It was the last day of October, about a week after a certain very quiet little funeral had taken place in the D—— Cemetery. The death of Raymond Deyncourt had appeared in the papers a day or two afterwards, without mention of date or place, and it was generally supposed that it had taken place some considerable time previously, without the knowledge of his friends.

Charles had been sitting for a long time with Mr. Alwynn, and after he left the rectory he took the path over the fields in the direction of the Slumberleigh woods.

The low sun was shining redly through a golden haze, was sending long burning shafts across the glade where Charles was pacing. He sat down at last upon a fallen tree to wait for one who should presently come by that way.

It was a still, clear afternoon, with a solemn stillness that speaks of coming change. Winter was at hand, and the woods were transfigured with a passing glory, like the faces of those who depart in peace when death draws nigh.

Far and wide in the forest the bracken was all aflame—aflame beneath the glowing trees. The great beeches had turned to bronze and ruddy gold, and had strewed the path with carpets glorious and rare, which the first wind would sweep away. Upon the limes the amber leaves still hung, faint yet loath to go, but the horse-chestnut had already dropped its garment of green and yellow at its feet.

A young robin was singing at intervals in the silence, telling how the secrets of the nests had been laid bare, singing a requiem on the dying leaves and the widowed branches, a song new to him, but with the old plaintive rapture in it that his fathers had been taught before him since the world began.

She came towards him down the yellow glade through the sunshine and the shadow, with a spray of briony in her hand. Neither spoke. She put her hands into the hands that were held out for them, and their eyes met, grave and steadfast, with the light in them of an unalterable love. So long they had looked at each other across a gulf. So long they had stood apart. And now, at last—at last—they were together. He drew her close and closer yet. They had no words. There was no need of words. And in the silence of the hushed woods, and in the silence of a joy too deep for speech, the robin's song came sweet and sad.

"Charles!"

"Ruth!"

"I should like to tell you something."

"And I should like to hear it."

"I know what Raymond told you to conceal. I went to him just after you did. We passed you coming back. He did not know me at first. He thought I was you, and he kept repeating that you must keep your own counsel, and that, unless you showed Mr. Dare's marriage was illegal, he would never find it out. At last, when he suddenly recognized me, he seemed horror-struck, and the doctor came in and sent me away."

Charles knew now why Raymond had sent for him the second time.

There was a long pause.

"Ruth, did you think I should tell?"

"I hoped and prayed you would, but I knew it would be hard, because I do believe you actually thought at the time I should still consider it my duty to marry Mr. Dare. I never should have done such a thing after what had happened. I was just going to tell him so when he began to give me up, and it evidently gave him so much pleasure to renounce me nobly in your favor that I let him have it his own way, as the result was the same. My great dread, until he came, was that you had not spoken. I had been expecting him all the previous evening. Oh, Charles, Charles! I waited and watched for his coming as I had never done before. Your silence was the only thing I feared, because it was the only thing that could have come between us."

"God forgive me! I meant at first to say nothing."

"Only at first," said Ruth, gently; and they walked on in silence.

The sun had set. A slender moon had climbed unnoticed into the southern sky amid the shafts of paling fire which stretched out across the whole heaven from the burning fiery furnace in the west. Across the gray dim fields voices were calling the cattle home.

Charles spoke again at last in his usual tone.

"You quite understand, Ruth, though I have not mentioned it so far, that you are engaged to marry me?"

"I do. I will make a note of it if you wish."

"It is unnecessary. I shall be happy, when I am at leisure to remind you myself. Indeed, I may say I shall make a point of doing so. There does not happen to be any one else whom you feel it would be your duty to marry?"

"I can't think of any one at the moment. Charles, you never could have believed I would marry him, after all?"

"Indeed, I did believe it. Don't I know the stubbornness of your heart? You see, you are but young, and I make excuses for you; but, after you have been the object of my special and judicious training for a few years, I quite hope your judgment may improve considerably."

"I trust it will, as I see from your remarks—it will certainly be all we shall have to guide us both."

Postscript.—Lady Mary would not allow even Providence any of the credit of Charles's engagement; she claimed the whole herself. She called Evelyn to witness that from the first it had been her work entirely. She only allowed Charles himself a very secondary part in the great event, to which she was apt to point in later years as the crowning work of a life devoted—under Church direction—to the temporal and spiritual welfare of her fellow-creatures; and Charles avers that a mention of it in the long list of her virtues will some day adorn the tombstone which she has long since ordered to be in readiness.

Molly was disconsolate for many days, but work, that panacea of grief, came to the rescue, and it was not long before she was secretly and busily engaged on a large kettle-holder, with kettle and motto entwined, for Charles's exclusive use, without which she had been led to understand his establishment would be incomplete. When this work of art was finished her feelings had become so far modified towards Ruth that she consented to begin another very small and inferior one—merely a kettle on a red ground—for that interloper, but whether it was ever presented is not on record.

Vandon is to let. The grass has grown up again through the niches of the stone steps. The place looks wild and deserted. Mr. Alwynn comes sometimes, and looks up at its shuttered windows and trailing, neglected ivy, but not often, for it gives him a strange pang at the heart. And as he goes home the people come out of the dilapidated cottages, and ask wistfully when the new squire is coming back.

But Mr. Alwynn does not know.

THE END.

TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS CORRECTED

The following typographical errors in the text were corrected as detailed here.

In the text: " ... Mrs. Alwynn had the delight of taking her completely ..." the word "competely" was corrected to "completely."

In the text: "You evidently imagine that I have gone in for the fashionable creed of the young man" the word "fashionble" was corrected to "fashionable."

In the text: "Molly, tired of her castles, suggested that she might sit on his knee," the word "hnee" was corrected to "knee."

In the text: " ... Molly has formed a habit of expressing herself with unnecessary freedom." the word "Mary" was changed to "Molly."

In the text: " ... as it reached the steps a shrill voice suddenly called" the word "suddedly" was corrected to "suddenly."

In the text: "I considered her to be a pink-and-white nonentity... " the word "nonenity" was corrected to "nonentity."

In the text: " ... pressing invitation to to come down... " the word "to" is repeated and one instance was removed.

Misspelt proper names were also corrected: "Thurshy" was corrected to "Thursby," “Alywnn” was corrected to “Alwynn,” and “Eveyln” was corrected to “Evelyn.”

Some punctuation was also regularized.