apples on de way, neidah."

* * * * *

It was not till after dark had come that Valiant said good-by to the
garden. He loved it best under the starlight. He sat a long hour under
the pergola overlooking the lake, where he could dimly see the green
rocks, and the white froth of the water bubbling and chuckling down over
their rounded outlines to the shrouded level below. The moon lifted
finally and soared through the sky, blowing out the little lamps of
stars. Under its light a gossamer mist robed the landscape in a
shimmering opalescence, in which tree and shrub altered their values and
became transmuted to silver sentinels, watching over a demesne of
violet-velvet shadows filled with sleepy twitterings and stealthy
rustlings and the odor of wild honeysuckle.

At last he stood before the old sun-dial, rearing its column from its
pearly clusters of blossoms. "_I count no hours but the happy ones_": he
read the inscription with an indrawn breath. Then, groping at its base,
he lifted the ivy that had once rambled there and drew up the tangle
again over the stone disk. His Bride's-Garden!

In the library, an hour later, sitting at the big black pigeonholed
desk, he wrote to Shirley:

"I am leaving to-night on the midnight train. Uncle Jefferson
will give you this note in the morning. I will not stay at
Damory Court to bring more pain into your life. I am going very
far away. I understand all you are feeling--and so, good-by,
good-by. God keep you! I love you and I shall love you always,
always!"

CHAPTER XLVI

THE VOICE FROM THE PAST

Though the doctor left the church with Shirley and her mother, he did
not drive to Rosewood, but to his office. There, alone with Mrs.
Dandridge while Shirley waited in the carriage, he unlocked the little
tin box that had been the major's, with the key Mrs. Dandridge gave him,
and put into her hands a little packet of yellow oiled-silk which bore
her name. He noted that it agitated her profoundly and as she thrust it
into the bosom of her dress, her face seemed stirred as he had never
seen it. When he put her again in the carriage, he patted her shoulder
with a touch far gentler than his gruff good-by.

At Rosewood, at length, alone in her room, she sat down with the packet
in her hands. During the long hours since first the little key had lain
in her palm like a live coal, she had been all afire with eagerness.