She sat there for over an hour, asking for nothing but the sky and sea, and the warm, sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal and touched the Autumn hills with living flame.  She drew long breaths of the wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, half-way across the world.

[Sidenote:  The Boy in the Tower]

At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent.  How strange that the Boy in the Tower should be Roger, and yet, was it so strange, after all, when she had known him all her life?

Before looking at the book, she tore open the letter and read it—­with wide, wondering eyes and wild-beating heart.

[Sidenote:  Roger’s Letter]

          “Barbara, my darling,” it began.  “I found this
          book to-night and so I send it to you, for it is
          yours as much as mine.

“I think my father’s wish has been granted and his love has been bequeathed to me.  I have known for a long time how much I care for you, and I have often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me silent.

“It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to you when you were sewing or while you were ill, and sweeter than all else besides to help you walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending on me for strength and guidance.

“Sometimes I have thought you cared, too, and then I was not sure, so I have kept the words back, fearing to lose what I have.  But to-night, after having read his letters, I feel that I must throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal loss.  You can never know, if I should spend the rest of my life in telling you, just how much you have meant to me in a thousand different ways.

“Looking back, I see that you have given me my ideals, since the time we made mud pies together and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, we never got the golden bells.  I have loved you always and it has not changed since the beginning, save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day that passed.

“As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or truth, or honour, I owe to you, who set my standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my dearest, my love has kept me clean.  If I have nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my life that can make me ashamed to look straight into the eyes of the woman I love.

“Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, I have been wishing it were our own—­that you and I might stand together before God’s high altar in that little church with the sun streaming in, and be joined, each to the other, until death do us part.

“Sweetheart, can you trust me?  Can you believe that it is for always and not just for a little while?  Has your mother left her love to you as my father