more he worships it the less he thinks of himself.  And Helen, you can never know how hard a struggle my life has been, just to keep before me something to love,—­how lonely a struggle it has been, and how sad.  I can only tell you that there was very little strength left, and very little beauty, and that it was all I could do to remember there was such a thing as joy in the world, and that I had once possessed it.  The music that moved me and the music that I made was never your wild-rose singing, but such yearning, restless music as you heard in the garden.  I cannot tell you how much I have loved that little piece that I played then; perhaps it is my own sad heart that finds such breathing passion in it, but I have sent it out into the darkness of many a night, dreaming that somewhere it might waken an echo.  For as long as the heart beats it never ceases to hunger and to hope, and I felt that somewhere in the world there must be left some living creature that was beautiful and pure, and that might be loved.  So it was that when I saw you all my soul was roused within me; you were the fairest of all God’s creatures that I had ever seen.  That was why I was so bitter at first, and that was why all my heart went out to you when I saw your suffering, and why it is to me the dearest memory of my lifetime that I was able to help you.  Afterwards when I saw how true you were, I was happier than I had ever dared hope to be again; for when I went back to my lonely little home, it was no longer to think about myself and my sorrow and my dullness, but to think about you,—­to rejoice in your salvation, and to pray for you in your trouble, and to wait for the day when I might see you again.  And so I knew that something had happened to me for which I had yearned, oh so long and so painfully!—­that my heart had been taken from me, and that I was living in another life; I knew, dear Helen, that I loved you.  I said to myself long ago, before you got Arthur’s letter, that I would wait for the chance to say this to you, to take your hand in mine and say:  Sweet girl, the law of my life has been that all my soul I must give to the best thing that ever I know; and that thing is you.  You must know that I love you, and how I love you; that I lay myself at your feet and ask to help you and watch over you and strengthen you all that I may.  For your life is young and there is much to be hoped for in it, and to my own poor self there is no longer any duty that I owe.  My heart is yours, and I ask for nothing but that I may love you.  Those were the words that I first meant to say to you, Helen; and to ask you if it pleased you that I should speak to you thus.”

Mr. Howard stopped, and after he had waited a minute, the girl raised her eyes to his face.  She did not answer him, but she put out her other hand and laid it very gently in his own.