dark against the moonlit house, a settled patience in its lines. Duty!
Here was duty, surely, with tenderest happiness. She was leaning toward
him--her hand was seeking his, when she heard through the fragrant
silence a sound from her mother's room--the faint creak of her light
rocking chair. She could not sleep--she was sitting up with her
trouble, bearing it quietly as she had so many others.

The quiet everyday tragedy of that distasteful life--the slow withering
away of youth and hope and ambition into a gray waste of ineffectual
submissive labor--not only of her life, but of thousands upon thousands
like her--it all rose up like a flood in the girl's hot young heart.

Ross had turned to her--was holding out his arms to her. "You won't go,
my darling!" he said.

"I am going Wednesday on the 7.10," said Diantha.



WHAT DIANTHA DID


CHAPTER IV.

A CRYING NEED


"Lovest thou me?" said the Fair Ladye;
And the Lover he said, "Yea!"
"Then climb this tree--for my sake," said she,