to have lost eternally its vernal season. She knew that it was April; she dreaded when it should be June. Purpose and energy forsook her; she dared not write and tell Vallandigham that this bond was stifling her heart; she only awaited in awed suspense the month that should make her his wife. Her mother became alarmed at her looks, roused herself, and succeeded in getting her into the saddle every morning. Once accustomed to this, she learned a certain joy in the new experience; put it to all perilous tests; galloped down the slippery, mossy hills; leaped the great storm-fallen trees, and perhaps, if chance had but taken the initiative, she would not have been sorry if the leap had been into infinite space itself. One morning the servants told Eleanor that strangers had been seen lurking suspiciously about a portion of the wood known as the Great Gorge, some two miles from the house, and disregarding her mother's remonstrances, she mounted and rode away to look into the affair. It was still so early as to be little lighter than sunrise among the trees; the dew was yet showering from the heavy branches that brushed her hat; the shadows were yet black in the tempting hollows; the birds were piping drowsy tunes from half-forsaken dreams. But all the sweet freshness of the dawn, the fanning winds, the flowing streams, touched her heart as they would have touched a rock. The reins hung loosely on her horse's neck; he had chosen his own path, and had as frequently gone astray as to the purpose. Suddenly some breeze seemed to blow athwart her cheek, some whisper to touch her ear; her heart for a moment stood still, and then beat up in great bounds; she gathered the reins and dashed off between the tree-stems, over thickets, through swamps and briers; and then, with light in her eyes, smiles round her mouth, and her cheeks the color of carnation, pulled up at the verge of the Great Gorge, dismounted, and bent to look over. At the same instant another face there below aspired to look up. And there the gaze of the two continued as if they had been slowly changed to stone, and were doomed for a thousand years to such penance, she to gaze down into the tempting blackness, he to gaze up into the impossible light. There were others below, yet she saw no one; then there came blankness, and before she recovered herself he was beside her. Then she remembered. "You stood there," said he, "the woman's form beside this black horse's head, like some wild conjunction of demonology, if ever such were half so fair. And, indeed," he added, more quickly, "they needs must, to be one half so enticing!" Truly, as she stood there, backed by the forest and an edge of sky, alone, and clearly outlined, the hat blown partly off, the curls massed on the ivory throat, the flush going and coming in wave after wave, nothing was ever lovelier. But as he finished the old pride rose and commanded her. "I am not here for posturing," said she, "but to inquire your business below." Her manner was too haughty to be borne. She had assumed it for safety from herself. She did not dare trust her lips with any such sentence as she might have addressed a friend. Her very pride betrayed itself. Such coldness was never indifference. Meantime he would reply, as she should have questioned, in a quiet, unruffled way. My business, of which I am happy to inform you, because you will approve it, is to lay the Breakneck Railroad, and to run it through these beautiful woods." "Approve of it? Run a railroad through my beautiful woods?" "Exactly." "I can not understand you. This estate is Captain Vallandigham's, although we have a life-interest—” "Yes. And he has been requested to state the value—” "He never will." "It makes no difference. It will still be taken, and the price be arranged for him." "Is it inevitable? You speak as if you were Fate." "A railroad company is Fate." "But to have traffic, and dust, and noise, and speed-roaring wheels, and yelling whistles, and such strange eyes, come dashing through our dear old wood. Oh, it is wretched! I had rather leave it! I hate railways! We will go live in some dusty little city alley first!" "Pray do not regard me with such displeasure. I am but the instrument. It was unavoidable to cross the wood, and I have even made a curve in order to occasion as little change as possible and to bring the track into the gorge." "Oh, but it is ruin!" It "Is it so? To me here is a new charm. is better than all the sun-dials that ever were set up; that far, far scream, like an eagle's on the wing, never fails the hour; it is a perpetual excitement. It flashes the city through your forest, it brings in the savor of the sea and the spice of foreign climates; the mountains send down their messages by it, the tall prairie timber shoots through it; it is an artery up and down which ever pours the great current of human life. It will bind you to all the wide world outside, when at the dead of night the ground throbs in distant tremor, and you hear the panting creature trail its thunderous music far off and low on the edge of the horizon. You will watch it, too, by irresistible attraction. I never see a great engine crashing along in its plates of shining iron and its fiery, invincible strength without having my heart beat with a wild propulsion inside me, and feeling a daring wish to attempt impossible things!" Eleanor forgot the attitude she had previously taken, while her fancy warmed in listening. Her eye wandered over the gap, bathed, in its deeper distance, with thin rising and rolling mists, that were every where pierced and scattered by the warm sunbeams. "And what becomes then of all my tangle | down there?" she said. "The columbines and harebells and rues in the rock, the tall ferns and golden brakes and asters that plumed the edge, the great rosy clouds of laurel half down the side? The cardinals and gentians grew deep there by the brook. And now comes smoke to trail round and kill them out!" "No, they will blossom just the same the year round. Why are you not thankful that so many a dusty heart will be gladdened at its flying glimpse of such cool airy loveliness blowing forever to itself whether they come or whether they go?" "I have enough to do to take care of my own heart!" she exclaimed, without a thought, and then ready to wring her hands at her words. "Eleanor," he said, stepping nearer, "if it were at right angles with my course, I would yet bring my work here, for it is where you are!" She caught the bridle and led her horse off through the trees. He called to know if he might come and see her, but she did not turn her face or answer him a word; he only saw the slender figure walking on with drooping head and nerveless hand deep and deeper into the wood until the jealous spring hid her from his view. All the evening Eleanor remained within; her mother fell off in little naps, and Eleanor withdrew herself into the furthest arch of the long room, without book or candle, dreaming, and unwittingly listening. She started at length upon the striking of the clock, and becoming irate to find with what a flush expectation and waiting and disappointment had dyed her cheek, woke her mother and went up stairs. To her room, but not to her sleep; sitting, instead, into the starlit midnight, and looking out across the lawn to its dark screen of silent boughs, where, ever and anon, she dreamed she saw one shadow come and go. When Etienne did appear it was a warmer evening, and they sat on the veranda. Mrs. Leighton welcomed him with a surprised warmth that taught him Eleanor's silence concerning their meeting; the good lady was delighted to see again one who had the bearing that recalled her younger days, for the village people scarcely filled her fastidious fancy; she was gratified, moreover, at the opportunity of spreading her patronage, not often exercised; and she begged him to repeat his visit. It was not Eleanor's virtue that she added no words to the request; her eyes spoke for her. So again and again he came, every evening, every day, sometimes in the morning, or appearing with the sunset, joined them at the simple tea-table now so often spread under the open sky. "I thought I had heard that by this time you were to have been married, Mr. Des Vignes," said Mrs. Leighton, simply, on the first evening. "My engagement was broken, Madame," he replied, "many months ago." "That is unfortunate!" a favorite pastime that I should be sorry in failing to afford it to any one." "A young man is so much happier with a home that he makes himself, I have always believed." "He is indeed," then said Etienne, gloomily. "We have a wedding ourselves, you know, in June," she added, in a significant aside, with a glance at Eleanor. "A thing to which I have always looked forward. Captain Vallandigham is too dear to me to sustain any other relation than that of a son." And the good lady erected herself, bridling, and stroking her cap-ribbons. Etienne looked at the daughter, and delayed with his bold glance the crimson that was sweeping her brow, and fixed the look of tormented disgust in her eyes till it melted to something fairer while the falling lashes strung themselves with tears. He needed nothing more to banish sadness and satire and let the old sunshine and sweetness of his nature have sovereign sway again. It was always with this potent wand that he proved himself a wizard, and certainly one more consummate never wove his spells round a woman's heart. Gradually again Eleanor's reserve faded before it; the sense of approaching summer stole into her soul; she suffered herself to bask in these rays, and never lifted a startled thought to question the future. Then the house became filled with needle-work and women; June was drawing near. Letters from Vallandigham came oftener: she piled them on her dressing-table with unbroken seals. As one day she crossed the wood with another in her hand, and the gloom from it overshadowing her face, Etienne met her, turned, and walked with her. "Pardon me," said he, "but I see, I can not fail to see, that you are most miserable in your engagement." "How do you dare—” she began, with an old gleam. "Not to me. Not so to me!" he said; then withdrew his gaze and kept it on the ground, until at length and abruptly, "why do you not break it?" he asked. "That way honor lies!" she exclaimed, savagely. "Honor lies in an empty gift? Honor lies in the truth. You change.' "Do you remember when once we spoke of singleness of heart?" Eleanor asked, turning hastily, lest she should repent and keep silent. "Do I not!" "Very well, then. It is through that that this Vallandigham holds his power over me. When I gave him my promise I felt the same as now; there is no reason why I should retract it. There is something colossal about him that dwarfs me and takes away my will. He is so noble that I can not be ignoble. Moreover, why should I break his heart?" "You prefer to break mine and your own." "Never speak to me such words again!" and at her haughty motion he bowed and passed on in another path. But Eleanor might have He laughed bitterly at herself as she thought what Eleanor's fingers pinched the little shell with which they played to powder. She gasped for strength only to let him go. Mrs. Leighton, with a word of regret-because she had that kind of mind not capable of double action, and just now she was busy with bustle and pleasure-adjusted her glass for another look at the letter. Etienne remained half lying back in the corner of the sofa-his face fixed, his eyes bent upon the fire-screen-remained so a long time. Suddenly and unexpectedly he raised those eyes, and they rested on Eleanor's. He rose and reached her; bent, and his words fell like waterdrops in a parched night. "What is the use of all this? Do you dare meet him? If you wait he will overpower you again. You will marry him with a lie- Your vows are slippery withes!" She His hand was on her shoulder; his eyes, his breath upon her. She did not look up. saw nothing, but felt the sand slipping under her feet. He stooped lower; the dark, dropping hair brushed her brow. "You love me!" he said. me!" IV. A MAN. "Then fly with The village bells were ringing nine away on the dark edge of the wood that night; and with a tread that in its attempt at noiselessness could by no means be disguised, the martial stride and bearing, a form, made greater and stronger by shadow, was drawing near the house. Vallandigham had written that he should arrive in the morning; and then had come the wish to take his little Elle at unawares-and here he was. On the veranda he stooped to look in, but the drawing-room was dark. Mrs. Leighton had probably retired, that she might rise betimes on the morrow. So much the better. He would see his little Elle alone. A rough vine-wreathed pillar shielded him; he leaned upon it, because his heart beat so plungingly against his side, the blood burned so in his sun-tanned cheek, his breath so choked his voice, the tears were so ready to spin forth in gladness, that he did not want to go in till self-command resumed its rule. The door opened gently, and some one closed it after them, then stole across the veranda and descended the flight of stone steps. On the last one she hesitated; swayed to and fro in a pained indecision; looked back at the dark door and casements an instant. Then the slender figure erected itself, the foot fell firmly, she looked back no more, but went down and on, and disappeared beneath the hemlock shadows. Something leaped through the mind of Val- whispered secret. But to all that could be seen landigham! He knew, as if he had read it writ- he was insensible; his whole soul was centred ten on heaven, that departing she was to return in listening. Still he waited upon Elle, with no more. It had been noon with him-full, ra- the big dogs beside him. The sky became great diant noon-noon that hastily fell, quenched in and hollow at last; damp cold winds breathed night; but even in that night it seemed that his up and down the place; gray dawn was upon vision was supernaturally clear. He had that him, with no splendor of sunrise, but ushering perfect faith in Elle that, though he might have in the rains; the birds stirred and sent about been unaware of it, his whole scheme of life di- the news of dew, broke into brief chorus, shivverged from the central point of belief that she ered back to their nests again. All the noises was incapable of a baseness. There was only of day asserted themselves in the woods, and one fierce breath, during which the world seemed drowned the phantom sound for which he hearkrushing into chaos, and he doubted her. In that ened. He drew up his weary limbs, and rose as breath he recalled among the shadows a darker an old man rises, stiffened and sore, with the shadow lurking as he entered; recalled the horses weight of years that had been compressed into that he had seen waiting on the edge of the wood; that single night. The dogs rose too, shook off recalled and remembered now that the impatient the dew in showers, and went bounding away, step which crushed the crackling brush was Eti- frolicking and rolling, into the wood. Vallandienne des Vignes! But what of that? What gham betook himself to another portion of the though she had taken the very path that would house where he knew of an old entrance, found lead her to his arms? His conviction remained it, made free with it, and was within. Then the same: Elle, his pure, proud Elle, was in no striding to the door through which Eleanor had danger from herself or another. And yet, so passed he slid the bolts, upper and lower, instartlingly, stunningly rent from hope with pangs serted the chain, turned the key, and put it in that pierced his soul as he was, if it had been to his pocket: that door should never again be Etienne that she went, he himself would have opened till Elle came to recross its threshold or taken her, have given her-this great, strong he himself went to be carried out feet first. For Vallandigham. He stood looking after her; he now Vallandigham knew that he should never seemed yet to see her, sliding through the star- die in the din, and rush, and mad heart-boundlit glades, stepping along the swampy mosses, ings of battle. His determination was taken; lifting the wide low boughs that guarded the he should resign his commission, and leave the deep-rutted ways. Elle had gone-his bride, place no more. his wife-and left him desolation. But to do, and yearly he funded the profits which she rendered him therefrom to the account of Eleanor. But of this no one knew; nor did Eleanor ever suppose herself to be mistress of a portion which her father's fortunes, if unruffled, could hardly have awarded. Now Vallandigham would take the burden and care on himself; and this woman, whom he had so long regarded as a mother, would still need to lean on him, for he was all she had left. Many years ago, when the father of Elle had The noises of the woodside, the crash of a fall-needed money for some transaction, he had aring branch, the sliping of a snake, the bird who ranged a transfer of the great farm to his ward, nestled and chirped, each one became a terror and taken instead the ready funds of the other. of the night-for now he remembered the strag- His transaction failed; and he at the same time glers from the railway who might be haunting | dying, left his wife and child little except the the by-paths, the great browsing cattle who wan- devotion of Vallandigham. The young man dered under the shadow, those fierce gigantic chose then his profession, left Mrs. Leighton to dogs of his, turned loose at bedtime, and know- | manage the estate for him, as she was well able ing no odds 'twixt friend and foe. He started at thought of the fears that might beset the lonely girl, and stepped forward to follow her. she had chosen to go alone-she had desired no shield, she had withdrawn from any watchful eye. His heart yearned too much that way to let it lead him into dishonor. If trouble befell her he should hear her voice, and there he would await it. He came back with a heavy, dragging step, and seated himself upon the stones that were thickly gathering dew. On the sound the big dogs came tearing round the corner of the house; but at an old gesture, so well recalled, they cowered, then sprang caressingly to reach his shoulders, fawning upon him, and at length crouching on either hand like guardant lions. So he sat listening, waiting, with no thought of his own desertion other than a blind, blackened sense of woe behind; with fears, and wishes, and hopes for her alone. The hours went on, he heard them tolled by the old house-clock within there. Lyra flung out her banner of blue flame above him, and slipped away; the constellations shifted silently over the darkness that seemed so full of weight and sorrow and some hushed, un There began to be a stir in the house. The crowing cocks had waked the maids. Mrs. Leighton had overslept herself in the cloudy morning; but rising and drawing aside her curtain, and lamenting that they had such a sorry day for the wedding, went to rouse Eleanor. Vallandigham never left the room that he paced to and fro. Commotion then disturbed all the region-doors slammed, agitated voices crossed each other-there were cries, and mandates, and loud, confused rumor. Some servant seemed to have snatched from one of the dogs, as they came pitchpolling toward the house, a little silk handkerchief; it was the one that Eleanor so often tied round her throat when she went out. There came no subsidence then in the tumult, and af- till he was like one who has passed the night with horrid phantasms; he remembered how all his love had been allowed to sweep on in its great current and dash headlong against a rock; he thought with fierce self-pity of the heart so ruthlessly shattered; looking into his soul he tried to measure that depth to which the iron had entered. He grew stern and merciless. Eleanor had gone-gone and left him not a In the afternoon there came a letter mailed in word, not a sign; he was the last, the least, in the village, brief, and to the point: "DEAR MOTHER,-I can trust you with Vallandigham, and so I shall not fret." "Dear! dear!" exclaimed the mother, "as if she'd any right to fret! I should think I was the one!" And here her woes again overcame her. "Oh, poor child!" she cried. "What has she done? Where can she be? Oh, I am going distracted!" But being composed with valerian, and having a handkerchief drenched in ether, she finally resumed the letter. "As for me, I can not stay. I am gone to take care of myself. If any thing happens to you I shall know it and return." "How's she going to know it? And how can she take care of herself? Can't stay? Run away? Oh-she's a living disgrace. Eleanor!" Here, however, she remembered there were other lines of the letter. "Be at rest about me; the very spirit that sends me away is proof armor against the world. Be sure, dear mother, that my affection for you remains forever the same. E." “Oh!” groaned Mrs. Leighton, at the general exclaim as she concluded, and the reiterations that she'd brought it all upon herself-she shouldn't have expected any thing different after the willful way in which she'd let that headstrong girl grow up; they were sure it didn't surprise them. "Oh, if every one knew what it was to be a mother, there'd never be another child born into the world!" For she had a way, not uncommon, be it known, of viewing a child as if the mother alone had any part or parcel in it. her thought; he too would forget-he swore he And here Vallandigham took up his life. There was much to fill this life, and yet how hollow it seemed! The cares of the vast farm, the wants of some distant tenants, the household affairs, the daily papers; he had but little time for more than these; yet it did not seem to him like duty done, steps taken on the solid earth; it was just a bridge, and a broken bridge at that, across which he trod what distance there might be between the days of his youth and the hour of his death. And in the evenings, the long dull evenings when the chess-table had been pushed aside and he took up his book, the book fell in an oblivious hand, and he heard Mrs. Leighton talk on as if in a dream, while he contemplated never what might have been, what yet might be, but only what was. Then he dragged himself from the chair and went out into the night, to pace with that long stolid stride the walks in the grass under the clear summer stars, till stung by the recollection that here she had wandered with Etienne (for he had heard all that her mother knew, perforce, and whether he would or no), he tore his feet from the spot and went in again. Vallandigham was in the depth of his misery when some one brought him word concerning a sick man in the village. What were sick men to him? and why should he go? he was sick himself, sick at heart and ill at ease; but go he did, and go again, every day he went, staid all day long, and sometimes throughout the fiercefevered nights. But at this point Vallandigham came to her side, banished the others by his mere presence, soothed her and stilled her, and through the perpetual care which thenceforth he extended over her, at length gladdened her heart as Elea- Did the sick man think some demon haunted nor had never been able to do. But for that it him, some Nemesis had fallen upon him? In took weeks, and months, almost years; to quiet those wild ravings that told Vallandigham all, her just now needed only hours; the forlorn little did he-with that face bending above him-acwoman, as he carried her up and down in his cuse Fate of baring her sword, Heaven with arms, remembered how the strong loving arms stooping to crush him? And when he woke, of her husband had done the same when she was fainting it seemed into death, did he dream that young, and fair, and tender, and sighed away to his adversary sat there already waiting to judge sleep with the gentle motion. Then he laid her him. If it had been so, indeed, lenient judg in the pillows and sat beside her. Night fell ment would he have received; for this dark, paagain as he sat, and Vallandigham kept his sec- tient man with the sympathizing eye and the ond watch. It was not of Eleanor now that he tender mouth was not the same as he who enthought-not of pity, not of love. He thought tered-this soldier who had learned how to be a of the forsaken mother slumbering so heavily woman. Vallandigham had found that he was there; but then he forgave that. He thought not the only one who suffered, the only one who of himself; and this he could not forgive. He loved. It had never entered his mind how thought of himself: through the livelong hours much pain and more these others had had to enimages of his misery crowded down upon him, | dure. Full of sorrow and utter compassion for |