Page:Comin' Thro' the Rye (1898).djvu/397

Rh sorry, maimed, and loveless: but leave us life!" I wonder why, when a man or woman is ugly, selfish, and unlovely in life and character, he or she nearly always lives to a good old age?—why the young, the beautiful, the beloved, should always be called away first? Death passes by the wicked, whose evil deeds increase and multiply, to take the adored husband, pillar of the house, the happy, loving wife, the tender house-mother; he spares the vicious, wretched cripple, to gather the beautiful, vigorous child. Oh, he has a rarely, dainty taste, and there must be some sweet blossoms up above, since he takes our best from us so ruthlessly.

I fetch my hat and jacket and go out into the garden, leafless, sodden, miserable, that looked almost cheerful when Paul and I walked in it a week ago. Round and round I go, visiting every haunt in which he and I have sat together, pausing to recall the memories that hang about every nook and corner, standing still at last at the place where Dorley came upon us with his untimely nosegay. Yes, it was just here, and I hold out my arms to the empty air, with a bitter yearning of body and soul. He was here only a few days ago, but where is he now? How lonely it is! If only Jack or Dolly could suddenly appear before me to fill up this deadly, drowsy silence! Even the echoes of papa's belligerent voice would be better than nothing, or Amberley's bleating monotone, which I disliked so heartily in the old careless school-days. One of the children has the chicken-pox and mother is nursing him; she has no time to attend to me, and if she had I could not say much to her about Paul: it is never easy to talk to one's elders about one's lovers.

Steps come along the gravel path behind me. I know whose they are—George Tempest's.

"You have heard?" he asks eagerly.

I shake my head.

"Then he must be on his way back," he says, walking by my