, 'I will pray
for you every night.' Now you leave me without a tear and with no
promise to remember me."

Tenderly his low voice appealed to her heart, as he bent his head so
close that his hair swept across her brow.

She raised the hand that held hers, suddenly kissed it with an
overwhelming passionate fervour, and holding it against her cheek,
murmured almost in a whisper:

"God knows I have never ceased to pray for you, and, Mr. Palma, as
long as I live, come what may to both of us, I shall never fail in my
prayers for you."

She dropped his hand, and covered her face with her own.

He stretched his arms toward her, all his love in his fine eyes, so
full of a strange tenderness, a yearning to possess her entirely, but
he checked himself, and, taking one of the hands, led her to the
door. Upon the threshold she rallied, and looked up:

"Good-bye, Mr. Palma."

He drew her close to his side, unconscious that he pressed her
fingers so tight that the small points of the diamonds cut into the
flesh.

"God bless you, Lily. Think of me sometimes."

They looked in each other's eyes an instant, and she walked away. He
turned and closed the door, and she heard the click of the lock
inside. Blind and tearless, like one staggering from a severe blow,
she reached her own room, and fell heavily across the foot of her
bed.

Through the long hours of that night she lay motionless, striving to
hush the moans of her crushed heart, and wondering why such anguish
as hers was not fatal. Staring at the wall, she could not close her
eyes, and the only staff that supported her in the ordeal was the
consciousness that she had fought bravely, had not betrayed her
humiliating secret.

Toward dawn she rose, and opened her window. The sleet had ceased,
and the carriage was standing before the door. An impulse she could
not resist drove her out into the hall, to catch one more glimpse of
the form so precious to her. She heard a door open on the hall
beneath, and recognized her guardian's step. He paused, and she heard
him talking to his stepmother, bidding her adieu. His last words were
deep and gentle in their utterance.

"Be very tender and patient with Olga. Wounds like hers heal slowly.
Take good care of my ward. God bless you all."

Descending the steps she saw him distinctly, enveloped in an overcoat
buttoned so close that it showed the fine proportions of his tall
figure; and as he stopped to light his cigar at a gas gl