ated himself.

"Any news?" asked Gerald.

"None whatever. It's a swindle to pay three cents for the _Herald_ in
such monotonous times. I was reduced to searching in your church paper to
see if by any chance something new had gotten lost in there."

"I hope you found it."

"I didn't. Not so much even as the death of someone I knew to cheer me.
There would have been variety at least in that. By the way, though, I
did see a familiar name among the personals,--just a notice that the Rev.
Denham Halloway had accepted a call to some church or other in some place
or other. He was quite a friend of yours, wasn't he, that summer before
we were married, when we were all in that odious little Joppa together?
How bored I was there!"

"Denham Halloway," repeated Gerald, musingly. "Denham Halloway. Why, I
don't believe I have thought of him since. But he was never any especial
friend of mine, you know."

"Ah, there was somebody else who managed to engross a great deal of your
time and most of your thoughts that summer, was there not, my dear, while
nobody but myself was bold enough to suppose that any impression had been
made on that frigid heart of yours? Well, I was perfectly fair. I left
your friend, Phebe, for Halloway."

"Poor little Phebe!" said Gerald, with softened eyes. "How long ago it
all seems. Poor dear little Phebe! I have never wanted to hear of Joppa
since her death. I feel as if she had given her life for it. Yes; I
don't suppose I have thought twice of Denham Halloway since."

Ah, so it was! That brief summer meeting, which had had so potent an
influence on the lives of those other two, had in her life been only
an incident.

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's Only an Incident, by Grace Denio Litchfield

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