in the future with an untroubled conscience. He hoped, on the whole, she would refuse him ; and then, again, as he saw the brown roof which sheltered her, peeping through some willows at an angle of the stream, he was half inclined to reverse the wish, and more than half ashamed of himself for this infirmity of purpose.

Marjory seemed glad to see him, and gave him her hand without affectation or delay.

‘ I have been thinking about this marriage,’ he began.

‘ So have I,’ she answered. ‘ And I respect you more and more for a very wise man. You understood me better than I understood myself ; and I am now quite certain that things are all for the best as they are.’

‘ At the same time—,’ ventured Will.

‘ You must be tired,’ she interrupted. ‘ Take a seat and let me fetch you a glass of wine. The afternoon is so warm ; and I wish you not to be displeased with your visit. You must come quite often ; once a week, if you can spare the time ; I am always so glad to see my friends.’

‘ O, very well,’ thought Will to himself. ‘ It appears I was right after all.’ And he paid a very agreeable visit, walked home again in capital spirits, and gave himself no further concern about the matter.

For nearly three years Will and Marjory continued on these terms, seeing each other once or twice a week without any word of love between them ; and for all that time I believe Will was nearly as happy as a man can be. He rather stinted himself the pleasure of seeing her ; and he would often walk half-way over to the parsonage, and then back again, as if to whet his appetite. Indeed there was one corner of the road, whence he could see the church-spire wedged into a crevice of the valley between sloping firwoods, with a triangular snatch of plain by way of background, which he greatly affected as a place to sit and moralize in before returning homewards ; and the peasants got so much into the habit of finding him there in the twilight that they gave it the name of ‘ Will o’ the Mill’s Corner’.

At the end of the three years Marjory played him a sad trick by suddenly marrying somebody else. Will kept his countenance bravely, and merely remarked that, for as little as he knew of women, he had acted very prudently in not marrying her himself three years before. She plainly knew very little of her own mind, and, in spite of a deceptive manner, was as fickle and flighty as the rest of them. He had to congratulate himself on an escape, he said, and would take a higher opinion of his own wisdom in consequence. But at heart, he was reasonably displeased, moped a good deal for a month or two, and fell away in flesh, to the astonishment of his serving-lads.

It was perhaps a year after this marriage that Will was awakened late one night by the sound of a horse galloping on the road, followed by precipitate knocking at the inn-door. He opened his window and saw a farm servant, mounted and holding a led horse by the bridle, who told him to make what haste he could and go along with him ; for Marjory was dying, and had sent urgently to fetch him to her bedside. Will was no horseman, and made so little speed upon the way that the poor young wife was very near her end before he arrived. But they had some minutes’ talk in private, and he was present and wept very bitterly while she breathed her last.

Death

Year after year went away into nothing, with great explosions and outcries in the cities on the plain : red revolt springing up and being suppressed in blood, battle swaying hither and thither, patient astronomers in observatory towers picking out and christening new stars, plays being performed in lighted theatres, people being carried into hospital on stretchers, and all the usual turmoil and agitation of men’s lives in crowded centres. Up in Will’s valley only the winds and seasons made an epoch ; the fish hung in the swift stream, the birds circled overhead, the pine-tops rustled underneath the stars, the tall hills stood