By-and-by I went out to the strawberry-bed. The season was too
backward. None were turning. With bitter disappointment I searched
the cold, wet leaves, bending them apart for the sight of as much as
one scarlet lobe, that I might take it in to her if only for
remembrance of the day. At last I gathered a few perfect leaves and
blossoms, and presented them to her in silence on a plate with a waiter
and napkin.

She rewarded me with a laugh, and lifted from the plate a spray of
blossoms.

"They will be ripe by the time I am well," she said, the sunlight of
memory coming out upon her face. Then having touched the wet blossoms
with her finger-tips, she dropped them quickly back into the plate.

"How cold they are!" she said, as a shiver ran through her. At the
same time she looked quickly at me, her eyes grown dark with dread.

I set the plate hastily down, and she put her hands in mine to warm
them.




VII

A month has gone by since Georgiana passed away.

To-day, for the first time, I went back to the woods. It was pleasant
to be surrounded again by the ever-living earth that feels no loss and