At the word “eternity,” they stood on the brow of the hill which they had been climbing, and the squire said it again very solemnly.  “Eternity!  How dreadful to spend it in repentance which can undo nothing!  That is the most awful conception of the word ‘eternity.’  Eh?  What?”

They were silent a moment, then Sandal turned and looked westward.  “It is mizzling already, Charlotte; the snow will turn into rain, and we shall have a downpour.  Had we not better go home?”

But Charlotte painted in such glowing colors Ducie’s fireside, and the pipe, and the cosey, quiet dinner they would be sure to get there, that the squire could not resist the temptation.  “For all will be at sixes and sevens at home,” he commented, “and no peace for anybody, with greens and carols and what not.  Eh?  What?”

“And very likely, as it is Christmas Eve, you may be asked to give Sophia away.  So a nice dinner, and a quiet smoke, and an hour’s nap will help you through to-night.”  And the thought in each heart, beyond this one, was “Perhaps Harry will be at home.”

Nobody missed the fugitives.  Mrs. Sandal was sure Harry would come, and she was busy preparing his room with her own hands.  The brightest fire, the gayest greens, the whitest and softest and best of every thing, she chose for Harry’s room.

Certainly they were not missed by Julius and Sophia.  They were far too much interested in themselves and in their own affairs.  From the first hour of his return to Seat-Sandal, Sophia had understood that Julius was her lover, and that the time for his declaration rested in the main with herself.  When the Christmas bells were ringing, when the house was bright with light and evergreens, and the very atmosphere full of happiness, she had determined to give him the necessary encouragement.  But the clock of Fate cannot be put back.  When the moment arrives, the word is spoken or the deed done.  Both of them were prepared for the moment, and yet not just then prepared; for Love still holds his great surprise somewhat in reserve.

They were in the drawing-room.  The last vase had been filled, the last wreath hung; and Sophia looked at her beautiful hands, marked with the rim of the scissors, and stained with leaves and berries, in a little affected distress.  Julius seated himself on the sofa beside her.  She trembled, but he looked at her almost triumphantly.  Over Sophia’s heart he knew his power.  With the questioning, unwinking gaze of love his eyes sought hers, and he tenderly spoke her name, “Sophia.”  She could answer only by her conscious silence.

“My wife!  Mine in lives long forgotten.”

“O Julius!”

“Always mine; missed in some existences, recovered in others, but bringing into every life with you my mark of ownership.  See here.”

Then he lifted her hand, and opening its palm upward, he placed his own in the same attitude beside it.  “Look into them both, Sophia, and see how closely our line of fortune is alike.  That is something, but behold.”  And he showed her a singular mark, which had in his own palm its precise counterpart.