“You placed it on my finger, Ralph! Will you also take it off? I was passive then; I will be passive now.”
Ralph raised the pale hand in his own and tried to draw off the ring. But since, three years before, the token had been placed upon the little hand of the child, that hand had grown, and it was found impossible to draw the ring over the first joint.
Ralph Houston, unwilling to give her physical pain, resisted in his efforts, saying quietly, as he bowed and left her:
“The betrothal ring refuses to leave your finger, Margaret. Well, good-morning!”
A smile, holy with the light of faith, hope, and love, dawned within her soul and irradiated her brow. In a voice, solemn, thrilling with prophetic joy, she said:
“The ring remains with me! I hail it as the bow of promise! In this black tempest, the one shining star!”
CHAPTER XV.
NIGHT AND ITS ONE STAR.
Two years had elapsed since the disappearance of Margaret Helmstedt.
Major Helmstedt had caused secret investigations to be set on foot, that had resulted in demonstrating, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that Margaret Helmstedt and William Dawson had embarked as passengers on board the bark Amphytrite, bound from Norfolk to Liverpool. From the day upon which this fact was ascertained, Margaret’s name was tacitly dropped by all her acquaintances.
It was about twelve months after the disappearance of Margaret that old Mr. Wellworth died, and his orphan daughter Grace found a refuge in the home of Nellie Houston.