after his trip to England to have Clayton at once in New York; but
now he had best wait perhaps another year. Then had come a struggle that racked heart and brain. All he had ever had was before him again. Could it be his duty to shut himself from this life-his natural heritage-to stifle the highest demands of his nature? Was he seriously in love with that mountain girl? Had he indeed ever been sure of himself? If, then, he did not love her beyond all question, would he not wrong himself, wrong her, by marrying her? Ah, but might he not wrong her, wrong himself -even more? He was bound to her by every tie that his sensitive honor recognized among the duties of one human being to another.
He had sought her; he had lifted her above her own life. If one
human being had ever put its happiness in the hands of another,
that had been done. If he had not deliberately taught her to love
him, he had not tried to prevent it. He could not excuse himself;
the thought of gaining her affection had occurred to him, and he
had put it aside. There was no excuse; for when she gave her love,
he had accepted it, and, as far as she knew, had given his own
unreservedly. Ah, that fatal moment of weakness, that night on the
mountam-side! Could he tell her, could he tell Raines, the truth,
and ask to be released? What could Easter with her devotion, and
Raines with his singleness of heart, know of this substitute for love
which civilization had taught him? Or, granting that they could understand, he might return home; but Easter-what was left for her?

It was useless to try to persuade himself that her love would fade
away, perhaps quickly, and leave no scar; that Raines would in
time win her for himself, his first idea of their union be realized,
and, in the end, all happen for the best. That might easily be
possible with a different nature under different conditions-a nature
less passionate, in contact with the world and responsive to varied
interests; but not with Easter -alone with a love that had shamed
him, with mountain, earth, and sky unchanged, and the vacant days
marked only by a dreary round of wearisome tasks. He remembered Raines s last words-" Air ye goin' to leave the po' gal
to die sorrowin' fer ye ? " What happiness would be possible for
him with that lonely mountain-top and the white, drawn face
forever haunting him?

That very night a letter came, with a rude superscription-the first
from Easter. Within it was a poor tintype, from which Easter's