d with
sunshine dancing on her winsome face, and kind words trembling on her
lips; for the moment it seemed impossible to part, and, with an
impetuous gesture, he cried to her,--

"Oh, Dora, let me stay and try to win you! for everything is possible
to love, and I never knew how dear you were to me till now!"

There were sudden tears in the young man's eyes, the flush of a genuine
emotion on his cheek, the tremor of an ardent longing in his voice,
and, for the first time, a very true affection strengthened his whole
countenance. Debby's heart was full of penitence; she had given so
much pain to more than one that she longed to atone for it--longed to
do some very friendly thing, and soothe some trouble such as she
herself had known. She looked into the eager face uplifted to her own
and thought of Will, then stooped and touched her lover's forehead with
the lips that softly whispered, "No."

If she had cared for him, she never would have done it; poor Joe knew
that, and murmuring an incoherent "Thank you!" he rushed away, feeling
very much as he remembered to have felt when his baby sister died and
he wept his grief away upon his mother's neck. He began his
preparations for departure at once, in a burst of virtuous energy quite
refreshing to behold, thinking within himself, as he flung his
cigar-case into the grate, kicked a billiard-ball into a corner, and
suppressed his favorite allusion to the Devil,--

"This is a new sort of thing to me, but I can bear it, and upon my life
I think I feel the better for it already."

And so he did; for though he was no Augustine to turn in an hour from
worldly hopes and climb to sainthood through long years of inward
strife, yet in aftertimes no one knew how many false steps had been
saved, how many small sins repented of, through the power of the memory
that far away a generous woman waited to respect him, and in his secret
soul he owned that one of the best moments of his life was that in
which little Debby Wilder whispered "No," and kissed him.

As he passed from sight, the girl leaned her head upon her hand,
thinking sorrowfully to herself,--

"What right had I to censure him, when my own actions are so far from
true? I have done a wicked thing, and as an honest girl I should undo
it, if I can. I have broken through the rules of a false propriety for
Clara's sake; can I not do as much for Frank's? I will. I'll find him,
if I search the house,--and tell him all, thou