“I know you won’t.  I honor your judgment,” was Hugh’s mental comment, while Alice went on: 

“And what she told me of her brother was not calculated to impress me favorably.”

Nervously Hugh’s hands grasped each other, and he could distinctly hear the beating of his heart as he leaned forward so as not to lose a single word.

“She seemed trying to prepare me for him by telling how rough he was; how little he cared for etiquette; and how constantly he mortified her with his uncouth manners.”

Alice did not hear the sigh of pain or see the mournful look which stole over Hugh’s face.  She did not even suspect his presence, and she went on to speak of Spring Bank, wondering if Hugh would be there before his mother returned, half hoping he would not, as she rather dreaded meeting him, although she meant to like him if she could.

Alice’s long, bright hair, was arranged at last, and the soft curls fell about her face, giving to it the same look it had worn in childhood—­the look which was graven on Hugh’s heart, as with a pencil of fire; the look he never had forgotten through all the years which had come and gone since first it shone on him; the look he had never hoped to see again, so sure was he that it had long been quenched by the waters of Lake Erie.  Alice’s face was turned fully toward him.  Through the open window at her back the August sunlight streamed, falling on her chestnut hair, and tinging it with the yellow gleam which Hugh remembered so well.  For an instant the long lashes shaded the fair round cheek, and then were uplifted, disclosing the eyes of lustrous blue, which, seen but once, could never be mistaken, and Hugh was not mistaken.  One look of piercing scrutiny at the face unconsciously confronting him, one mighty throb, which seemed to bear away his very life, one rapid passage of his hand before his eyes to sweep away the mist, if mist there were, and then Hugh knew the grave had given up its dead, mourned for so long as only he could mourn.  She was not lost.  Some friendly hand had saved her; some arm had borne her to the shore.

Golden Hair had come back to him, but, alas, prejudiced against him.  She hoped he might be gone.  She would be happier if he never crossed her path.  “And I never, never will,” Hugh thought, as with one farewell glance at her dazzling beauty, he staggered noiselessly from the room, and sought a small outer court, whose locality he knew, and where he could be alone to think.

“Oh, Adaline,” he murmured, “what made you so cruel to me?  I would not have served you so.”

There was a roll of wheels before the door, and Hugh knew by the sound that it was the carriage for the cars.  She was going.  They would never meet again, Hugh said, and she would never know that the youth who saved her life was the same for whose coming they would wait and watch in vain at Spring Bank—­the Hugh for whom his mother would weep a while; and for whose dark fate even Ad might feel a little sorry.  She was not wholly depraved—­she had some sisterly feeling, and his loss would waken it to life.  They would appreciate him after he was gone, and the poor heart which had known so little love throbbed joyfully, as Hugh thought of being loved at last even by the selfish ’Lina.