y wind, for aught I knew, and
every rustling leaf might whisper it. The law, you said, made us
white; but not the law, nor even love, can conquer prejudice. HE spoke
of my beauty, my grace, my sweetness! I looked into his eyes and
believed him. And yet he left me without a word! What would I do in
Clarence now? I came away engaged to be married, with even the day
set; I should go back forsaken and discredited; even the servants would
pity me."

"Little Albert is pining for you," suggested Warwick. "We could make
some explanation that would spare your feelings."

"Ah, do not tempt me, John! I love the child, and am grieved to leave
him. I'm grateful, too, John, for what you have done for me. I am not
sorry that I tried it. It opened my eyes, and I would rather die of
knowledge than live in ignorance. But I could not go through it again,
John; I am not strong enough. I could do you no good; I have made you
trouble enough already. Get a mother for Albert--Mrs. Newberry would
marry you, secret and all, and would be good to the child. Forget me,
John, and take care of yourself. Your friend has found you out through
me--he may have told a dozen people. You think he will be silent;--I
thought he loved me, and he left me without a word, and with a look
that told me how he hated and despised me. I would not have believed
it--even of a white man."

"You do him an injustice," said her brother, producing Tryon's letter.
"He did not get off unscathed. He sent you a message."

She turned her face away, but listened while he read the letter. "He
did not love me," she cried angrily, when he had finished, "or he would
not have cast me off--he would not have looked at me so. The law would
have let him marry me. I seemed as white as he did. He might have
gone anywhere with me, and no one would have stared at us curiously; no
one need have known. The world is wide--there must be some place where
a man could live happily with the woman he loved."

"Yes, Rena, there is; and the world is wide enough for you to get along
without Tryon."

"For a day or two," she went on, "I hoped he might come back. But his
expression in that awful moment grew upon me, haunted me day and night,
until I shuddered at the thought that I might ever see him again. He
looked at me as though I were not even a human being. I do not love
him any longer, John; I would not marry him if I were white, or he were
as I am. He did not love me--o