that time, which had so beautified him, would
have done the same for Winifred. It would
be a matured, ennobled, glorified woman
that he should meet, but still the same that
he had left; it would be the nymph become
the goddess. And thinking, hoping, believing
this, it was with all the fervour of his old
affection that he knocked at the door of the
cottage where they told him Miss James lived.

A beautiful girl came hurriedly and rather
noisily into the room, almost as soon as he
had entered. She did not know of his visit,
and a deep blush broke over her brilliant
face. Louis forgot all about baby Mary, and
never remembered the possibility of this glorious
creature being the butterfly from that
cradled chrysalis; he only said to himself,
that dear Winifred had just as much sweetness
as ever, and as little vanity, else she
never would have dared the presence of such
a beautiful girl as this. He asked for her,
however, smiling; and Mary went out of the
room to call her, glad enough to get away.

Winifred came down almost immediately,
bringing Mary with her. When she saw
Louis, she stood for a moment—stupified,
as if she had seen a ghost from the
grave before her; then uttering a low cry,
she staggered, turned deadly pale, and holding
out her withered hands toward him,
cried, "Louis! Louis!" and "My love!"
and then fell fainting to the ground.

In her fainting the last chance of illusion
vanished. O! why had he come? Why had
he not been content to live on the pleasant
romance of memory and faith?

Winifred's faintness soon passed; and with
it her weakness. When she recovered, she
held out her hand, smiling; saying in a firm
tone, "It was such a surprise to see you,
Louis, that I was overcome." And then, she
began to talk of former days with as calm a
countenance as if they had parted but last
week, and had never met in love. She thus
put them both into a true position, which
they had nearly lost; and left the future
unembarrassed by any fetters of the past.
Louis could not but love the woman's
delicacy and tact; and saying to himself; "I
shall soon get accustomed to the loss of her
beauty," believed that he would love her as
of old, and that all would go smoothly and
happily for them both. He was glad now,
that he had come. After all, what did a little
prettiness signify? Winifred was just as
good as, perhaps even better than, she used to
be; and what did it matter if she were less
beautiful? Louis was philosophical—as men
are when they deceive themselves.

He remained in Devonshire for nearly a
month, and at the end of that time began to
grow perplexed and confused in his mind. In
the first days he had made Winifred understand
that he loved her still; he had told
her why he had come to Devonshire; he had
spoken much of the softening and beautiful
influence that her memory had been to him
all his life, and of how he had hoped and
trusted in the future; he had called back all
her former love to him, and had awakened her
sleeping hopes; he had poured fresh life into
her heart, he had given her back her youth.
He had spoken of her to herself as a being to
be worshipped for goodness, and in speaking
thus, had pressed a kiss on her withered
cheek; and, when he had done all this, and
had compromised his honour as well as his
compassion, he found out that she was old and
faded; that she was a mother, not a wife;
that, considering her age, love-passages
between them were ridiculous. If she had
been Mary, now——!

Mary was much struck with Louis Blake.
His grand kind of bearing, his position,
the dazzling qualities of his mind, all filled
her with admiration, so intense that it
was almost worship. But worship tinged
with awe. And, thus—she changed too.
Her frank and childish manners became
fitful and reserved; her causeless tears, her
wild excitement, her passionate manner to
Winifred, embracing her often and eagerly,
as she used when as a child she wanted her
forgiveness for an unconfessed, but silently
recognised fault; her bashfulness when Louis
spoke to her; her restless wretchedness
when he passed her in silence; her eager
watching for his eye and smile, and her
blushes when she was rewarded; all gave
the key to Winifred, so far as she was
concerned; though as yet she did not know
that this key opened another heart as well.
But, she began to feel a change, gradual, and
perceptible, and sure, in Louis. He grew
cold in his manner to her, and sometimes
irritable; he avoided her when she was
alone, and he spoke no more of the past;
he was constrained, he was harsh—he no
longer loved her, and this was what he was
teaching her. His manner to Mary was as
fitful as her own. Now tender and fatherly,
now hard and cruel; sometimes so absorbed
in watching her, or talking with her, that
he forgot all the world beside, and sometimes
seeming to forget her, and her very
existence in the room. Winifred saw it all.
She was the first to give the true name to
this perplexity, and factitious attempts to
reconcile impossible feelings; and when once
enlightened she accepted her position with
dignity and grandeur. There was no middle
way. Louis no longer even fancied that he
loved her, and she could not hold him to
the promise made when under the illusion
of that fancy. She must again judge
between duty and self, and again ascend to
the altar of sacrifice. He loved her child;
and Mary—and Winifred wept as she said it
low in her own chamber, kneeling by her bed,
half-sobbing and half-praying—Mary loved
him. Yes, the child she had cared for as her
own, and for whom she would have given
her life, now demanded more than her life.
And she should have it.