Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 2.djvu/18

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��MY FRIENDS AND I : MEMORIES.

��calm, save a lingering treinulousness :

" And is this the end, dear Will? Must our love-laden bark here founder? Does my father think by driving you hence to turn my thoughts and affections into an- other and unnatural channel? It can nev- er be. Wherever you may go, rest assured my heart goes with you. Time, you know, is the mother of change, and we may be happy yet. As the months go away, my father may relent, and see in a strong, noble soul, armed with true manhood, more of real worth than in the gold and glitter and lands of a cold-hearted man of the world. But, Will, it is hard to say goodbye — almost harder than I can bear. I must commence a new life, for all my present life and love will be gone, per- haps forever. But I will find companion- ship in our old haunts ; I shall be alone on the bank ofHhe river, where the shadows come and go, and there is wild melody of wind and waves ; out upon the hillside at the foot of the cliff, where the nigh t-bird sings the daylight away, and where we so love to worship the moon and the star- light as they come glinting into the even- ing sky ; up in the glen, so full of sweet solitude, and where the laughing brook babbles among the rocks and the mosses. But, dear Will, should you never return to these scenes ; should death come to you in a distant land — and now her voice became broken — I will name a tryst, and you shall treasure it in memory with this love of ours : If you go hence before me you shall be first to greet me upon the other shore ; but if I tarry not long with these friends of earth, and your mission be not yet fulfiilled, so I meet you not over there, my kiss shall awaken you upou that glorious morning. Shall it not be thus?"

'' We will live and die in that memory, dear Ellen."

Just then a ray of moonlight stole in through the branches, and she blushed not to see two white arms wound around a manly neck, and a love- ly form pressed lovingly to a breast where beat as noble a heart as ever warmed with human love; and I am very sure that compact was sacredly sealed with pure and ardent lips.

��The intruder upon that sacred scene has long since been forgiven the innova- tion. It was my intention to steal away unnoticed with this unsought secret, and was moving with that purpose when a peculiar but well-remembered signal ar- rested my steps. I had heard it often in those days of which I mentioned — those later school days — and I obeyed its call with as much pleasure and alacrity as did my old friend a similar summons from me in one of our adventurous holi- day excursions, whereof I may sometime tell you, but not now.

So novel a meeting would, under or- dinary circumstances, have proved a very enjoyable one. for he was a glorious talker, and we would have walked and talked the night hours away and bridged over the almost three years of separation with the events of the lapsed period, whereof each formed a part, and of oth- er days and their memories ; but I knew the heart of my friend was o'er-filled with sad thoughts and dreary forebod- ings, and that of his.fair companion, who clung so trustingly to his side as we strolled leisurely along toward her home among the maples, was brimming with meditations too sacred to commit to words; so I ventured not to turn the current of their moody reflections by idle, common-place utterences of my own. I shrank from entering the consecrated precincts where those agonized souls were worshipping at the shrine of true and holy love; so I aw r aited in silence, making companionship with the God- given glories of that summer evening, and turning at times with frank emotion to do homage to the world of beauty and true womanly loveliness that gleamed with heavenly radiance from the bright but sad young face of Ellen Burton.

Once, only once, was the silence brok- en by aught of the lips' expression :

" Better die then, since life has lost its joy; it were better to die that the aching heart may be at rest."

" No, dear Ellen, not so, for 'the dark- est day wait till to-morrow will have passed away,' and these murky clouds may be hiding from us their sun-illu-

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