a fortnight, however, the stress of work would be over, and then he meant to leave. During that fortnight he was strangely troubled. He did not leave the camp, but his mind was busied with thoughts of Easter-nothing but Easter.

Time and again he had reviewed their acquaintance minutely from the beginning, but he could find no cause for her strange behavior. When the work was done, he found himself still lingering, and climbing the mountain once more. He meant to solve the mystery if possible. He would tell Easter that he was going home. Surely, then, she would betray some feeling.

At the old fence which he had climbed so often he stopped, as was his custom, to rest a moment, with his eyes upon the wild beauty before him—the great valley, with mists floating from its gloomy depths into the tremulous moonlight; and far through the radiant space the still, dark masses of the Cumberland lifting themselves in majesty against the east; and in the shadow of the great cliff the vague out lines of the old cabin, as still as the awful silence around it. A light was visible, but he could hear no voices. Still, he knew he would find the Occupants seated in the porch, held by that strange quiet which nature imposes on those who dwell much alone with her. He had not been to the cabin for several weeks, and when he spoke, Easter did not return his greeting; Raines nodded almost surlily, but from the mother came as always a cordial welcome.

"I'm mighty glad ter see ye," she said; "ye hev n't been up fer a long time."

"No," answered Clayton; "I have been very busy-getting ready to go home." He had watched Easter closely as he spoke, but the girl did not lift her face, and she betrayed no emotion, not even surprise; nor did Raines. Only the mother showed genuine regret. The girl's apathy filled him with bitter disappointment. She had relapsed into barbarism again. He was a fool to think that in a few months he could counteract influences that had been molding her character for a lifetime. His purpose had been unselfish. Curiosity, the girl's beauty, his increasing power over her, had stimulated him, to be sure, but he had been conscientious and earnest. Somehow he was more than disappointed; he was hurt deeply, not only that he should have been so misunderstood, but for the lack of gratitude in the girl. He was bewildered. What could have happened? Could Raines have really poisoned her mind against him? And indignation shot through Clayton that Easter could believe so easily what might have been said against him, and not allow him a hearing.

for several weeks," he found himself saying a moment later; "I think I shall go to-morrow." He hardly meant what he said; a momentary pique had forced the words from him, but, once spoken, he determined to abide by them. Easter was stirred from her lethargy at last, but Clayton's attention was drawn to Raines's start of surprise, and he did not see the girl's face strangely agitated for an instant, nor her hands nervously trembling in her lap. The mother had made an ejaculation of astonishment.

"Ter-morrer!" she said. "Why, ye almost take my breath away. I declar', I'm downright sorry ye air goin', I hev tuk sech a shine ter ye. I kind o' think I'll miss ye more 'n Easter."

Raines's eyes turned to the girl, as did Clayton's. Not a suggestion of color disturbed the pallor of the girl's face, once more composed, and she said nothing.

"Ye air so jolly 'n' lively," continued the mother, "'n' ye allus hev so much ter say. Ye air not like Easter 'n' Sherd hyar, who talk 'bout as much ez two stumps. I suppose I'll hev ter sit up hyar 'n' talk ter the moon when ye air gone."

The mountaineer rose abruptly, and, though he spoke quietly, he controlled himself with difficulty.

"Ez my company seems ter be unwelcome ter ye," he said, “I kin take it away from ye, 'n' I will."

Before the old woman could recover herself, he was gone.

"Well," she ejaculated, "whut kin be the matter with Sherd? He hev got mighty cur'us hyar of late, 'n' so hev Easter. All o' ye hev been a-settin' up hyar ez ef ye was at a buryin'. I'm a-goin' ter bed. Ye 'n' Easter kin set up ez long ez ye please. I suppose ye air comin' back ag'in ter see us," she said, turning to Clayton.

"I don't know," he answered. " I may not; but if I don't, I won't forget you."

"Well, I wish ye good luck." Clayton shook hands with her, and she went within doors. Easter had risen, too, with her mother, and was standing in the shadow.

"Good-by," said Clayton, holding out his hand to Easter.

As she turned he caught one glimpse of her face in the moonlight as she dropped it over her bosom, and its whiteness startled him. Her hand was cold when he took it, and her voice was scarcely audible as she faintly repeated his words. She lifted her face as their hands were unclasped, and her lips quivered mutely as if trying to speak; but he had turned to go. For a moment she watched his darkening figure, and then with stifled breath almost staggered

THE road wound around the cliff and back again, and as Clayton picked his way along it he was oppressed by a strange uneasiness. Easter's face, as he last saw it, lay in his mind like a keen reproach. Could he have been mistaken? Had he been too hasty? He recalled the events of the evening. He began to see that it was strange that Raines had shown no surprise when he spoke of going home, and yet had seemed almost startled by the suddenness of his departure. Perhaps the mountaineer knew he was going. It was known at the camp. If he knew, then Easter must have known. Perhaps she had felt hurt because he had not spoken to her earlier. What might Raines not have told her, and honestly, too? Or the mountaineer might have made a shrewd use of his departure. Perhaps he was unconsciously confirming all that Raines might have said. He ought to have spoken to her. Perhaps she could not speak to him. He wheeled suddenly in the path to return to the cabin, and then paused in indecision. It was late; he would wait one day longer.

As he resumed the descent, a noise of something hurrying down through the undergrowth of the cliff-side which towered darkly behind him, startled him, and he stopped in wonder and fear. Nearer, nearer the bushes crackled as though some hunted animal were flying for life through them, and then through the thick hedge there burst the figure of a woman who sank to the ground in the path before him. The flash of yellow hair and a white face in the moonlight told him who it was.

"Easter, Easter!" he exclaimed, in sickening fear. "My God! is that you? Why, what is the matter, child? What are you doing here?" He stooped above the sobbing girl, and pulled away her hands from her face, tearstained and broken with pain. The limit of her self-repression was reached at last; the tense nerves, strained too much, had broken; and the passion, so long checked, surged through her like fire. O God! what had he done? He saw the truth at last. In a sudden impulse of tenderness he lifted the girl to her feet and held her, sobbing uncontrollably, in his arms, with her head resting against his breast, pressing his cheek to her hair and soothing her as though she had been a child.

Presently she felt a kiss on her forehead, and, as she looked up with a sudden fierce joy in her eyes, their lips met.

VIII.

CLAYTON shunned all self-questioning after that night. His deepest emotions stirred by that close embrace on the mountain-side, he gave himself wholly up to the love or infatuation

great love, the struggle she had against its disclosure, the appeal for tenderness and protection in her final defeat. It was ideal, he told himself, as he sank into the delicious dream; they two alone with nature, above all human life, with its restraints, its hardships, its evils, its distress. For them was the freedom of the open sky lifting its dome above the mountains; for them nothing less kindly than the sun shining its benediction; for their eyes only the changing beauties of day and night; for their ears no sound harsher than the dripping of dew or a bird-song; for them youth, health, beauty, love. And it was primeval love, the love of the first woman for the first man. She knew no convention, no prudery, no doubt. Her life was impulse, and her impulse was love. She was the teacher now, and he the taught; and he stood in wonder and awe when the plant he had tended flowered into such beauty in a single night. Ah, the happy, happy days that followed! The veil that had for a long time been unfolding itself between him and his previous life seemed to have almost fallen, and they were left alone to their happiness. The mother kept her own counsel. Raínes had disappeared as though Death had claimed him. And the dream lasted till a summons home broke

IX.

THE SUMMONS was from his father, and was emphatic; and Clayton did not delay. The girl accepted his departure with a pale face, but with a quiet submission that touched him. Of Raines he had seen nothing and heard nothing since the night he had left the cabin in anger; but as he came down the mountain after bidding Easter good-by, he was startled by the mountaineer stepping from the bushes into the path.

"Ye air a-goin' home, I hear," he said quietly.

"Yes," answered Clayton; "at midnight." "Well, I'll walk down with ye a piece, ef ye don't mind. Hit's not out o' my way."

As he spoke his face was turned suddenly to the moonlight. The lines in it had sunk deeper, giving it almost an aged look; and the eyes were hollow as from physical suffering or from fasting. He preceded Clayton down the path, with head bent in thought, and saying nothing till they reached the spur of the mountain. Then in the same voice:

"I want ter talk ter ye awhile, 'n' I'd like ter hev ye step inter my house. I don't mean ye no harm," he added quickly, "'n' hit ain't fur."

"Certainly," said Clayton.

The mountaineer turned into the woods by a narrow path, and soon the outlines of a miserable little hut were visible through the dark woods. Raines thrust the door open. The single room was dark except for a few dull coals in a gloomy cavern which formed the fireplace. "Sit down, ef ye kin find a cheer," said Raines, "'n' I'll fix up the fire."

"Do you live here alone?" asked Clayton, as he heard the keen, smooth sound of the mountaineer's knife going through wood.

"Yes," he answered; "fer five years." The coals brightened; tiny flames shot from them, and in a moment the blaze caught the dry fagots, and shadows danced over floor, wall, and ceiling, and vanished as the mountaineer rose from his knees. The room was as bare as the cell of a monk. A rough bed stood in one corner; a few utensils hung near the fireplace, wherein were remnants of potatoes roasting in the ashes, and close to the wooden shutter which served as a window was a rough table. On it lay a large book,- -a Bible,—a pen, a bottle of ink, and a piece of paper on which were letters traced with great care and difficulty. The mountaineer did not sit down, but began pacing the floor behind Clayton. Clayton moved his chair, and Raines seemed unconVOL. XLIV.- III-112.

"Ye hev n't seed me up on the mount'in lately, hev ye?" he asked. "I reckon ye hev n't missed me much. Do ye know whut I hev been doin'?" he asked with sudden vehemence, stopping still and resting his eyes, which glowed like an animal's from the darkened end of the cabin, on Clayton.

"I hev been tryin' ter keep from killin' ye. Oh, don't move-don't fear now; ye air as safe ez ef ye were down in ther camp. I seed ye that night on ther mount'in," he continued, again pacing rapidly backward and forth. "I was waitin' fer ye. I meant ter tell ye jest whut I'm goin' ter tell ye ter-night; 'n' when Easter come a-tearin' through ther bushes, 'n' I seed ye-ye-a-standin' together,”—the words seemed to stop in his throat,-"I knowed I was too late.

"I set thar fer a minute like a rock, 'n' when ye two went back up ther mount'in, before I knowed it I was hyar in ther house thar at the fire moldin' a bullet ter kill ye with ez ye come back. All to oncet I heerd a voice ez plain ez my own is et this minute say:

666

Air ye a-thinkin' 'bout takin' ther life of a fellow-creetur, Sherd Raines―ye thet air tryin' ter be a servant o' ther Lord ?'

"But I kept on a-moldin', 'n' suddenly I seed ye a-lyin' in the road dead, 'n' ther heavens opened, 'n' ther face o' ther Lord appeared, 'n' he raised his hand ter smite me with ther brand o' Cain-'n' look thar!"

Clayton had sat spellbound by the terrible earnestness of the man, and as the mountaineer swept his dark hair back with one hand, he rose in sudden horror. Across the mountaineer's forehead ran a crimson scar yet unhealed. Could he have inflicted upon himself this fearful penance?

"Oh, it was only ther molds. I seed it all so plain thet I throwed up my hands, fergittin' ther molds, 'n' ther hot lead struck me thar; but," he continued solemnly, "I knowed ther Lord hed tuk thet way o' punishin' me fer ther sin o' havin' murder in my mind, 'n' I fell on my knees a-prayin' fer fergiveness; 'n' since thet night I hev stayed away from ye till ther Lord give me power ter stand ag'in' ther temptation of harmin' ye. He hev showed me anuther way, 'n' now I hev come ter ye ez he has directed me. I hev n't tol' ye this fer nuthin'. Ye kin see now whut I think o' Easter, ef I war tempted to take the life o' ther man who tuk her love from me, 'n' I think ye will say I hev ther right ter ask ye whut I 'm a-goin' ter. I hev known ther gal all my life. We was children together, and thar hain't no use hidin' thet I hev never keered fer anuther woman. She used ter be mighty

a slow realization of all he had lost; taunting him with the possibility of regaining it and the certainty of losing it forever.

As he had stepped from the dock at Jersey City, the fresh sea wind had thrilled him like a memory, and his pulses leaped instantly into sympathy with the tense life that vibrated in the air. He seemed never to have been away so long, and never had home seemed so pleasant. His sister had grown more beautiful; his mother's quiet, noble face was smoother and fairer than it had been for years; and despite the absence of his father, who had been hastily summoned to England, there was an air of cheerfulness in the house that was in marked contrast to its gloom when Clayton was last at home. He had been quickened at once into a new appreciation of the luxury and refinement about him, and he soon began to wonder how he had ever inured himself to the discomforts and crudities of his mountain life. Old habits easily resumed sway over him. At the club friends and acquaintances were so unfeignedly glad to see him that he began to suspect that his own inner gloom had darkened their faces after his father's misfortune. Day after day found him in his favorite corner at the club, watching the passing pageant and listening almost eagerly to the conversational froth of the town-the gossip of club, theater, and society. His ascetic life in the mountains gave to every pleasure the taste of inexperience. His early youth seemed renewed, so keen and fresh were his emotions. He felt, too, that he was recovering a lost identity, and still the new one that had grown around him would not loosen its claim. He had told his family nothing of Easter,-why, he could scarcely have said, and the difficulty of telling increased each day. His secret began to weigh heavily upon him; and though he determined to unburden himself on his father's return, he was troubled with a vague sense of deception. When he went to receptions with his sister, this sense of a double identity was strangely felt amid the lights, the music, the flowers, the flash of eyes and white necks and arms, the low voices, the polite, clear-cut utterances of welcome and compliment.

Several times he had met a face for which he had once had a boyish infatuation. Its image had never been supplanted during his student career, but he had turned from it as from a star when he came home and found that his life was to be built with his own hands. Now the girl had grown to gracious womanhood, and when he saw her he could scarcely repress a thrill of joy that she had once favored him above all others. One night a desire had assailed him to learn upon what footing he then stood. He had yielded, and she gave him a kindly wel

come. They had drifted to reminiscences, and that night Clayton went home with a troubled heart; angry that he should be so easily disturbed, surprised that the days were passing so swiftly, and pained that they were filled less and less with thoughts of Easter. With a pang of remorse and fear, he determined to go back to the mountains as soon as his father came home. He knew the effect of habit. He would forget these pleasures felt so keenly now, as he had once forgotten them, and he would leave before their hold upon him was secure.

Knowing the danger that beset him, he had avoided it all he could. He even stopped his daily visits to the club, and spent most of his time at home with his mother and sister. Once only, to his bitter regret, was he induced to go out. Wagner's tidal wave had reached New York, and it was the opening night of the season; and the opera was one that he had learned to love in Germany. The very brilliancy of the scene threw him into gloom, so aloof did he feel from it all-the great theater aflame with lights, the circling tiers of faces, the pit with its hundred musicians, their eyes on the leader, who stood above them with baton upraised and German face already aglow.

In his student days he had loved music, but he had little more than trifled with it; now, strangely enough, his love, even his understanding, seemed to have grown; and when the violins thrilled all the vast space into life, he was shaken as with a passion newly born. All the evening he sat riveted. A rush of memories came upon him- memories of his student life with its dreams and ideals of culture and scholarship, which rose from his past again like phantoms. In the elevation of the moment the trivial pleasures that had been tempting him suddenly became mean and unworthy. With a pang of regret he saw himself as he might have been, as he yet might be.

A few days later his father came home, and his distress of mind was complete. Clayton need stay in the mountains but little longer, he said; he was fast making up his losses, and he had hoped after his trip to England to have Clayton at once in New York; but now he had best wait perhaps another year. Then had come a struggle that racked heart and brain. All he had ever had was before him again. Could it be his duty to shut himself from this life,—his natural heritage,-to stifle the highest demands of his nature? Was he seriously in love with that mountain girl? Had he indeed ever been sure of himself? If, then, he did not love her beyond all question, would he not wrong himself, wrong her, by marrying her? Ah, but might he not wrong her, wrong himself-even more? He was bound to her by every tie that his sensitive honor recog