Hester was away, or, of course, this would never have happened.  She had gone for a month’s visit to distant friends.

In that month I lived a lifetime.  Hugh Blair courted me as the other girls in Newbridge were courted.  He took me out driving and came to see me in the evenings, which we spent for the most part in the garden.  I did not like the stately gloom and formality of our old Meredith parlor, and Hugh never seemed to feel at ease there.  His broad shoulders and hearty laughter were oddly out of place among our faded, old-maidish furnishings.

Mary Sloane was very much pleased at Hugh’s visit.  She had always resented the fact that I had never had a “beau,” seeming to think it reflected some slight or disparagement upon me.  She did all she could to encourage him.

But when Hester returned and found out about Hugh she was very angry—­and grieved, which hurt me far more.  She told me that I had forgotten myself and that Hugh’s visits must cease.

I had never been afraid of Hester before, but I was afraid of her then.  I yielded.  Perhaps it was very weak of me, but then I was always weak.  I think that was why Hugh’s strength had appealed so to me.  I needed love and protection.  Hester, strong and self-sufficient, had never felt such a need.  She could not understand.  Oh, how contemptuous she was.

I told Hugh timidly that Hester did not approve of our friendship and that it must end.  He took it quietly enough, and went away.  I thought he did not care much, and the thought selfishly made my own heartache worse.  I was very unhappy for a long time, but I tried not to let Hester see it, and I don’t think she did.  She was not very discerning in some things.

After a time I got over it; that is, the heartache ceased to ache all the time.  But things were never quite the same again.  Life always seemed rather dreary and empty, in spite of Hester and my roses and my Sunday-School.

I supposed that Hugh Blair would find him a wife elsewhere, but he did not.  The years went by and we never met, although I saw him often at church.  At such times Hester always watched me very closely, but there was no need of her to do so.  Hugh made no attempt to meet me, or speak with me, and I would not have permitted it if he had.  But my heart always yearned after him.  I was selfishly glad he had not married, because if he had I could not have thought and dreamed of him—­it would have been wrong.  Perhaps, as it was, it was foolish; but it seemed to me that I must have something, if only foolish dreams, to fill my life.

At first there was only pain in the thought of him, but afterwards a faint, misty little pleasure crept in, like a mirage from a land of lost delight.

Ten years slipped away thus.  And then Hester died.  Her illness was sudden and short; but, before she died, she asked me to promise that I would never marry Hugh Blair.