her eyes
were fixed, and as she walked with folded arms and drooping head, she
sang low to herself--

'Upon the convent roof, the snows
Lie sparkling to the moon;
My breath to heaven like incense goes,
May my soul follow soon.
Lord, make my spirit pure and clear,
As are the frosty skies,
Or this first snowdrop of the year,
That in my bosom lies.'

"Sylvia!"

Very gentle was the call, but she started as if it had been a shout,
looked an instant while light and color flashed into her face, then ran
to him exclaiming joyfully--

"Oh, Geoffrey! I am glad! I am glad!"

There could be but one answer to such a welcome, and Sylvia received it
as she stood there, not weeping now, but smiling with the sincerest
satisfaction, the happiest surprise. Moor shared both emotions, feeling
as a man might feel when, parched with thirst, he stretches out his
hand for a drop of rain, and receives a brimming cup of water. He drank
a deep draught gratefully, then, fearing that it might be as suddenly
withdrawn, asked anxiously--

"Sylvia, are we friends or lovers?"

"Anything, if you will only stay."

She looked up as she spoke, and her face betrayed that a conflict
between desire and doubt was going on within her. Impulse had sent her
there, and now it was so sweet to know herself beloved, she found it
hard to go away. Her brother's happiness had touched her heart, roused
the old craving for affection, and brought a strong desire to fill the
aching void her lost love had left with this recovered one. Sylvia had
not learned to reason yet, she could only feel, because, owing to the
unequal development of her divided nature, the heart grew faster than
the intellect. Instinct was her surest guide, and when she followed it
unblinded by a passion, unthwarted by a mood, she prospered. But now she
was so blinded and so thwarted, and now her great temptation came.
Ambition, man's idol, had tempted the father; love, woman's god, tempted
the daughter; and, as if the father's atonement was to be wrought out
through his dearest child the daughter also made the fatal false step of
her life.

"Then you _have_ learned to love me, Sylvia?"

"No, the old feeling has not changed except to grow more remorseful,
more eager to prove its truth. Once you asked me if I did not wish to
love you; then I did not, now I sincerely do. If you still want me with
my many faults, and will teach me in your gentle way to