e--which she always wore on
the wedding-finger of her left hand.

Major Harper sighed, not one of his sentimental sighs, but one from the
deeps of his heart. A smile, hollow and sad, followed it. "I suppose it
is idle talking now, but--but--you were my first-love, Anne! If things
had gone differently, I might have been a different man."

"Not so. God ordained your fate, not I. No man need be ruined for life
because a woman cannot love him. Human beings hang not on one another
in that blind way. We have each an individual soul; on another soul
may rest all its hopes and joys, but on God only rests its worth,
its duties, and its nobility. We may live to do His work, and rejoice
therein, long after we have forgotten the very sound of that idle
word--happiness."

She paused.

"Go on; you talk as you always used to do."

"Not quite," said Anne, with a faint smile; "I am hardly strong enough.
Frederick," and her eyes had their former lovely, earnest look--earnest
almost to tears, save that girl-tears had from them long been
dried,--"Frederick, for the sake of our olden days--of your mother whom
we both loved--of your father who has gone to her--listen to me for a
little. Trust to your brother--he will not act unjustly. Do not create
dissensions in your family; do not let people say that the moment Mr.
Harper's head was laid in the grave his children quarrelled over his
property."

"I do not quarrel--I but take my right," cried Major Harper, becoming
again the "man of the world," as he saw, the curious glances that from
time to time reached the bay-window. "Thank you for this good advice;
for which my brother owes you even more than I. But I am not a child
now, nor a boy in love, to be talked over by a woman."

Miss Valery rose, rather proudly. "Nor am I that woman, Major Harper.
But I have been so long united in affection with your family; I could
not bear to think it would be brought to dishonour. Surely--surely _you_
will not be the one to do it."

Again as he turned to go, she drew him back by those earnest eyes.

"Frederick, it would grieve me so, ay, break my heart, to see them
brought into open shame, the old familiar home, and the name--the dear,
dear name."

Major Harper's bitter tongue burst its control and stung. "I now see
your motive. Everybody knows how very dearly Anne Valery has all her
life loved the Harper name."

Anne rose to her full height, and a blush, vivid as a girl's, dyed her
cheek. "I