Up the Hill and Over

know, but now I want you to know it all. But first-when you found me in that hospital, a useless bit of human wreckage, and forced

ropper. Some girl, I gathered. You had lost her, you blamed yoursel

ncied himself as a man of business and the disillusion killed him. He-shot himself. My mother, my sister and myself were left, with nothing save a small sum in the bank and the deed of the modest house we lived in. Adela was twenty-one and I was nineteen. We sold the house, moved in

ty miles from my mother's home and an electric tram connected the towns. One night I went with Adela to a Church Social-of all places-and that is where the story really begins, for it was at the Social that I met Molly Weston. It seemed the most casual of all accidents, for you can imagine that I did not frequent churches in those days, and Molly, too, had come there by chance. She was dressed in pink, her cheeks were pink, she wore a pink rose in her hair. She was the prettiest little fairy that ever smiled and pouted her way into a boy's heart. Before I left her I was madly in love-a boy's f

stand anything clearly. I remember well how I used to agonise in explanation, trying to make her see our difficulties and to face them with me. But when I had talked myself

picture of a grim hard face instinct with an almost terrible strength. No wonder my pretty Molly was her slave. One would have deemed it impossible that they were mother and daughter. Molly, it appears, was like her father, and

oved me-else how could her timid

ut her mother wrote 'Come home,' and there was no appeal from that. Then I did a desperate thing. Without Molly's knowledge I wrote to her mother telling her that I loved her daughter and begging, as a man begs for his life, to be allowed t

s tears! Never for an instant did she dream of disobeyin

tempt to excuse myself; what I did was dastardly, but it did not seem so then. The night before she left, she stole away from home. I had a license and we were married by a Methodist minister

followed, the professor

a in forcing a mea

ng her leave me without the legal tie. But I justified it to myself-I could have justified anything, I fear! I vowed a vow that she would be repaid for

ore terrified of receiving a letter. She would live in constant dread, she said, if th

med the mother. I found out, indirectly, that shortly after her return, Mrs. Weston whisked her off to Europe. They were gone a year. When they returned I was in the far west with a government surveying party, earning something to help me with my last y

algary, where they still are. Then Thomas Callandar, my mother's brother, who had never bothered about any of us living, died, and left me a handsome property,

e and wrote to her, to the California address, hoping to catch her there. In three weeks' time the letter came back from the dead letter office. I wrote again, this time to the Clevela

miliar-I had seen Molly's snapshots of it often. I cannot tell you what it felt like to be really there-to walk down the street, up th

ause. What if they were not at home? What if they lived there no longer?

greatness of my relief for the face in the opening was undoubtedly the face of Moll

ined. Surely she did not intend to continue her opposition? Yet it

I want to see Molly. I a

to close. But I had myself in hand now. I laid hold of th

ught you understood. I can and I will

The woman stood aside, made no effort to stop me, but looking me in the

and bodily deprivation rose up and took their due. I tried to speak, stuttered fo

master-influence into my life, taught me that the old ambition, the old work-ardour was not dead. Those months with you in Paris, in Germany, in London

r raised

ven you, but you have made yourself what

thing to do with facts at all. It is just that when I first began to show signs of overwork this last time I became tr

look of strain which had aroused his alarm some months ago. Nevert

can hardly speak of it

that Molly i

or, startled out of his calm. "But hav

e other hand I have been unable to confirm them. I cannot find where my wife died-except tha

y were seldom at home. That th

evidence in Clevel

el any doub

ved to drive the fatal message home. Dead!-There was death in the air of that house, death in the ghastly face-in the cruel, toneless words!-After my tedious recovery I made an effort to see Mr

go did the whol

hree when I went to claim my

s thought you older than that! But twelve years is-twel

the thing is absurd.

de any furth

he remembers 'hearing it' and that's all. Then I sought for the aunts, the maiden ladies whom Molly visited in California. They too are gone, the older died during the time I lay ill in the hospital. The younger one was not quite bright, I believe, and was taken away to live with some rela

your informant tell yo

d visite

her if she had ever heard of Molly's death she said no, but that she was not a bit surprised as she had always predicted that the pretty, little, white thing would be worried into an early grave. I noticed the word 'white' and asked her about i

hich goes

of her mother, perhaps the doubt of me, the burden of the whole disastrous secret was too much. And it was my fault, Willits-all my fault!

. The mother could have had no possible reason for deceiving you. You were no longer an ineligible student-and the girl loved you. Besides, there wa

ind of mental torture. It is my soul that has been sick; it is my soul that must be cured. And to c

s. Sykes

s. Sykes is pa

e other

year, I am beginning to feel free of that oppression, that haunting sense that somewhere Molly is alive, that she needs me and that I cannot get to her. I had begun to fear that it would drive me mad. But, here, i

friends met in

" said the professor,

er me s

es bearing before her a large tray upon which stood tall glasses, a

cool you off some. Especially as breakfast will be five minutes late owin

the question in her voice. "Mrs. Sykes, let me present Pro

t the doctor, good Presbyterian as he is, would know any such. But priests is terrible wily. They deceive the very elect-

said the prof

them each a glass

id, "to Coombe. 'Coom

said W

rs. Sykes. "I though