When they were ready to leave the hallowed spot she gathered a bunch of the spring violets growing there, and kissing them, handed the cluster to him in silence.
Late that evening when they parted she put one arm caressingly about his neck and whispered: "Give me all the hours you can, Charlie, before you must go; they may be all we shall ever have together."
CHAPTER XII.
A DAY IN THE WOODS.
When schoolmates who have studied and played together until almost maturity reach the parting of their ways a feeling of sadness comes to them; but when out of such a band there are eighteen of the best young men about to take part in the horror of war, the occasion becomes doubly so. The last few weeks passed together by the graduating pupils of Southton Academy came back to them in after years much like the memory of a funeral. There were no frolics at noontime or after school; no mirth and scant laughter.
A few of the girls were known to be carrying aching hearts, and it was whispered that two or three were engaged to be married to young soldier-boys now in the academy. Liddy wore a new and heavy plain gold ring, and when questioned as to its significance quietly answered, as was her wont: "I have no confessions to make," but those who were nearest to her and knew her best detected a proud look in her eyes and drew their own conclusions. It was noticed also that she and Manson were seldom apart during the noon hour, and invariably walked away from the academy together. As there were other couples who thus paired off it caused no comment.
When the last day came the academy was packed with the parents and friends of pupils, and on Liddy's desk was a bunch of June roses. She knew whose hand had placed them there. When the final exercises began she felt herself growing nervous. She had never felt so before, but now the mingled joy and sorrow of the past four weeks were telling upon her. There were several patriotic and warlike recitations by the young men, and readings of an unusually melancholy nature by young ladies, all of which tended to make matters worse, so that when her turn came she felt ready to cry. But she caught a look from Manson that was like wine. "He has been brave," she thought; "I will be as much so"—and she was.
When the exercises were over the principal made a brief but feeling address which raised him several degrees in Manson's estimation, and that was the end. Most of the pupils lingered, loth to utter the last farewells, but finally they were spoken, and with many moist eyes among that gathering of young friends they separated. Some of them never met in life again.