we have each our path to follow. I
heard the rumours: trouble--failure--your income swept away--dearest
Ada. But you must not come to want. You will give me back the cross,
though; not the forget-me-nots. Keep them, though they are withered and
dry--withered and dry as our old love--something of the past. Let me
see," she said--and her eyes assumed a troubled, anxious
expression--"you cannot claim me now. I am another's--his wife. How
blue the lake looks! and how plainly it mirrors the mountains! Fair
blue waters--blue--true blue. If I could have died then--died when you
plucked the flowers from my breast--but it was not to be. I have a duty
to fulfil--a burden--a cross"--she said, dreamily--"a cross? Yes--yes--
yes, the cross. You will give it me back, Philip," she whispered, with
a smile; "it lies, you see, where once your forget-me-nots lay. I
cannot wear them now, but the colour is the same--true blue. But you
will find them for me, those bright gems, and all will yet be well."

She raised Sir Murray's hand to her lips, and kissed it reverently, as
she continued:

"Always true and noble, Philip. You will respect my husband for the
sake of the old days. It has been like a cloud always hovering above my
life: that great dread lest you should ever meet in anger. Go now--let
me sleep--I am weak and weary. But remember your promise."

Pride, misery, despair, shame, and grief, seemed to have mingled for him
a cup of bitterness, forcing him to drink it there in the presence of
those who were gathered round the sick woman's couch; and it was with a
step that tottered in spite of all his self-command, that when Lady
Gernon loosed his hand, Sir Murray strode slowly from the room, to seek
the solitude of the library, where, alone through the rest of that
night, he could sit and brood upon his misery. She did not love him--
she had never loved him; and he told himself that he could not stay to
hear her words--to hold her hand, when her last sigh was breathed. Had
not that man risen, as it were, from the dead to blast their wedding,
she would have clung to him with a softened, child-like affection; but
now--"how could he stay when her thoughts all seemed another's?"

The tearful eyes of father and mother met across the bed, as Sir Murray
left the room, and then as the doctor sat silent and averted of gaze by
the bedside, the broken voice of the father rose, as, sinking upon his
knees, he prayed long and ea