ten it."

"Forgotten it! No, Miss Burton; she cannot think that. Do you believe
that men or women can forget such things as that? Can you ever forget
her brother? Do you think people ever forget when they have loved? No, I
have not forgotten her. I have not forgotten that walk which we had down
this lane together. There are things which men never forget." Then he
paused for an answer.

Florence was by nature steady and self-collected, and she at once felt
that she was bound to be wary before she gave him any answer. She had
half fancied once or twice that Fanny thought more of Mr. Saul than she
allowed even herself to know. And Fanny, when she had spoken of the
impossibility of such a marriage, had always based the impossibility on
the fact that people should not marry without the means of living--a
reason which to Florence, with all her prudence, was not sufficient.
Fanny might wait as she also intended to wait. Latterly, too, Fanny had
declared more than once to Florence her conviction that Mr. Saul's
passion had been a momentary insanity which had altogether passed away;
and in these declarations Florence had half fancied that she discovered
some tinge of regret. If it were so, what was she now to say to Mr.
Saul?

"You think then, Miss Burton," he continued, "that I have no chance of
success? I ask the question because if I felt certain that this was so
quite certain--I should be wrong to remain here. It has been my first
and only parish, and I could not leave it without bitter sorrow. But if
I were to remain here hopelessly, I should become unfit for my work. I
am becoming so, and shall be better away."

"But why ask me, Mr. Saul?"

"Because I think that you can tell me."

"But why not ask herself? Who can tell you so truly as she can do?"

"You would not advise me to do that if you were sure that she would
reject me?"

"That is what I would advise."

"I will take your advice, Miss Burton. Now, good-by, and may God bless
you. You say you will be here in the Autumn; but before the Autumn I
shall probably have left Clavering. If so our farewells will be for very
long, but I shall always remember our pleasant intercourse here." Then
he went on toward Cumberly Green; and Florence, as she walked into the
vicarage grounds was thinking that no girl had ever been loved by a more
single-hearted, pure-minded gentleman than Mr. Saul.

As she sat alone in her bed-room, five or six hours after this
interview, she f