpardonable. He told me he had
resolved never to return to his native land again, till, by the merest
chance, he met a man in Australia who informed him of the death of his
father, and that his father had said upon his death-bed, that all that
gave him the least anxiety was his ag