another six months and Christmas will be here; and, after
Christmas is turned, the weeks till February the 12th--the second
anniversary of Theophil's coming to New Zion--will fly by in no time.

Meanwhile Mrs. Talbot and Jenny--with occasional contributions from
Theophil--began to busy themselves with Jenny's bottom drawer.

Translated into the language of those more magnificent circles in which
this simple-hearted romance has no desire to move, a "bottom drawer"
might be described as a trousseau, though such translation would be only
partially correct. A bottom drawer is a good deal more than a trousseau.
It is the corner of a girl's wardrobe, usually its bottom drawer, where
the home that is to be begins to take shape in deposits of various
kissed objects, minor articles of apparel, of ornament or
use,--handkerchiefs such as we have already seen Jenny marking, in
defiance of the old prophecy that the bride who dares even to write her
married name before her marriage will never know a wedding day; quaint
candlesticks that had to be picked up in some old curiosity shop as come
upon or be missed altogether; pretty shoes of a pattern you weren't
likely to meet with again; occasionally, perhaps, even an anticipatory
wedding present, that some friend who would be far away in Australia
when the day came had already contributed; a pretty tea-service Theophil
had suddenly taken a fancy to buy for Jenny one day,--"any straw will
help a nest;" a sweet and rather naughty picture that must never be hung
anywhere but in their little sacred bedroom,--"O love, our little room!"

How often did Jenny bend lovingly over that drawer, which by now had
spread itself over a whole chest of drawers,--for home was growing,
growing,--only a few more months and it would have grown so big and real
that nothing but a little house would hold it. And Theophil was brought
sometimes to peep in too,--"O love, think of it--our little home."

CHAPTER XVI

THEOPHIL ALL THIS TIME

Have I seemed to shirk the subject of Theophil's feelings all this time?

Well, I confess I have rather shrunk from writing down in so many words
that he was in love with Isabel,--obvious as the fact has been,--just as
he himself shrank from admitting the same truth even to his own soul.

When he had sat up in his study that night of the recital, he had looked
the whole sad splendid truth in its wonderful face, had loved it wildly
for an hour, and then shut his ey