"I shall try never to think of you except in my prayers; " and the tears rained through the hands with which she hid her face. 66 "Go," she urged; "please to go. I can bear no more." "I will go," he returned; but he fell on his knees beside her, and seizing her hand kissed it, one long, lingering kiss. Then he rose and slowly left the house.

Several days had gone by since the burial of Edward, when Captain Arthur Morton took his way, one afternoon, across the fields from his home towards the long highway of Germantown. He was on his usual visit to Hester, but was more sad than common, his morning having been spent in the legal business which necessarily followed his brother's death. Nothing in life had so sobered him as this loss. He went along through the woods of June, thinking how remorselessly the busy waters of life had closed over this dear one, as the sea above its dead. It was in truth no common calamity. Edward's strong individuality intensified the sense of his loss to those he left; for although there are many people in the world, there are but few persons, and Edward's was a distinctive personality.

As the young soldier approached the house, he saw Hester in the garden beside it tying up the roses, which were now putting out anew their summer buds. She had dressed herself in black, and the vase-like curves of her young form came out sharply in the dark dress against the gray stone wall.

Arthur leapt lightly over the pale fence, and if the roses were of a sudden jealous they had reason therefor.

The two young folks strolled down the little garden, chatting as they went of many things: of the great war, out of which he had come with little scath; of the happy future they promised themselves, and over and over returned to speak of the power to love which their

brother and friend had possessed, of the sweetness that came out of his strength, until, looking up, each saw tears in the other's eyes, and owned their mysterious relief.

"And, Arty, no one loved him better than Dr. Wendell."

"I am sure of that. But was it not very strange that he did not come to the funeral? I could not understand it."

"He was in bed all that day," returned Hester. "I never saw a person so altered. I think he must have been dreadfully shocked by Edward's death. I heard him tell Miss Ann once that he ought not to have been a doctor; and I think may be he is right, for Miss Ann says he broods for days when any of his patients die."

"And Ned did love him well," said Arthur. "I have a pleasant surprise for him, and I want you to come into the house with me and find him. It may do him good, poor fellow."

"And what is it, Arty?"

"That you cannot know until I tell Miss Aun. Come."

"I think he needs some help. He really must be ill. He scarcely speaks to any one. Miss Ann went out early to-day, and came back to tell me that she has arranged with Mrs. Westerley that I am to go to her, while Miss Ann takes the doctor to the seashore a while."

"Mother has a still better plan. She has written to ask Mr. Gray to let you go with her to Europe in August; and then in September, if you are a good girl, I may follow you; and afterwards, in a year, Hester, mother says you must have a year abroad, — you will consider the propriety and advantages of a residence in a mountain district; Alleghanies, we may say."

"Perhaps," said Hester, smiling. "How kind your mother is!"

"Mother is never half anything," he returned. "She fought us a good while, and now she is making believe that she has won a victory. We need n't contra

"I shall know how to escape contradiction," cried Hester, laughing. "But "But there is Miss Ann at the window;" and as she spoke they passed through the hall into the sitting-room.

"Good news, Miss Ann," cried Arthur. "I wanted to be first to tell you that my dear Ned has left your brother ten thousand dollars." He had in reality left a letter asking Arthur to give it, as he had only a life estate in his property, which passed to Arthur.

"It was like him," she returned; "and I may say to you that it will be a great relief. God has been good to us, and there is no one I would like better to think of as helping us than your brother. But here is Ezra. Please don't remark his appearance. He has been very wretched, and he does not like to have it mentioned."

Arthur was struck with the man's face. It was haggard and flushed. "Tell him about it," continued Ann; "you will like to, I am sure."

"What is it? Tell me what?" returned Wendell, in an uninterested voice.

words,

66

66

away, chilHe will be This last week

Yes," said Ann, go dren. Leave him to me. all right in a few days. has been too much for him." She knew he had taken a good deal of opium, and, thinking his strangeness of conduct due to this, dreaded lest he should further betray himself.

Somewhat reluctantly they left her. Then Wendell spoke: "We must get away, Ann. We must go somewhere. And don't mind what I say. Tell Arthur I don't mean anything. Tell him I took some morphia this morning; and don't look at me that way, Ann."

66

"Yes, brother," she replied uneasily; yes, you want a change. Don't worry, dear. I will arrange it."

It was all one horrible mystery to her, this last week; but she got her brother to bed, and went on at once completing her arrangements for leaving town for a week or two, hoping that with change of air he would become as

Arthur was troubled. "Yes; isn't it nice? We all owe you so much that I should like to have given it myself; only you might not like to take from the living what you can take from the dead. But it is as if dear Ned were thanking you for us all. That is why we like it."

Wendell looked up at the speaker with a face written all over with the toneless, infirm lines of weariness. Then he said, in a monotonous voice, as if he

Within a day or two they left abruptly, without leave-taking; and the house was closed, and Hester went to Alice Westerley's.

Alice found it impossible to talk of what Wendell had told her. Some day she must do it. Just now she could not make up her mind to blacken further the character of the man she had loved; but being a just woman, she wrote to Helen Morton:

"I have done you a wrong, and while I have in no respect changed my views

as to what should have been our course, I want to ask your pardon. I have kept away on the plea of ill health. If you can forget what I said in haste, I will come over to-morrow and see you, but let us say nothing of the past."

Helen Morton was too much softened by the sorrow of the week to give any but a kindly answer, and they were friends again, but always with a sense of some vague barrier between them. We may be eager enough to let the dead past bury its dead passions, but at times their ghosts move sadly in the dreary graveyard of memory. Some day the good priest Time shall lay them.

Late in August Mrs. Morton, Hester and Alice went abroad; and meanwhile there came no news of Wendell. In

September, Ann returned. There was a sudden sale of their furniture, and she went as she had come, still ruddy-cheeked and quiet, and betraying no sign of any suffering these months may have laid upon her.

XXIV.

A year or more had gone by since the actors in this story passed, one by one, from the quiet village which now makes a part of the great city. There was a dinner, one of those debtor-andcreditor feasts which wise men dread, at which was assembled a somewhat incongruous collection of guests.

Mr. Wilmington found, to his horror, that he was assigned to Mrs. Grace, and was not sorry to see, as he sat down, that the seat on his left was occupied by Miss Clemson, who came in to dinner on the arm of Dr. Jones, a more than middleaged man, much known as reliable; a comfortable physician, too well satisfied with his art," and so sympathetic, my dear."

Mrs. Grace spoke to him across her neighbors as soon as the soup was removed. "Whatever has become of Dr. Wendell?" she asked.

"He

"I do not know," he returned. was always a rolling stone, I am told. And he was a rolling stone in his opinions, too. Never could hold fast to anything."

"He was very strong on gout," said Wilmington; "had some ideas about it I never heard before."

"I dare say," rejoined Dr. Jones.

"The doctors are like dentists," murmured Miss Clemson to Wilmington. "How they hate one another; and after all people get well. It is merely a question of statistics."

"May be Dr. Lagrange knows," said Mrs. Grace, who pursued a personal fact as a naturalist does a butterfly. Lagrange was within ear-shot across the table. "We were talking of Dr. Wendell," she added. "Do you know where he has gone? I always did think he went away quite mysteriously."

"He is in the West, I believe," replied Lagrange; "but why he left I do not know."

"I am not old enough to manage so much real estate," said Wilmington, ferociously. "But do you know," he added, aloud, "that we expect Arty and his wife next week?"

"Oh, that is too bad!" exclaimed Mrs. Grace. "I never heard it."

She began to feel that the world of facts was evading her pursuit in some maliciously mysterious way.

"You seem skeptical," said Miss Clemson; "we shall have you dubious as to the census next, Mrs. Grace."

"Well, I have my opinions," returned that lady. "And as to Dr. Wendell, you can say what you like; I never approved of him, and I am not surprised at the result."

"You should have been a doctor yourself," remarked Lagrange, who said vicious things with a bewildering tranquillity of manner; "you are such a good observer thrown away."

"I wish you would say all that over again to Mrs. Grace."

• Thank you, I never talk to her if I can help it. It makes me feel as if I were looking at life through a bad window glass. Alice Westerley was right about her when she said the real chiffonnière would be nicer society. Mrs. Grace does like the pursuit of ragged facts."

“Oh, our dear Mrs. Westerley! I wish she would come home and abuse me a little. Seriously speaking, I had myself some idea that she might marry Dr. Wendell. I liked the man, on the whole, a good deal better than I like most Yankees."

"I do not share your prejudices," returned Miss Clemson. "He was charmingly intelligent. What has become of him?"

"Well, you know his health broke down, and I believe Fox found him

"And," added Miss Clemson, "it would be so nice to be able to ask people their ages."

"But they would n't ever tell you the truth," rejoined Mrs. Grace, thoughtfully.

"It is the absence of truth that makes social life possible," said Miss Clem

son.

"And women agreeable!" cried Wilmington. "What a horrible sherry!"

"Poor thing!" cried Miss Clemson. "Let us talk wine a little."

"It was like Mr. Fox," said Miss Clemson. "I shall write Alice Westerley all about it this very evening. She will be so interested."

Wilmington smiled.

"What is amusing you?" she asked. "Oh, I was thinking," he replied.

Some two months after this dinner, which has let us into a knowledge of the fates of some of our friends, Mrs.

letter:

DEAR MRS. MORTON, - I have been able to persuade my brother that it were well in the eyes of God that he permit me to write to you, and say that the death of your son Edward was owing to negligence on the part of my brother, who was in haste, for some cause unknown to me, and so gave the wrong

examine as he should have done. For reasons which I do not understand, my brother allowed the blame to rest on Arthur, and seemed to be willing to assist in concealing the truth. Now, at last, having come to look at it more wisely, he is desirous that I should tell you the truth; and hence you will see why he could not take the money which would not have come to him except for the death he caused.

Perhaps, now that some time has

gone, you will try to forgive this great wickedness, knowing that my brother is much broken in health and spirit.

When Alice Westerley saw this note, a good while after it was written, she had a great longing to be able to say some tender words to the true, simple, honest woman, who had poured out the waters of her loving life where the barren soil seemed to give back no least S. Weir Mitchell.

return.

Ir was with regret that I broke up my residence in Santiago, and prepared for a trip across the Andes to Buenos Ayres. I was sorry to say good-by to the many hospitable and kindly friends whose attentions had made my stay among them so pleasant, and yet I was on the whole quite content at departing, since I was at last to scale that immense snow-crowned mountain range that formed a permanent background to every view, and with whose stately and sublime grandeur one could never be come too familiar.

After leaving Santiago, I passed a few days upon the hacienda of Don José J. Carbajal, with his estimable family, which now includes his sister, the widow of Arturo Prat, the hero of Iquique; and at length, feeling eager to set out upon my proposed trip, I bade them adieu, and rode over to Santa Rosa de los Andes, where the road begins. Here I hastily procured provisions, a guide, mules, etc.; and being already provided with an American saddle, blankets, and revolver, I felt fully equipped for my journey.

At 6.05 A. M. I left the Hotel del Comercio with Pascual Martinez, the guide, and passed leisurely through the

On

dusty streets in the cool morning. leaving Santa Rosa, we struck the Rio Aconcagua almost immediately, and followed it through its sinuous course until ten o'clock, when we reached the Resguardo, where the Rio Colorado joins the river which gives its name to the province. The Rio Aconcagua is the redder of the two. I had brought letters to the Resguardo from friends in Santiago, and I stayed and breakfasted with him. At 11.30 I took my leave, thanking him for his attention, and, mounting my macho, rode off across the river and up the spiral path which leads easily into the Cordillera. Many of the tourists who cross the mountains by this pass come as far as the Resguardo in coaches; but soon after leaving this point the road becomes impassable for carriages.

I very soon found, to my regret, that the guide who accompanied me was as stupid as he was trustworthy, and that, although he had traveled the road for over twenty-five years, he could never give any explanation of the curious and often striking names of the different lo

1 The Resguardo is the custom house of the Cordillera. The same name is given to the officer in charge.