ess of
her project as going for naught to her advantage. She dared not
contemplate the forfeit; so she hardened her heart.

"Why," she said, with a forced absence of feeling, "so many years have
passed--so many things have happened--you appear so much a stranger--"

"Stranger!" echoed he. "Why, not if you had thought of me half as
constantly as I have of you! You have been in my mind, in my heart,
every hour, every minute since that day--Can it be? Is it my Margaret
that stands there and speaks so? So unmoved to see me! So cold! Oh,
who would have expected this?"

He sat down and gazed wretchedly about the room, taking no cognisance
of what objects his sight fell upon. Margaret seated herself, with a
sigh of annoyance, and regarded him with a countenance of displeasure.

"Margaret, do you mean what you say?" he asked, after a short silence.

"I'm sure you shouldn't blame me," said she. "You enabled me to learn
how to endure your absence. You stayed away all these years. Naturally
I've come to consider you as--"

"Nay, don't attempt to put me in the wrong. My heart is as warm to you
as ever, in spite of the years of absence. Those years have made no
change in me. Why should they have changed you, then? No--'tis not
their fault if you are changed, nor mine neither. There is something
wrong, I see. Be frank, dear, and tell me what it is. You need not be
afraid of me--you know I wouldn't hurt a hair of your head. Oh,
sweetheart, what has come between us? Tell me, I beg!"

"Why, nothing, of course--nothing but the gulf that time has widened.
That's all--sure 'tis enough."

"But 'tis more than that. Were that all, and I came back to you thus,
a minute's presence would bridge that gulf. All the old feelings would
rush back. Why, if I were but a mere acquaintance whom you had once
known in a friendly way, you wouldn't have greeted me so coldly. There
would have been cordiality, smiles, a warm clasp of the hand,
questions about my health and doings, at least a curiosity as to how I
had passed the years. But you meet me, not merely with lack of warmth,
but with positive coldness. Nay, you were shocked, startled,
frightened! You turned white, and stood still as if you saw a spirit,
or as if you were caught in some crime! Yes, 'twas for all the world
like that! And what was't you said? It passed me then, I was so amazed
at my reception--so different from the one I had pictured all the way
thither, all the weeks and months.