“Where is the Anchor, Ella?”
“Here,” she said, laying her hand upon her breast.
“Ella, have you forgiven me for robbing you of the cross your mother gave you?”
“Oh, yes; I had forgotten it, George.”
He held it up before her—the sea-weed clinging to it still. “See,” he said, “the waves were too generous to keep it. I found it just now on the rock—the place where you stood that night.”
“Keep it, George. Though I never thought to leave you such a remembrancer. Oh, George! I should have been just as this sea-weed, and perhaps have clung to the Cross of Christ with not a bit more energy, if I had staid in the world.”
“You are not going away! You are not going!” he cried; but his voice faltered and fell as he said it, for he felt that she was going.
“Doctor, I left a little book on my desk, will you bring it to me?”
It was laid before her.
“This,” she said, again addressing the youth, “I meant for you. It pleased me, and I thought perhaps you would like it—and won’t you lay it on your shelf nearest to your cross, the one we made. It has a pretty name—The Shadow of the Cross. See, I wrote your name in it after I came home that night. You could write a better book”—he shuddered, and half turned away—she observed his look and motion, and said quickly, “Yes, you will. And all the world will love you. But you will keep this, if only for my sake. And don’t ever, ever think, George Waldron, that I wouldn’t have been proud to have taken your arm and walked with you in the broad daylight through our streets. I was very tired and sick that night, or I wouldn’t have let you go home without convincing you. Do you believe me?”