“And you always loved me?  How wonderful that we should meet here and to-day!” he said, unable to take his eyes from her.

“You know the place and remember the day?  Is it more marvellous, than that we should have been here before?  I never knew how you found me then, and I am as much puzzled about your being here now.  Father wrote us that you would come down with him to-morrow.”

“Tell me how you come to be here, to-day, of all the things in the world?” said Bart.

“Am I to tell first?  Well, you see, I wanted to see Mrs. Wilder and Rose; I have not been to their house since last fall, and so, having nothing else to do, I rode over, and just thought we would come down here—­didn’t we, Prince?”

“And so you call him Prince?” said Bart, who had recognized the horse.

“Yes, and I will sometime tell you why, if you will tell me how you came here to-day.”

“I came on purpose, because I wanted to.  Because you had hallowed the place, I knew that I should find your haunting presence in it.  Oh, when that case was over, and I got out, all the old dreams, and visions, and memories, and voices came to me.  And your face never absent, not with the old look of scorn that it seemed to wear, but sweet, and half reproachful, haunted me, and made me half believe what poor Henry’s smitten love said to me of you, when I told her my story.”

“Bless her,” murmured Julia.

“And I walked, and mused, and dreamed all the night; and this morning I sent your kind, good father a note, and came off.  I came as directly here as I could, and now indeed I believe God sent me.”

His arm was about her, and he held both her hands.  The frank confession, so sweet to her, had its immediate reward from her lips.

“Arthur,” she said, “I, too, came to see this place, with its sweet and sacred memories.  I have been here three times before.  You may know every thought and feeling of my heart.  I could not have got through the day without coming:  and how blessed I am for coming.  Do you remember, when you had done all you could for my rest and comfort, how, on that awful yet precious night, you asked me if I had said a prayer, and I asked you to pray?  Do you know that my mother and I both believe that that prayer was answered, and that she was impressed with my safety in answer to it?  Oh, how grateful to our Father for his goodness to us we should be.  Arthur, can you thank Him for us, now?” And they knelt in the forest solitude, with God and his blessed sun and blue sky, and their two young, pure, loving hearts joined in a fervent outpouring of gratitude.

“Our Father, for the precious and blessed revelation of our hearts, each to the other, we thank Thee.  Let this love be as pure, and sacred, and holy, and eternal, as we now feel it to be.  Grant, dear Father, that it may be sanctified by holy marriage; and that through Thy gracious providence, this union of hearts and souls may ever be ours.  Hear us, thy young, helpless, yet trusting, believing, and loving children.”