hile with his
broad hand spread over the letters which he had cut in those early
days, so as to hide them from his sight. "What an ass I have
been,--always and ever!" he said to himself.

It was not only of his late disappointment that he was thinking, but
of his whole past life. He was conscious of his hobbledehoyhood,--of
that backwardness on his part in assuming manhood which had rendered
him incapable of making himself acceptable to Lily before she had
fallen into the clutches of Crosbie. As he thought of this he
declared to himself that if he could meet Crosbie again he would
again thrash him,--that he would so belabour him as to send him out
of the world, if such sending might possibly be done by fair beating,
regardless whether he himself might be called upon to follow him.
Was it not hard that for the two of them,--for Lily and for him
also,--there should be such punishment because of the insincerity of
that man? When he had thus stood upon the bridge for some quarter of
an hour, he took out his knife, and, with deep rough gashes in the
wood, cut out Lily's name from the rail.

He had hardly finished, and was still looking at the chips as they
were being carried away by the stream, when a gentle step came close
up to him, and turning round, he saw that Lady Julia was on the
bridge. She was close to him, and had already seen his handiwork.
"Has she offended you, John?" she said.

"Oh, Lady Julia!"

"Has she offended you?"

"She has refused me, and it is all over."

"It may be that she has refused you, and that yet it need not be all
over. I am sorry that you have cut out the name. John. Do you mean to
cut it out from your heart?"

"Never. I would if I could, but I never shall."

"Keep to it as to a great treasure. It will be a joy to you in after
years, and not a sorrow. To have loved truly, even though you shall
have loved in vain, will be a consolation when you are as old as I
am. It is something to have had a heart."

"I don't know. I wish that I had none."

"And, John;--I can understand her feeling now; and, indeed, I thought
all through that you were asking her too soon; but the time may yet
come when she will think better of your wishes."

"No, no; never. I begin to know her now."

"If you can be constant in your love you may win her yet. Remember
how young she is; and how young you both are. Come again in two
years' time, and then, when you have won her, you shall tell me that
I have been