She promised to do this, and she mentioned to me that when,
for a moment, disburdened, delighted, he held her hand,
thanking her for the sacrifice, she already felt rewarded."

"But was that all her reward?" one of the ladies asked.

"She never saw him again."

"Oh!" said the lady; which, as our friend immediately left us again,
was the only other word of importance contributed to the subject till,
the next night, by the corner of the hearth, in the best chair,
he opened the faded red cover of a thin old-fashioned gilt-edged album.
The whole thing took indeed more nights than one, but on the first occasion
the same lady put another question. "What is your title?"

"I haven't one."

"Oh, _I_ have!" I said. But Douglas, without heeding me,
had begun to read with a fine clearness that was like a rendering
to the ear of the beauty of his author's hand.



I


I remember the whole beginning as a succession of flights and drops,
a little seesaw of the right throbs and the wrong. After rising, in town,
to meet his appeal, I had at all events a couple of very bad days--
found myself doubtful again, felt indeed sure I had made a mistake.