. Yet I tried
awkwardly to comfort her.

"I can't bear to leave them," she said.

"But you will see them often, when we come back," I reassured her. It was
scarcely the moment for reminding her of what she was getting in return.
This peculiar family affection she evinced was beyond me; I had never
experienced it in any poignant degree since I had gone as a freshman to
Harvard, and yet I was struck by the fact that her emotions were so
rightly placed. It was natural to love one's family. I began to feel,
vaguely, as I watched her, that the new relationship into which I had
entered was to be much more complicated than I had imagined. Twilight was
coming on, the train was winding through the mountain passes, crossing
and re-crossing a swift little stream whose banks were massed with alder;
here and there, on the steep hillsides, blazed the goldenrod....
Presently I turned, to surprise in her eyes a wide, questioning
look,--the look of a child. Even in this irrevocable hour she sought to
grasp what manner of being was this to whom she had confided her life,
and with whom she was faring forth into the unknown. The experience was
utterly unlike my anticipation. Yet I responded. The kiss I gave her had
no passion in it.

"I'll take good care of you, Maude," I said.

Suddenly, in the fading light, she flung her arms around me, pressing me
tightly, desperately.

"Oh, I know you will, Hugh, dear. And you'll forgive me, won't you, for
being so horrid to-day, of all days? I do love you!"

Neither of us had ever been abroad. And although it was before the days
of swimming-pools and gymnasiums and a la carte cafes on ocean liners,
the Atlantic was imposing enough. Maude had a more lasting capacity for
pleasure than I, a keener enjoyment of new experiences, and as she lay
beside me in the steamer-chair where I had carefully tucked her she would
exclaim:

"I simply can't believe it, Hugh! It seems so unreal. I'm sure I shall
wake up and find myself back in Elkington."

"Don't speak so loud, my dear," I cautioned her. There were some very
formal-looking New Yorkers next us.

"No, I won't," she whispered. "But I'm so happy I feel as though I should
like to tell everyone."

"There's no need," I answered smiling.

"Oh, Hugh, I don't want to disgrace you!" she exclaimed, in real alarm.
"Otherwise, so far as I am concerned, I shouldn't care who knew."

People smiled at her. Women came up and took her hands. And on the fourth