The Diary of a Saint

to love. I suppose that the truth is that the little prick stings where the blow numbs. For the moment it seemed to me to-night as if I felt more the sudden knowle

came in just at twilight. She

cut the one bud off your moss-rose! I thought t

with her gayest air. "T

I said; "that is, if she can

it is for you. I'm an old woman, you know, and I've whims. It's my whim for you to have

nd I went to her and kissed her. The poor old dear had tears in her eyes, but she said nothing. She understood, I am sure, that I could not talk, but that I had seen what she meant me to see, her sympathy and her love. We sat down before the fire in the gathering dusk, and talked of indi

party ready," she said, rising

ave a party?" I ask

with her explosive laugh. "All the Kendall ghos

me more touched than I sh

's visit prepared me last night, for to-day Kathie

out, "ain't you going t

swered; "but you mu

I thought you promise

about. You are too young to understand, and it is vulgar to

no wrong

ch word as 'wr

to break one'

t to unmake it if they change their minds; and that

red; "but father said tha

, "I have told you before that you mu

" she returned r

he is always fighting with her conscience about rig

n the whole matter off with a laugh. "I don't

nners don't matter i

ll be right. If you in your heart consider whether your father would wish you

nd I could not be harsh with her. She evidently wanted much to go on with the subj

mit to me that she is failing, I am convinced that he thinks so. She has been telling

e if I have these things off my mind. I've thought them out, and if you'll put them on paper, t

o let her see how the tears hindered my writing. When I ha

thing, Ruth,

ting words to show me that she felt for me, and

ld her, though I confess

ll. You are too much his superior to be happy with him. You would try to make him what you think he ought to be, and you couldn't do it. The s

rested a little,

ime. But I want you to remember it is much less hard for me to leave you alone than it would have bee

hat I could not bear it. I dropped on my knees by the bed, and fell to sobbing i

ts, as your father would have said, do not

nd I must not b

about myself. The way to do it, I suppose, is to think about others; and that would be all very well if it were not that the others I inevitably think about are George and Miss West. I cannot help knowing that he is with her a great deal. Somehow

gement is another matter. It came about very naturally after his being here so much in Father's last illness. George was so kind and helpful about the business that we were all full of gratitude, and in my blindness I did not perceive how Mother really felt. I re

all these years. She hopes that I will forget, but I should be poorer if I could. One does not leave off loving just because

me in her quick, jerky way, stopped suddenly, tall and strong, and looked at me as if she were trying to read some profound secret,

e to Tom?" s

know where he

don't writ

N

iercing me so that they almost gave me a sensat

silence, thinking she might

at?" I aske

ding her head emphatically; "but if you don't kno

I know, and know with sincere pain, that Deacon and Mrs. Webbe believe that I could have saved Tom if I had been willing to marry him. I have cared for Tom from girlhood, and I am fond of him now, in spite of all that

is afternoon, evidently thinking that I should wish to hear it, and evidently, too, trying not to let me see that she regarded it as mo

heological troubles. Now it is a Catholic who asks advice. Perhaps I had better set up as a consulting something or other. Mediums are the only sort of female consulting

small mind, which never can remember to lay the table properly, can hold in remembrance all the droll superstitions she shiveringly accepts. Perhaps the reason why she is so inefficient a servant, and is so constan

and she wishes, in defiance of her church's prohibition, to marry a divorced man. She declares that unless she can marry Ran Gargan her heart will be broken

d, "you're that clever that ye could invint a way what would ge

h, and marry Ran. Hannah would regard it as a signal triumph of grace if Rosa could be so far persuaded to disobey the tenets of Catholicism. I can understan

don't you believe

eemed inclined to feel that harm might come to her from some unseen ma

said. "If you are a good Catholic, I sh

she responded, beginning to cry. "Me heart is broke for Ran,

hat was there to say? I could only try to show her that she co

, when ye don't belave it's wrong?"

act against a church in w

her, for she went away with an air in which

hat she saw Dennis Maloney last night, and was engaged to him already. He has, it seems, personal att

sin' me to give Ran the go-by," sh

he change of sweethearts or the amazing

t a pauper to have me send her soup, she informed Rosa. I am afraid that Rosa was indiscreet enough to make some remark upon the fact that I carry her food pretty often, for old Peggy said,-I can see her wrinkled old nose turned up in supreme scorn as she brought it out,-"That's different. When Miss Ruth brings me a little thing now and then,-and it a

g about the Burgess mortgage, and in it he said t

. It is not my business what it means. Henceforth he

n see how she grows weaker, and I can only be thankful that she does not suffer. Sh

morning, "you seem to be no more afra

be afraid," she answered, wi

racious as if she had invited death as a dear friend, and awaited him with the kindliest welcome. The naturalness of it all is what impresses me most. When I am with her it is impos

ent, either,-she has always fo

you, Ruth," she said, after Dr. Wentworth had gone, "but we must

s always so lovely

ill only last! I asked her last night if she expected to see Father. She lay q

us apart. If he is not any more, why, then I shall not be either, and so of course I can't be unhappy. I feel just as he used to when he had you read that translation from something to him the week

with her patient, sunken eyes. Then she smiled again, a

or ask my opinion as she generally does. She was wonderfully tactful and kind; only I can see she thought I ought to know about it, and that the best way was to put the matter bluntly and simply, as if it had no pos

ousand times better to have it all over at once. I might have brooded morbidly through the days as they brought nearer and nearer the time when George was to be her husband instead of mine. Now it is done without my knowing. For three days he has been married; and I have only to think of him as the husband of another wo

weeks. I wonder if all men are like this. It seems sometimes as if they were not capable of the long, brooding devotion of women. But it is better so, and I would not have him thinking about

ses. He has cut me off from the happiness of serving him and helping him as a wife; but as a friend there is still much that I may do. Very likely I can he

for George. I hope that I have not been unfair to my fr

curls and cheeks pink from the wind. Almost as soon as

my dear," she said. "I came to ask you about George We

but I confess I had selfishly thou

gentle voice, "though of course after your father took him into his office a

d, wondering if my voice sounded queer;

could hardly have known her. She was a Hardy, you know, from Canton. But I have always found Mr. W

said, "I don't see how we can

ed entirely on account of his connection with your family, I told Aunt Naomi that it ought to be for you to say whether the fa

I have seen her. She is not-Well, I am afraid

to our church. I say 'our,' Ruth, because you really belong to it. You are just a lamb that ha

only disgrace you and injure the fold by pullin

uttered her small hands in

the Lord leads you in, He is able to make you

rd about writing it?-Mrs. Weston is to be one of us. G