He started up, for he had not heard her light tread. His hair was wildly tossed back, his eyes filled with tears, his lips quivering.
“You here, Mary,” he gasped. “I little thought of this. I little thought to meet you here. I came to take a parting look at the spot where I had seen you last as my own. Here it was that I sinned and fooled away my happiness, and here I would pour out the bitterness of my fruitless sorrow.”
“Not fruitless sorrow, I trust, dear Frank,” she said gently. “It cannot be fruitless, if it be a genuine sorrow for sin. Oh, perhaps there is hope before us yet!”
“Do you say so, Mary? Do you bid me hope? Well, I will live on that hope. I ask no promise from you, I do not expect it. I am glad that we have met here, after all. Here you have seen both my degradation and my sorrow.”
“Yes, Frank, and I am glad, too; it will connect this sad spot with brighter memories. God bless you. I shall never cease to pray for you, come what will. May that comfort you, and may you—may you,—” her tears choked her voice.
“Oh, one word more,” he said imploringly, as, having accepted his arm in climbing the stile, she now relinquished it, and was turning from him—“One word more—one word of parting! Oh, one word such as once might have been!”
His hands were stretched towards her. They might never meet again. She hesitated for an instant. Then for one moment they were pressed heart to heart, and lip to lip—but for one moment, and then,— “Farewell,” “Farewell.”