Thus uncertainly the week passed on; till one morning Stockdale said to her:  ‘I have had a letter, Lizzy.  I must call you that till I am gone.’

‘Gone?’ said she blankly.

‘Yes,’ he said.  ’I am going from this place.  I felt it would be better for us both that I should not stay after what has happened.  In fact, I couldn’t stay here, and look on you from day to day, without becoming weak and faltering in my course.  I have just heard of an arrangement by which the other minister can arrive here in about a week; and let me go elsewhere.’

That he had all this time continued so firmly fixed in his resolution came upon her as a grievous surprise.  ‘You never loved me!’ she said bitterly.

‘I might say the same,’ he returned; ’but I will not.  Grant me one favour.  Come and hear my last sermon on the day before I go.’

Lizzy, who was a church-goer on Sunday mornings, frequently attended Stockdale’s chapel in the evening with the rest of the double-minded; and she promised.

It became known that Stockdale was going to leave, and a good many people outside his own sect were sorry to hear it.  The intervening days flew rapidly away, and on the evening of the Sunday which preceded the morning of his departure Lizzy sat in the chapel to hear him for the last time.  The little building was full to overflowing, and he took up the subject which all had expected, that of the contraband trade so extensively practised among them.  His hearers, in laying his words to their own hearts, did not perceive that they were most particularly directed against Lizzy, till the sermon waxed warm, and Stockdale nearly broke down with emotion.  In truth his own earnestness, and her sad eyes looking up at him, were too much for the young man’s equanimity.  He hardly knew how he ended.  He saw Lizzy, as through a mist, turn and go away with the rest of the congregation; and shortly afterwards followed her home.

She invited him to supper, and they sat down alone, her mother having, as was usual with her on Sunday nights, gone to bed early.

‘We will part friends, won’t we?’ said Lizzy, with forced gaiety, and never alluding to the sermon:  a reticence which rather disappointed him.

‘We will,’ he said, with a forced smile on his part; and they sat down.

It was the first meal that they had ever shared together in their lives, and probably the last that they would so share.  When it was over, and the indifferent conversation could no longer be continued, he arose and took her hand.  ‘Lizzy,’ he said, ‘do you say we must part—­do you?’

‘You do,’ she said solemnly.  ‘I can say no more.’

‘Nor I,’ said he.  ‘If that is your answer, good-bye!’

Stockdale bent over her and kissed her, and she involuntarily returned his kiss.  ‘I shall go early,’ he said hurriedly.  ’I shall not see you again.’

And he did leave early.  He fancied, when stepping forth into the grey morning light, to mount the van which was to carry him away, that he saw a face between the parted curtains of Lizzy’s window, but the light was faint, and the panes glistened with wet; so he could not be sure.  Stockdale mounted the vehicle, and was gone; and on the following Sunday the new minister preached in the chapel of the Moynton Wesleyans.