r's half-hour I rose to go. Mrs. Stewart had
fallen asleep and he would not let me wake her, saying he needed
nothing and felt like sleeping himself. I promised to come up again on
the morrow and went out.

It was dark in the hall, where no lamp had been lighted, but outside
on the lawn the moonlight was bright as day. It was the clearest,
whitest night I ever saw. I turned aside into the garden, meaning to
cross it, and take the short way over the west meadow home. There was
a long walk of rose bushes leading across the garden to a little gate
on the further side ... the way Mr. Lawrence had been wont to take
long ago when he went over the fields to woo Margaret. I went along
it, enjoying the night. The bushes were white with roses, and the
ground under my feet was all snowed over with their petals. The air
was still and breezeless; again I felt that sensation of waiting ...
of expectancy. As I came up to the little gate I saw a young girl
standing on the other side of it. She stood in the full moonlight and
I saw her distinctly.

She was tall and slight and her head was bare. I saw that her hair was
a pale gold, shining somewhat strangely about her head as if catching
the moonbeams. Her face was very lovely and her eyes large and dark.
She was dressed in something white and softly shimmering, and in her
hand she held a white rose ... a very large and perfect one. Even at
the time I found myself wondering where she could have picked it. It
was not a Woodlands rose. All the Woodlands roses were smaller and
less double.

She was a stranger to me, yet I felt that I had seen her or someone
very like her before. Possibly she was one of Mr. Lawrence's many
nieces who might have come up to Woodlands upon hearing of his
illness.

As I opened the gate I felt an odd chill of positive fear. Then she
smiled as if I had spoken my thought.

"Do not be frightened," she said. "There is no reason you should be
frightened. I have only come to keep a tryst."

The words reminded me of something, but I could not recall what it
was. The strange fear that was on me deepened. I could not speak.

She came through the gateway and stood for a moment at my side.

"It is strange that you should have seen me," she said, "but now
behold how strong and beautiful a thing is faithful love--strong
enough to conquer death. We who have loved truly love always--and this
makes our heaven."

She walked on after she had spoken, down the long rose