The door opened and closed. Mercy went back into the room. It was cheerless and empty, and the children's happy voices lived in it no more. The girl's heart ached with a dull pain that had never a pang at all, but was dumb and dead and cold; and Mercy was all alone.
"Perhaps he was only in fun when he said that about walking out with somebody and trying to forget, and not being seen," she thought. "Yes; he must have been only in fun," she thought, "because he knew how I waited and waited."
Then she took up again the book that he had hardly glanced at. It fell open at a yellow, dried-up rose that had left the stain of its heart's juice on the white leaf.
"Yes, he was only in fun," she said, and then laughed a little; and then a big drop fell on to the open page and on to the dead flower.
Then she tried to be very brave.
"I must not cry; it makes my eyes, oh! so sore. I must get them well and strong—oh, yes! I must be well and strong against—against—then."
She lifted her head slowly where she stood alone, and a smile, like a summer breeze on still water, rippled over her mouth.
"He kissed me," she thought, "and he came to see me—all this long, long way."
A lovely dream shone in her face now.
"And if he does not come again until—until then—he will be glad—oh, he will be very glad!"