o the corridor, caressing with his large hand the
child that lay on his shoulder. "Of course," she said, "Mrs. Maynard is
still very sick, and needs the greatest care and attention."

"Yes, I understand that. But I reckon it will come out all right in the
end," he said, with the optimistic fatalism which is the real religion
of our orientalizing West. "Good-night, doctor."

She went away, feeling suddenly alone in this exclusion from the
cares that had absorbed her. There was no one on the piazza, which the
moonlight printed with the shadows of the posts and the fanciful jigsaw
work of the arches between them. She heard a step on the sandy walk
round the corner, and waited wistfully.

It was Barlow who came in sight, as she knew at once, but she asked,
"Mr. Barlow?"

"Yes'm," said Barlow. "What can I do for you?"

"Nothing. I thought it might be Mr. Libby at first. Do you know where he
is?"

"Well, I know where he ain't," said Barlow; and having ineffectually
waited to be questioned further, he added, "He ain't here, for one
place. He's gone back to Leyden. He had to take that horse back."

"Oh!" she said.

"N' I guess he's goin' to stay."

"To stay? Where?"

"Well, there you've got me again. All I know is I've got to drive that
mare of his'n over to-morrow, if I can git off, and next day if I can't.
Did n't you know he was goin'?" asked Barlow, willing to recompense
himself for the information he had given.

"Well!" he added sympathetically, at a little hesitation of hers:

Then she said, "I knew he must go. Good-night, Mr. Barlow," and went
indoors. She remembered that he had said he would go as soon as Maynard
came, and that she had consented that this would be best. But his going
now seemed abrupt, though she approved it. She thought that she had
something more to say to him, which might console him or reconcile him;
she could not think what this was, but it left an indefinite longing,
an unsatisfied purpose in her heart; and there was somewhere a tremulous
sense of support withdrawn. Perhaps this was a mechanical effect of the
cessation of her anxiety for Mrs. Maynard, which had been a support as
well as a burden. The house was strangely quiet, as if some great noise
had just been hushed, and it seemed empty. She felt timid in her room,
but she dreaded the next day more than the dark. Her life was changed,
and the future, which she had once planned so clearly, and had felt
so strong to encounter, had