remark it, for nobody knows anything. Besides, what matter? I am dying. Come if you can, within a week or so; they tell me I may last thus long. And I want to consult with you about my children. Therefore I will not say good-bye now, only good night, and God bless you."

But it was good-bye, after all. Though she did not wait the week; indeed, she waited for nothing, considered nothing, except her gratitude to this good man-the only man who had loved her and her affection for the two girls, who would soon be fatherless; though she sent a telegram from Brighton to say she was coming, and arrived within twenty-four hours, still -she came too late.

When she reached the village she heard that his sufferings were all over; and a few yards from his garden wall, in the shadow of the churchyard lime-tree, the old sexton was busy re-opening, after fourteen years, the family grave, where he was to be laid beside his wife the day after to-morrow. His two daughters,

sitting alone together in the melancholy house, heard Miss Williams enter, and ran to meet her. With a feeling of nearness and tenderness such as she had scarcely ever felt for any human being, she clasped them close, and let them weep their hearts out in her motherly arms.

Thus the current of her whole life was changed; for, when Mr. Moseley's will was opened, it was found that, besides leaving Miss Williams a handsome legacy, carefully explained as being given "in gratitude for her care of his children," he had chosen her as their guardian, until they came of age, or married, entreating her to reside with them and desiring them to pay her all the respect due to a near and dear relative." The tenderness with which he had arranged everything, down to the minutest points, for them and herself, even amidst all his bodily sufferings, and in face of the supreme hour-which he had met, his daughters said, with a marvellous calmness, even joy-touched Fortune as perhaps nothing had ever touched her in all her life before. When she stood with her two poor

orphans beside their father's grave, and returned with them to the desolate house, vowing within herself to be to them, all but in name, the mother he had wished her to be, this sense of duty-the strange new duty which had suddenly come to fill her empty life—was so strong, that she forgot everything else—even Robert Roy.

And for months afterwards-months of anxious business, involving the leaving of the Rectory, and the taking of a temporary house in the village, until they could decide where finally to settle Miss Williams had scarcely a moment or a thought to spare for any beyond the vivid present. Past and future faded away together, except so far as concerned her girls.

"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might," were words which had helped her through many a dark time. Now, with all her might she did her motherly duty to the orphan girls, and as she did so, by-and-by she began strangely to enjoy it, and to find also not a little of motherly pride and pleasure in them. She had no time to think of herself at all, or of

the great blow which had fallen, the great change which had come, rendering it impossible for her to let herself feel as she had used to feel, dream as she used to dream, for years and years past. That one pathetic line,

"I darena think o' Jamie, for that wad be a sin,"

burnt itself into her heart, and needed nothing

more.

"My children! I must only love my children now," was her continual thought, and she believed she did so.

It was not until spring came, healing the girls' grief as naturally as it covered their father's grave with violets and primroses, and making them cling a little less to home and her, a little more to the returning pleasures of their youth, for they were two pretty girls, well-born, with tolerable fortunes, and likely to be much sought after;—not until the spring days left her much alone, did Fortune's mind recur to an idea which had struck her once, and then been set aside, to write to Robert Roy. Why should she not?

Just a few friendly lines, telling him how, after long years, she had seen his name in the papers; how sorry she was, and yet glad—glad to think he was alive and well, and married; how she sent all kindly wishes to his wife and himself, and so on. In short, the sort of letter that anybody might write or receive, whatever had been the previous link between them.

And she wrote it, on an April day, one of those first days of spring which make young hearts throb with a vague delight, a nameless hope; and older ones—but is there any age when hope is quite dead? I think not, even to those who know that the only spring that will ever come to them will dawn in the world everlasting.

When her girls, entering, offered to post her letter, and Miss Williams answered gently that she would rather post it herself, as it required a foreign stamp, how little they guessed all that lay underneath, and how, over the first few lines, her hand had shaken so that she had to copy it three times. But the address, "Robert Roy, Esquire, Shanghai"-all she could put, but she