e than if I had never existed. He said he would send
her a certain sum of money--and it was a generous one, that is but
just to admit--if when she received it she would take another sum,
which he would also send, and return to them. He said his home was
hers forever if she wished, and that he loved her, and had never had
other feeling for her than love. Upon this letter came a long time of
pleading with me--and I was ever soft--with her. She won her way.

"'We will both go, Larry, dear,' she said. 'I know he forgot to say
you might come, too. If he loves me as he says, he would not break my
heart by leaving you out.'

"'He sends only enough for one--for you,' I said.

"'Yes, but he thinks you have enough to come by yourself. He thinks
you would not accept it--and would not insult you by sending more.'

"'He insults me by sending enough for you, dear. If I have it for me,
I have it for you--most of all for you, or I'm no true man. If I have
none for you--then we have none.'

"'Larry, for love of me, let me go--for the gulf between my twin
brother and me will never be passed until I go to him.' And this was
true enough. 'I will make them love you. Hester loves you now. She
will help me.' Hester was the sweet wife of her brother. So she clung
to me, and her hands touched me and caressed me--lad, I feel them now.
I put her on the boat, and the money he sent relieved the suffering
around me, and I gave thanks with a sore heart. It was for them, our
own peasantry, and for her, I parted with her then, but as soon as I
could I sold my little holding near my grandfather's house to an
Englishman who had long wanted it, and when it was parted with, I took
the money and delayed not a day to follow her.

"I wrote to her, telling her when and where to meet me in the little
town of Leauvite, and it was on the bluff over the river. I went to a
home I knew there--where they thought well of me--I think. In the
evening I walked up the long path, and there under the oak trees at
the top where we had been used to sit, I waited. She came to me,
walking in the golden light. It was spring. The whip-poor-wills called
and replied to each other from the woods. A mourning dove spoke to its
mate among the thick trees, low and sad, but it is only their way. I
was glad, and so were they.

"I held her in my arms, and the river sang to us. She told me all over
again the love in her heart for me, as she used to tell it. Lad! There
is only one th