All about the parlor were the traces of my darling. A soft little coil
of rose-colored Berlin wool, with its ivory needle sheathed among the
stitches, lay in a tiny basket. I lifted it up: the basket was made of
scented grass, and there was a delicious sweet and pure fragrance
about the knitting-work. I took possession of it and thrust it into my
breast-pocket. A magazine she had been reading, with the palest slip
of a paper-knife--a bit of delicate Swiss wood--in it, next came in my
way. I tried to settle down and read where she had left off, but the
words danced before my eyes, and a strange tune was repeating in my
ears, "Good-night, Charlie--good-night and good-bye!"

One mad impulse seized me to go out under her window and call to her,
asking her to come down. But Lenox nights were very still, and the
near neighbors on either side doubtless wide awake to all that was
going on around the Sloman cottage.

So I sat still like an idiot, and counted the clock-strokes, and
nervously calculated the possibility of her reappearance, until I
heard, at last, footsteps coming along the hall in rapid tread. I
darted up: "Oh, Bessie, I knew you would come back!" as through the
open door walked in--Mary, Mrs. Sloman's maid!

She started at seeing me: "Excuse me, sir. The parlor was so--I
thought there was no one here."

"What is it, Mary?" I asked with assumed indifference. "Do you want
Miss Bessie? She went up stairs a few moments ago."

"No, sir. I thought--that is--" glancing down in awkward confusion at