young woman such as you are?"

"I don't know," groaned Godfrey.

"No, nor don't I; and yet something does come between. What's the
meaning of it all? Why do things always go cussed in this 'ere world?
Is there a devil about what manages it, or is it just chance? Why
shouldn't people have what they want and when it's wanted, instead of
being forced to wait until perhaps it isn't, or can't be enjoyed, or
often enough to lose it altogether? You can't answer, and nor can't I;
only at times I do think, notwithstanding all my Christian teachings
and hundreds and hundreds of your father's sermons, that the devil,
he's top-dog here. And as for that there foreign woman whose letter
you've read to me, she's his housemaid. Not but what I'm sure it will
all come right at last," she added, with an attempt at cheerfulness.

"I hope so," replied Godfrey, without conviction, and went to bed.

Presently he descended from his room again, bearing a pill-box in which
was enclosed a certain ring that years before he had bought at Lucerne,
a ring set with two hearts of turquoise.

"I promised not to write," he said, "but you might address this to her.
She'll know what it is, for I told her about it."

"Yes," said Mrs. Parsons, "the young lady shall have that box of pills.
Being upset, it may do her good."

In due course Isobel did have it; also the box came back addressed to
Mrs. Parsons. In it was another ring, a simple band of ancient gold--as
a matter of fact, it was Roman, a betrothal ring of two thousand years
ago. Round it was a scrap of paper on which was written:

"This was dug up in a grave. My great-grandmother gave it to my
great-grandfather when they became engaged about a hundred years
ago, and he wore it all his life, as in a bygone age someone else
had done. Now the great-granddaughter gives it to another. Let him
wear it all his life, whatever happens to her, or to him. Then let
it go to the grave again, perhaps to be worn by others far
centuries hence."

Godfrey understood and set it on the third finger of his left hand,
where it remained night and day, and year by year.

So that matter ended, and afterwards came silence and darkness which
endured for ten years or more. From his father he heard nothing, nor on
his part did he ever write to him again. Indeed the first news
concerning him which reached Godfrey was that of his death which
happened some seven years later, apparently after a brief ill