fore
leaving Zion Place there had been a moment in which for the second time
in their lives she and Theophil had been alone.

They had stood together in the little study and taken each other's
hands, without a word, and they had looked into each other's faces as
those look whom a look must last a long time.

They didn't even say good-bye, for, if they were never to meet again,
the look was not good-bye. And meet again it was not unlikely they
would, for it had been already arranged that Isabel was to lead off the
autumn entertainments; but the look did not mean that, either. As life
had been planned for them, all subsequent meetings must be merely
trivialities. They had met once, and fate had decided that they must
never meet like that again. In that long look each knew that they met
and parted for ever, autumn arrangements notwithstanding.

Each came out of that look as out of a great cathedral, and from that
moment till the train left Theophil, with an unwonted sense of
loneliness, by Jenny's side, they entered that cathedral no more. Their
devotions were done for that day, and they must resume their secular
duties, rippling idly over the great deeps of themselves.

One always leaves a station from which a dear friend has just gone with
a certain subdued air, a certain bereaved hush in the voice, and even
Jenny felt a momentary loneliness too. But it was not long before the
doors of home opened again for her in the sound of Theophil's voice;
and in the sense of the old familiar nearness to him she was back again
safe in the only world she ever wished to dwell in.

It was more of an effort with Theophil, and the voice that made home for
Jenny had a strange sound in his own ears, as though it were still
talking to Isabel; but the effort was soon made, and though Jenny teased
him a little and said she believed he had quite lost his, that was to
say _her_, heart to Isabel, of course she believed no such thing. Doubt
is too terrible a toy for true love to play with. You only dare to doubt
as you must sometimes face the fear of death.

"I wish next October were here," said Jenny, artlessly; "it seems such a
long time to wait to see her again."

Did Theophil wish the same? He hardly knew.

"Distance is such a silly thing," went on Jenny. "It seems to have been
invented just to separate those who want to be together. It seems so
arbitrary, so unnecessary."

"I suppose death is a form of distance," said Theophil, irr