“You dismiss me, then?  Of your own free will, Lucia?”

“Of my own free will.”

“And you will not tell me this strange secret which has changed you so?”

“No; there is no need.”

“No need truly, if we are to part in this way.  But you see that there is something romantic and unreal about the whole thing.  I don’t yet understand.”

“No; how should you?” she said, half to herself.  “I hardly can myself.”

“Let me see your mother.  I will come again, though my time is short.”

“You need not.  Mamma approves of what I say.  Indeed, I cannot bear any more.  Let me go.  Good-bye.”

She was growing of a more deathly paleness every moment, and the hand she offered him was cold as ice.

“Good-bye, then,” he replied.  “I am to consider all the past as a pleasant dream, am I?”

She raised her heavy, aching eyes to his face.  His reproaches, if he had any to make, died away before that look, which betrayed endurance, taxed to the utmost—­a burden on her own heart far heavier than that she laid on his.  He held her hand for a moment.

“I don’t understand,” he repeated; “but I can’t give you up so readily.  Think over all this again, and if you find that you have decided too hastily, send me one line to say so; but it must be to-day.  If I hear nothing from you, I shall leave Cacouna to-morrow.”

“Yes,” she answered passively.  “Good-bye.”

“Good-bye.”

She stood without moving until the sound of the gate assured her that he was gone; then she sank down on the floor, not fainting nor weeping, but utterly exhausted.  There her mother found her in a strange, heavy stupor, beyond tears or thought, and lifted her up, and made her lie down on her bed, where she fell into a heavy sleep, and woke in a new world, where everything seemed cold and dark, because hope and love had left her when she entered it.

Mr. Percy went back to Cacouna in greater perplexity than he had left it; nay, not merely in perplexity, but in real pain and mortification.  If he had not seen plainly that Lucia was suffering bitterly, he would have been much more angry and less sorry; but, as it was, the whole thing was a mystery.  Somehow he was very slow to believe that disgrace—­any disgrace he could comprehend—­really attached to her; his first idea, that she was making a great matter out of some trifle or mistake, had not yet left him, and he wished heartily that he could get at the truth, and see whether it was the insuperable obstacle she fancied it.  He thought Mrs. Bellairs might help him in solving the question.  He knew quite well that she was not particularly pleased with his attentions to Lucia, but she was both sensible and kind-hearted, and, when she knew how far matters had gone, he did not doubt that she would do what she could to save them both from a painful misunderstanding.  But no sooner had he quickened his steps with the idea of immediately seeking her advice, than he began to reflect that Lucia had said she herself had been ignorant of any reason for acting as she had just done until last night; it was, therefore, very unlikely that Mrs. Bellairs, dear friend though she was, knew anything of this matter.  And if there was a family secret, what right had he to betray it?