Ronald Valchester, whiling away the sunny afternoon by the side of his betrothed, little dreamed with what subtle art Violet Earle was implanting a prejudice in his mother's mind against his darling.

He was fastidious, and harder to please than most men, but even his exacting taste could find few things in Jaquelina that he would have cared to change.

She was naturally refined, graceful and polished, and her beauty was so remarkable that even in her simple print dress and white ruffled apron, Ronald thought her lovelier than any satin and jewel-bedecked belle he had ever met in society.

"Lina, sing to me," he said, when the sunset glow began to crimson the west. "I have longed to hear you sing so often while I was away from you."

She smiled, and turned her face to watch the setting sun as she began to sing.

Ronald thought there was nothing on earth so fair as that face, with the parted crimson lips, and the wonderful light that always came upon it when she sang.

"Lina, hush," he said, impulsively, when she had sung that first verse. "That is too sad a song. Choose something gayer and more suited to our bridal eve."

"I do not know any gay songs, Ronald," she replied, with some of the sadness of the song yet lingering on her face.

"That is strange," he said. "Did you learn nothing bright and lively at school, Lina?"

"No, I do not believe I did," she answered, musingly. "It seems to me that I always chose songs with a touch of sadness in them. Somehow I liked them best."

But after a minute's thought she sang lightly:

"Do you like that one any better, Ronald?" she said, with a smile, when she had finished.

"It is a pretty song," he said, "but, do you know, Lina, you keep selecting songs that hint of separation and sorrow; I do not like to hear you. Darling, do you begin to realize that after to-morrow we shall be separated no more 'until death us do part?'"

He took both her small hands in his as he asked the question.

She lifted her eyes to his, and he saw that they were full of bright, unshed tears.

"No, Ronald," she said, in a faint, fluttering voice. "I do not quite realize my happiness. It seems too bright to be real."

She shivered slightly as she spoke, and gave a swift, nervous look around her.

The soft sigh of the evening breeze, the rustling leaves seemed to whisper threateningly:

"In the moment that is the happiest of your whole life I shall take my revenge!"

"Lina, I do not believe you are well," cried Ronald Valchester, anxiously. "I saw you shivering that moment."

"The twilight is coming on, and these September evenings are chilly," she answered, rising. "Let us go to the house and sit on the porch. Uncle Charlie will be very glad to see you."

When they had crossed the purling brook and gone into the little vine-wreathed porch, Jaquelina felt easier. She was nervous out in the orchard among the whispering grasses.

She fancied a dark, demoniacal face peering at her behind the trees.

When she crossed the brook it seemed to be singing loudly:

"In the moment that is the happiest of your whole life I shall take my revenge."

The shadow of Gerald Huntington's vengeance was already upon her.

But on Ronald Valchester's love and happiness there fell no cloud from the near future.

To his ardent and poetic imagination life lay before him fair and lovely like a dream of summer.

Mr. Meredith came out and welcomed his niece's lover cordially, and after a brief conversation prudently retired into the house to the companionship of his wife and Dollie.

Mrs. Meredith, persuaded into amiability for once in her life by her husband, spread a dainty and neat-looking supper upon the table.

The lovers went through the form of eating, and then returned to the porch again where the air was spicy and sweet with the breath of late-blooming roses, and the new moon rose over the misty hills, smiling on these two lovers who were all the world to each other.

"This time to-morrow night you will be my bride," Ronald said to her fondly. "Then we will immediately take the train for Richmond. Oh! Lina, how often I have dreamed of that home-going. Often and often when I think of taking you with me, I recall the beautiful words in which Longfellow describes the home going of Hiawatha and his bride. Do you remember, Lina?"

She repeated a few lines softly:

Then Lina's small hand stole softly into her lover's. She raised her dark, passionate eyes to his face, and he read in their starry depths the deathless love that filled her heart.

"Lina, you do love me very much—do you not?" he said, lovingly.

"Ah, I could not tell you how much," she murmured. "If I were a poet like you, Ronald, I might put my tenderness into glowing words. But it is locked deep within my heart. I think if anything happens to part us I should die."

"Nothing can happen to part us, Love," he answered. "To-morrow night at this hour you will belong to me wholly, and then your life shall be all couleur de rose. Nothing can come between us after that magic ring is on your finger. We shall belong to each other, then, in the solemn, beautiful words of the marriage service, 'until death us do part.'"

His happy mood and his loving confidence were infectious.

The girl forgot for awhile the hovering shadow of evil.

She was gay and blithe and happy, looking forward to the morrow with timid, tremulous joy.

"I shall come for you in a carriage to-morrow evening, myself," he said. "Walter Earle has promised to come for mother in his phaeton. Violet will meet us at the church."

He kissed her good-night, saying that he would bring his mother to-morrow.

"My last good-night," he said, as he held her small hands tightly a moment, loth to leave her, and smiling at the warm blushes that surged into her cheeks.

She watched him walking away through the white radiance of the moonlight, a tall and graceful figure, on which her heart and her eyes dwelt fondly. She murmured his words with trembling pleasure, "our last good-night."