He approached the school-house and unlocking the door closed it behind
him, not so much to keep out human intrusion as the invasion of bats
and squirrels. The nearly vertical moon, while it perfectly lit the
playground and openings in the pines around the house, left the interior
in darkness, except the reflection upon the ceiling from the shining
gravel without. Partly from a sense of precaution and partly because
he was familiar with the position of the benches, he did not strike a
light, and reached his own desk unerringly, drew his chair before it and
unlocked it, groped in its dark recess for the myrtle spray, felt its
soft silken binding with an electrical thrill, drew it out, and in the
security of the darkness, raised it to his lips.

To make room for it in his breast pocket he was obliged to take out his
letters--among them the well-worn one he had tried to read that morning.
A mingling of pleasure and remorse came over him as he felt that it was
already of the past, and as he dropped it carelessly into the empty desk
it fell with a faint, hollow sound as if it were ashes to ashes.

What was that?

The noise of steps upon the gravel, light laughter, the moving of two or
three shadows on the ceiling, the sound of voices, a man's, a child's,
and HERS!

Could it be possible? Was not he mistaken? No! the man's voice was
Masters'; the child's, Octavia's; the woman's, HERS.

He remained silent in the shadow. The school-room was not far from the
trail where she would have had to pass going home from the ball. But