is opening of
his innermost would have given it. For while she bitterly grieved over
the death-blow she had dealt his happy hope, it no longer seemed a
possibility to change her stubborn heart, or lessen by a fraction the
debt which she sadly felt could only be repaid in friendship's silver,
not love's gold.

All night she lay there like some pictured Magdalene, purer but as
penitent as Correggio's Mary, with the book, the lamp, the melancholy
eyes, the golden hair that painters love. All night she read, gathering
courage, not consolation, from those pages, for seeing what she was not
showed her what she might become; and when she turned the little key
upon that story without an end, Sylvia the girl was dead, but Sylvia the
woman had begun to live.

Lying in the rosy hush of dawn, there came to her a sudden memory--

"If ever you need help that Geoffrey cannot give, remember cousin
Faith."

This was the hour Faith foresaw; Moor had gone to her with his trouble,
why not follow, and let this woman, wise, discreet, and gentle, show her
what should come next?

The newly risen sun saw Sylvia away upon her journey to Faith's home
among the hills. She lived alone, a cheerful, busy, solitary soul,
demanding little of others, yet giving freely to whomsoever asked an
alms of her.

Sylvia found the gray cottage nestled in a hollow of the mountain side;
a pleasant hermitage, secure and still. Mistress and maid composed the
household, but none of the gloom of isolation darkened the sunshine that
pervaded it; peace seemed to sit upon its threshold, content to brood
beneath its eaves, and the atmosphere of home to make it beautiful.

When some momentous purpose or event absorbs us we break through fears
and formalities, act out ourselves forgetful of reserve, and use the
plainest phrases to express emotions which need no ornament and little
aid from language. Sylvia illustrated this fact, then; for, without
hesitation or embarrassment, she entered Miss Dane's door, called no
servant to announce her, but went, as if by instinct, straight to the
room where Faith sat alone, and with the simplest greeting asked--

"Is Geoffrey here?"

"He was an hour ago, and will be an hour hence. I sent him out to rest,
for he cannot sleep. I am glad you came to him; he has not learned to do
without you yet."

With no bustle of surprise or sympathy Faith put away her work, took
off the hat and cloak, drew her guest beside her on the couch b