love is an undying light; it will not change for time or tears"--the
words they had read together in a little snuff-coloured book on the
counter in the shop one summer day a year ago. The words flashed into
his mind, and they were carried to hers. Her fingers pressed his, and
then Charley said, over her shoulder, to the approaching Mrs. Flynn: "Do
not let her come again, Madame. She should get some sleep," and he put
her hand in Mrs. Flynn's. "Be good to her, as you know how, Mrs. Flynn,"
he added gently.

He had won the heart of Mrs. Flynn that moment, and it may be she had a
conviction or an inspiration, for she said, in a softer voice than she
was wont to use to any one save Rosalie:

"I'll do by her as you'd do by your own, sir," and tenderly drew Rosalie
to her own room.

Such had been their first meeting after her return. Afterwards she was
taken ill, and the torture of his heart drove him out into the night, to
walk the road and creep round her house like a sentinel, Mrs. Flynn's
words ringing in his ears to reproach him--"I'll do by her as you would
do by your own, sir." Night after night it was the same, and Rosalie
heard his footsteps and listened and was less sorrowful, because she knew
that she was ever in his thoughts. But one day Mrs. Flynn came to him in
his shop.

"She's wantin' a word with ye on business," she said, and gestured
towards the little house across the way. "'Tis few words ye do be
shpakin' to annybody, but if y' have kind words to shpake and good things
to say, y' naidn't be bitin' yer tongue," she added in response to his
nod, and left him.