r spoke of my failing trust
in them both. I brooded upon it night and day, and my life became a
hell upon earth.

"One day in the early spring, about a month before you were born,
Caradoc, I had been to a funeral at the old church; and hearing of the
serious illness of a parishioner who lived on the high road to
Abersethin, I followed the path on the left side of the Berwen, and as
I neared the bridge which crosses the valley on the top, I suddenly
came upon Agnes, who was sitting on a boulder by the side of the brook,
and as I approached I saw her dry her eyes hurriedly. She rose from
her seat, and her colour came and went as she looked at me. I longed
to take her in my arms and press her to my heart, for she looked pale
and sorrowful."

An exclamation from Cardo interrupted him.

"It pains you, Caradoc--it pains me--it pained me then--it will pain me
as long as I have any being. I may be forgiven hereafter, but it
cannot cease to pain me.

"'Agnes,' I said, 'are you not straying very far from home?'

"'I came for a walk,' she answered; 'it is a lovely day!'

"'I did not know you could walk so far,' I said. 'Last evening when I
asked you to come down to the shore with me, you said it was too far!'

"'Yesterday, Meurig, I was feeling very ill; to-day I am better.'

"Her lip quivered a little, and she looked round uneasily, I thought.

"I said, 'I am going to see old Shon Gweydd, or I would walk back with
you; but perhaps you don't mind going alone.'

"'Oh, no, not at all,' she said, as she began her way back by the
Berwen.

"I went my way with a heavy heart, and as I entered Shon Gweydd's house
(it was a little way down the road) I looked back at the bridge, and
saw a girl cross the stile and go down into the valley. It was Ellen
Vaughan, and no doubt Agnes had been waiting for her; but when in
returning I met my brother Lewis coming over the same stile into the
high road, my whole soul was filled with anger, and I passed the
brother whom I had loved so tenderly with a short, cold remark about
the weather, and I reached Brynderyn consumed with jealousy and bitter
hatred.

"The same evening, Agnes was sitting at her work at the bay window of
the west parlour, while I was busily writing in the old farm parlour
which we now use. Lewis entered with the strained and saddened look
which he had worn in my presence latterly; he reached a book from the
bookshelf, and sauntered in through the stone passage i