felt her heart almost stand still. There was something about it which
renewed her vague surmise on the train. It was only a very few
minutes before Wollaston laid down the paper which he had been
reading, and said something to Evelyn, who began to fold her work
with the sweet docility which Maria remembered. Wollaston rose and
went over to Evelyn and kissed her as she stood up and let the yellow
cat leap to the floor. Evelyn looked to Maria more beautiful than she
had ever seen her. Maria stood farther back in the shadow. Then she
heard the front door opened, and the cat was gently put out. Then she
heard the key turn in the lock, and a bolt slide. Maria stood
perfectly still. A light from a lamp which was being carried by some
one, flitted like a will-o'-the-wisp over the yard, and the parlor
windows became dark. Then a broad light shone out from the front
chamber windows through the drawn white shade, and lay in a square on
the grass of the yard. The cat which had been put out rubbed against
Maria's feet. She caught up the little animal and kissed it. Then she
put it down gently, and hurried back to the station. She thought of
Rosa Blair, and an intense longing came over her. She seemed to
suddenly sense the highest quality of love: that which realizes the
need of another, rather than one's own. The poor little dwarf seemed
the very child of her heart. She looked up at the stars shining
through the plumy foliage of the trees, and thought how many of them
might owe their glory to the radiance of unknown suns, and it seemed
to her that her own soul lighted her path by its reflection of the
love of God. She thought that it might be so with all souls which
were faced towards God, and that which is above and beyond, and it
was worth more than anything else in the whole world.

She questioned no longer the right or wrong of what she had done, as
she hurried on and reached the little Amity station in time for the
last train.

THE END

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of By the Light of the Soul, by
Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

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