One evening, the summer after their marriage, they were walking in the Mall under the great elms that border the Common on the Tremont Street side.  They often used to wander there, talking of the books he was to write when strength should come and a little leisure, and sometimes their glances would linger longingly on Colonnade Row that Bulfinch built across the way, where dwelt the rich and powerful of the city—­and yet he would not have exchanged their lot for his.  Could he have earned with his own hands such a house, and sit Cynthia there in glory, what happiness!  But, I stray.

They were walking in the twilight, for the sun had sunk all red in the marshes of the Charles, when there chanced along a certain Mr. Judson, a jeweller, taking the air likewise.  So there came into Wetherell’s mind that amusing adventure with the country lad and the locket.  His name, by reason of some strange quality in it, he had never forgotten, and suddenly he recalled that the place the countryman had come from was Coniston.

“Cynthia,” said her husband, when Mr. Judson was gone, “did you know any one in Coniston named Jethro Bass?”

She did not answer him.  And, thinking she had not heard, he spoke again.

“Why do you ask?” she said, in a low tone, without looking at him.

He told her the story.  Not until the end of it did the significance of the name engraved come to him—­Cynthy.

“Cynthy, from Jethro.”

“Why, it might have been you!” he said jestingly.  “Was he an admirer of yours, Cynthia, that strange, uncouth countryman?  Did he give you the locket?”

“No,” she answered, “he never did.”

Wetherell glanced at her in surprise, and saw that her lip was quivering, that tears were on her lashes.  She laid her hand on his arm.

“William,” she said, drawing him to a bench, “come, let us sit down, and I will tell you the story of Jethro Bass.  We have been happy together, you and I, for I have found peace with you.  I have tried to be honest with you, William, and I will always be so.  I told you before we were married that I loved another man.  I have tried to forget him, but as God is my judge, I cannot.  I believe I shall love him until I die.”

They sat in the summer twilight, until darkness fell, and the lights gleamed through the leaves, and a deep, cool breath coming up from the sea stirred the leaves above their heads.  That she should have loved Jethro seemed as strange to her as to him, and yet Wetherell was to feel the irresistible force of him.  Hers was not a love that she chose, or would have chosen, but something elemental that cried out from the man to her, and drew her.  Something that had in it now, as of yore, much of pain and even terror, but drew her.  Strangest of all was that William Wetherell understood and was not jealous of this thing:  which leads us to believe that some essence of virility was lacking in him, some substance that makes the fighters and conquerors in this world.  In such mood he listened to the story of Jethro Bass.