ap. It had been as an impulsive girl, worshipping her
from a lowly inferiority, that Phebe had been used long ago to kiss
Felicita's hand. But this was the humility of a great love, willing to
help, and seeking to save her. Felicita felt it through every fibre of
her sensitive nature. For an instant she thought it might be possible
that Phebe had caught some glimmer of the truth. With her weary and dim
eyes lifted up to the pale crests of the mountains, beneath which lay
the miserable secret of her life, she hesitated as to whether she could
tell Phebe all. But the effort to admit any human soul into the inner
recesses of her own was too great for her.

"Christ loves me, you say," she murmured, "I don't know; I never felt
it. But I have felt sure of your love; and next to Felix and Hilda you
have stood nearest to me. Love me always, and in spite of all, my dear."

She lifted up her bowed head and kissed her lips with a long and
lingering kiss. Then Phebe knew that she was bent upon going alone and
immediately to Engelberg.

* * * * *

The icy air of the morning, blowing down from the mountains where the
winter's snow was but partially melted, made Felicita shiver, though her
mind was too busy to notice why. Phebe had seen that she was warmly
clad, and had come down to the boat with her to start her on this last
day's journey; but Felicita had scarcely opened her pale lips to say
good-by. She stood on the quay, watching the boat as long as the white
steam from the funnel was in sight, and then she turned away, blind to
all the scenery about her, in the heaviness of heart she felt for the
sorrowful soul going out on so sad and vain a quest. There had been no
time for Jean Merle to overtake them, and now Felicita was gone when a
few words from her would have stopped her. But Phebe had not dared to
utter them.

Felicita too had not seen either the sunlit hills lying about her, or
Phebe watching her departure. She had no thought for anything but what
there might be lying before her, in that lonely mountain village, to
which, after fourteen years, her reluctant feet were turned. Possibly
she might find no trace of the man who had been so long dead to her and
to all the world, and thus be baffled and defeated, yet relieved, at the
first stage of her search. For she did not desire to find him. Her heart
would be lightened of its miserable load, if she should discover that
Jean Merle was dead,