yes through recollection, pour
down her drawn cheeks, making little rivulets through some coarse
powder of the cheaper kind.

Eleanor's ever-ready pity rises up to crush the anger previously felt,
for she sees now the effort that this brief confession has cost her
fellow traveller. She knows, too, the reason for which these words
were spoken, and horror stops the beating of her heart, it checks her
throbbing pulses.

Mrs. Roche leans forward, and takes the stranger's hands.

"Thank you," she murmurs simply.

The woman clasps the little fingers gratefully.

"You understand?" she asks.

Eleanor whispers, "Yes."

"Do you know what I saw in your eyes?"

"No."

"Three long words that kept repeating themselves. All the same words,
and the worst, the most heartbreaking. 'To-morrow, and to-morrow, and
to-morrow!' They will drive a soul to perdition quicker than any in
the English language. I am going to have them engraved on my
tombstone, because I can only conquer them in death."

"You are right. I was looking on, living in fancy the worthless days
and hours."

"Crush that tendency, Mrs. Roche. Think of me when your life seems
worthless, and remember all that I have lost. Your face is so sweet,
so pure, so beautiful, it was made for the good love that crowns
spotless womanhood. But this is my station, and I shall never know
what you do with your future."

"Shall I show you?" says Eleanor hastily, for she is easily swayed, and
the stranger has worked upon her emotion.

"Yes."

"See!" and the soft, enticing eyes of Carol Quinton are torn
asunder--the photograph is reduced to a handful of scraps scattered on
the carriage cushion.

"You are a good woman," says the other, rising and looking down
tenderly, lovingly at Eleanor.

Again they clasp hands, then a cloud of towzled hair under a black
crape bonnet vanishes down the platform, and Mrs. Roche is left alone,
with the pieces of torn cardboard and the scent of patchouli on the
opposite seat.

CHAPTER XIII.

IF NEED, TO DIE--NOT LIVE.--_Chas. Kingsley_.

"Have I changed, or has everything changed?" Eleanor asks herself, as the
days slip by in the old farmhouse.

Mr. and Mrs. Grebby are just the same warm-hearted, genial couple as of
yore; they crack the same jokes at their knife-and-fork tea, while Rover
wags his tail as pleasantly as ever, and Black Bess trots to market.

The school children have not forgotten "Teacher," and, greet her