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 So, formal and constrained, we passed along, Rejoined our friends, and mingled with the throng To have no further speech again that day.

Next morn there came a bulky document, The legal firm of Blank and Blank had sent, Containing news unlooked for. An estate Which proved a cosy fortune—nowise great Or princely—had in France been left to me, My grandsire’s last descendant. And it brought A sense of joy and freedom in the thought Of foreign travel, which I hoped would be A panacea for my troubled mind, That longed to leave the olden scenes behind With all their recollections, and to flee To some strange country.

I was in such haste To put between me and my native land The briny ocean’s desolating waste, I gave Aunt Ruth no peace, until she planned To sail that week, two months: though she was fain To wait until the Springtime. Roy Montaine Would be our guide and escort.

No one dreamed The cause of my strange hurry, but all seemed To think good fortune had quite turned my brain. One bright October morning, when the woods Had donned their purple mantles and red hoods In honour of the Frost King, Vivian came, Bringing some green leaves, tipped with crimson flame,— First trophies of the Autumn time.

And Roy Made a proposal that we all should go And ramble in the forest for a while. But Helen said she was not well—and so Must stay at home. Then Vivian, with a smile, Responded, “I will stay and talk to you, And they may go;” at which her two cheeks grew Like twin blush roses—dyed with love’s red wave, Her fair face shone transfigured with great joy.

And Vivian saw—and suddenly was grave. Roy took my arm in that protecting way Peculiar to some men, which seems to say,