vil instead of good, he could hardly have
wrought more irreparable mischief--and with the thought, pity, which had
led him astray, winged off, like an ironic sprite, and left his heart
empty of comfort.

"God knows I am sorry for you, Judy," he said in the effort to reinforce
his compassion.

But Judy, though she was avid of sympathy, did not crave an expression
of it from her husband--for her temperament was of the morbid kind
that is happiest when it is most miserable. Her heart had fed upon the
sustenance of her brain until the abnormal enlargement of that single
organ had prepared her for inevitable suffering at the hands of men--if
not from actual unkindness, yet from an amiable neglect which could
cut even more deeply. She turned in the direction of sentiment as
instinctively as a plant turns toward light, and the Reverend Orlando
Mullen had had predecessors in her affections who had been hardly so
much as aware of her existence.

As Abel went out of the door, her accusing eyes followed him while she
thought, with sentimental regret, of the many things she had given up
when she married--of Mrs. Mullen's ironing day, of the rector's darning,
of the red flannel petticoats she had no longer time to make for the
Hottentots. It was over one of these flannel petticoats that Mr. Mullen
had first turned to her with his earnest and sympathetic look, as though
he were probing her soul. At the moment she had felt that his casual
words held a hidden meaning, and to this day, though she had pondered
them in sleepless nights ever since, she was still undecided.

"I don't believe he knew how much I cared," she said, as she started
mechanically to take out her hairpins.

CHAPTER IX

A MEETING IN THE PASTURE

As Judy did not appear next morning, her breakfast was carried up to
her by Sarah, who allowed her own cakes to become leathery while she
arranged the tray. Her feet were still on the staircase, when Blossom
turned to Abel and said in a furtive and anxious voice:

"Mrs. Bottom told me yesterday the Gays were coming back to Jordan's
Journey. Have you heard anything about it?"

"No, I haven't heard," he answered indifferently, though his pulses
throbbed at the words. Rising from the table an instant later, he went
out into the yard, where the sunshine filtered softly through June
foliage. By the porch a damask rose-bush was in bloom, and the fragrance
followed him along the path between the borders of portula