used to do when she was a child, and asked what she had done to anger
me; and then, Heaven forgive me! I told her all, and asked her if she
could say with her lips the words she had written, and she nestled in my
arms all a-trembling like a bird, and said them over and over again.

"When Mary's family heard of our engagement, there was trouble. They
looked higher for Mary than a middle-aged schoolmaster. No blame to
them. They forbade me the house, her uncles; but we met in the village
and at the neighbors' houses, and I was happy, knowing she loved me.
Matters were in this state when the war came on. I had a strong call to
look after the old flag, and I hung my head that day when the company
raised in our village marched by the schoolhouse to the railroad
station; but I couldn't tear myself away. About this time the minister's
son, who had been away to college, came to the village. He met Mary here
and there, and they became great friends. He was a likely fellow, near
her own age, and it was natural they should like one another. Sometimes
I winced at seeing him made free of the home from which I was shut out;
then I would open the grammar at the leaf where 'Dear John' was written
up in the corner, and my trouble was gone. Mary was sorrowful and pale
these days, and I think her people were worrying her.

"It was one evening two or three days before we got the news of Bull
Run. I had gone down to the burying-ground to trim the spruce hedge set
round the old man's lot, and was just stepping into the enclosure, when
I heard voices from the opposite side. One was Mary's, and the other I
knew to be young Marston's, the minister's son. I didn't mean to listen,
but what Mary was saying struck me dumb. _We must never meet again_, she
was saying in a wild way. _We must say good-by here, forever,--good-by,
good-by!_ And I could hear her sobbing. Then, presently, she said,
hurriedly, _No, no; my hand, not my lips_! Then it seemed he kissed her