“We are home at last—­your home and mine, my precious, precious wife.”

The village clock was striking one, and the sound echoed across the waters of Fairy Pond, awakening, in his marshy bed, a sleeping frog, who sent forth upon the warm, still air a musical, plaintive note as Morris bore his bride over the threshold and into the library, where on the hearth a cheerful fire was blazing.  He had ordered it kindled there, for he had a fancy ere he slept to see fulfilled the dream he had dreamed so often, of Katy sitting in the chair across the hearth, where he placed her now, himself removing her shawl and hood, then kneeling down before her, with his arm around her waist and his head upon her shoulder, he prayed aloud to the God who had brought her there, asking His blessing upon their future life, and dedicating himself and all he had to his Master’s service.  It is such prayer which God delights to answer; and a peace, deeper than they had yet known, fell upon that newly-married pair at Linwood.

CHAPTER LVI.

CONCLUSION.

The scene shifts now to New York, where, one week after that wedding in Silverton, Mark and Helen were, and where, too, were Morris and Katy.  But not on Madison Square.  That house had been sold, and Katy had seen it but once, her tears falling fast as driving slowly by with Morris she gazed at the closed doors and windows of what was once her home, and around which lingered no pleasant memories save that it was the birthplace of Baby Cameron.  Once Lieutenant Reynolds had thought to buy it, but Bell said:  “No, it would not be quite pleasant for Katy to visit me there, and I mean to have her with me as much as possible,” so the house went to strangers, and a less pretentious, but quite as comfortable, one was bought for Bell, so far uptown that Mrs. Cameron pronounced it quite in the country, while Juno wondered how her sister would manage to exist so far from everything, intimating that her visits would be far between, a threat which Lieutenant Bob took quite heroically; indeed, it rather enhanced the value of his pleasant home than otherwise, for Juno was not a favorite, and his equanimity was not likely to be disturbed if she never crossed his threshold.  She was throwing bait to Arthur Grey, the man who swore he was forty-five to escape the draft, and who, now that the danger was over, would gladly take back his oath and be forty, as he really was.  With the most freezing kiss imaginable, Juno had greeted Katy, calling her “Mrs. Grant,” and treating Morris as if he were an entire stranger, instead of the man whom to get she would once have moved both earth and heaven.  Mrs. Cameron, too, though glad in her heart that Katy was married, and fully approving of her choice, threw into her manner so much reserve that Katy’s intercourse with her was anything but agreeable, and she turned with alacrity to Father Cameron, who had received her with open arms, calling