se here she laid you in my
arms. God was very good to me that day."

"He is always good," answered Phebe.

"So the parson teaches us," he continued; "but it was very hard for me
to lose that money. It struck me a dreadful blow, Phebe. If I'd been
twenty years younger I could have borne it; but when a man's turned
sixty there's no chance. And he robbed me of more than money: he robbed
me of love. I loved him next to you."

She knew that so well that she did not answer him. Her love for Roland
Sefton lived still; but it was altogether changed from the bright,
girlish admiration and trustful confidence it had once been. His
conduct had altered life itself to her; it was colder and darker, with
deeper and longer shadows in it. And now there was coming the darkest
shadow of all.

"Read this," he said, opening the "Phaedo," and pointing to some words
with his crooked and trembling finger. She stooped her head till her
soft cheek rested against his with a caressing and soothing touch.

"I go to die, you to live; but which is best God alone can know," she
read. Her arm stole round his neck, and her cheek was pressed more
closely against his. Mrs. Nixey's hard face softened a little as she
looked at them; but she could not help thinking of the new turn affairs
were taking. If old Marlowe died, it might be more convenient, on the
whole, than for her to marry him. How snugly she could live up here,
with a cow or two, and a little maid from the workhouse to be her
companion and drudge!

Quite unconscious of Mrs. Nixey's plans, Phebe had drawn the old black
leather Bible toward her, turning over the stained and yellow leaves
with one hand, for she would not withdraw her arm from her father's
neck. She did not know exactly where to find the words she wanted; but
at last she came upon them. The gray shaggy locks of the old man and the
rippling glossy waves of Phebe's brown hair mingled as they bent their
heads again over the same page.

"For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die
unto the Lord: whether we live therefore or die, we are the Lord's. For
to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be
Lord both of the dead and the living."

"That is better than your old Socrates," said Phebe, with tears in her
eyes and a faint smile playing about her lips. "Our Lord has gone on
before us, through life and death. There is nothing we can have to bear
that He has not borne."

"He