’You must come to my wedding, Ursula, and I must choose your dress for you; of course father will pay for it, but I promise you it shall be pretty, and suitable to your complexion.  I mean to have eight bridesmaids.  Jocelyn will be one, of course, and I shall get that tall, fair Grace Underley to act as a foil to her bigness.  I shall not ask poor Lesbia to be one; it would be too trying for her, and I know you will not care about it; but you must come for a week, and see all my pretty things, and help poor mamma, for she has only Jocelyn:  so remember you are to keep yourself disengaged the week after Easter.’

I wrote back that same evening warm congratulations to Sara and Aunt Philippa, and promised to come when Sara wanted me.  A gay wedding was not to my taste, but I knew I owed this duty to them:  they had been kind to me in their own fashion and according to their lights, and I would not fail them.  Easter would fall late this year,—­in the middle of April:  there were still three months before Sara would be married, and most likely by that time I should need a few days’ rest and change.

The next morning I heard from Lesbia.  It was a kind, sad little letter; she told me she was glad about Sara’s engagement, and as they were still at Hastings she and her mother had called at Warrior Square, and had found Sara and her fiance together.

‘I think it has improved Sara already,’ it went on; ’she was looking exceedingly pretty, and in good spirits, and she seemed very proud of her tall, grave-looking soldier.  Mother and I always liked Colonel Ferguson.  He and Sara are complete contrasts; I think her brightness and good-humour, as well as her beauty, have attracted him, for he is honestly in love!  I liked the quiet, deferential way in which he treated her.  I am sure he will make a kind husband.  Mrs. Garston looked as happy as possible.  I did not see Jocelyn; she was out riding with her father.

’We are going down to dear Rutherford in March, but I have promised Sara to come up for the wedding.  Don’t sigh, Ursula:  it is all in the day’s work, and one has to do trying things sometimes.

’I have come to think that perhaps dear Charlie is better off where he is.  He was so enthusiastic and so true that life must have disappointed him.  Perhaps I should have disappointed him too; but no, I should have loved him too well to do that.

’I shall love to be at Rutherford during the spring.  Everything will remind me of those sweet spring days two years ago.  Oh, those walks and rides, and the evening when we listened to the nightingale and he told me that he loved me!  I remember the very patch of grass where I stood.  There was a little clump of alders, and I can see how he looked then.  Oh, Ursula, these memories are very sad, but they are sweet, too; for Charlie is our Charlie still, is he not?’

‘Poor Lesbia!’ I sighed, as I folded up her letter and prepared for my day’s work.  ’It must be hard for her to witness Sara’s happiness, when her own life is so clouded.  Her heart is still true to Charlie; but she is so young, and life is so long.  I trust that better things are in store for her.’