face was worn and weary;
he looked older than she had seen him look yet. "Did you put my letter
on the table for me?" she asked.

"Yes. I put it there at the doctor's request."

"I suppose the doctor told you it was from my sister? She is coming to
see me, and Miss Garth is coming to see me. They will thank you for all
your goodness to me better than I can."

"I have no claim on their thanks," he answered, sternly. "What I have
done was not done for them, but for you." He waited a little, and looked
at her. His face would have betrayed him in that look, his voice would
have betrayed him in the next words he spoke, if she had not guessed
the truth already. "When your friends come here," he resumed, "they will
take you away, I suppose, to some better place than this."

"They can take me to no place," she said, gently, "which I shall think
of as I think of the place where you found me. They can take me to no
dearer friend than the friend who saved my life."

There was a moment's silence between them.

"We have been very happy here," he went on, in lower and lower tones.
"You won't forget me when we have said good-by?"

She turned pale as the words passed his lips, and, leaving her chair,
knelt down at the table, so as to look up into his face, and to force
him to look into hers.

"Why do you talk of it?" she asked. "We are not going to say good-by, at
least not yet."

"I thought--" he began.

"Yes?"

"I thought your friends were coming here--"

She eagerly interrupted him. "Do you think I would go away with
anybody," she said, "even with the dearest relation I have in the world,
and leave you here, not knowing and not caring whether I ever saw
you again? Oh, you don't think that of me!" she exclaimed, with the
passionate tears springing into her eyes-"I'm sure you don't think that
of me!"

"No," he said; "I never have thought, I never can think, unjustly or
unworthily of you."

Before he could add another word she left the table as suddenly as
she had approached it, and returned to her chair. He had unconsciously
replied in terms that reminded her of the hard necessity which still
remained unfulfilled--the necessity of telling him the story of the
past. Not an idea of concealing that story from his knowledge crossed
her mind. "Will he love me, when he knows the truth, as he loves me
now?" That was her only thought as she tried to approach the subject in
his presence without shrinking from it.

"Let us