jealous of her, this man she loves and though jealousy be a sin, yet it is not without its sweetness, too, for say what the wiseacres may, jealously is oftentimes a proof of love.

"And you saw—" she cries, "Allan, you—saw—ugh!" She makes a little gesture, a little grimace. "Did you think that I invited, that I welcomed him? Did you think that I bore his kiss with patience? Go and seek him now and look for the red mark upon his face! He came on me unawares and then all suddenly—" she pauses. "Allan," she says pleadingly, "Allan, you will not go, you will not go, my dear, you will not go and leave me?" And sobbing she is in his arms. And so for Allan Pringle the sun shines out again and the flowers are blooming brightly and the little slim maiden of stone from the centre of the pool seems to throw the glittering water higher and yet higher into the air as though in joy that all is well between these two, who hold one another so tightly, who are mingling their tears and their laughter and their kisses, now that the cloud has passed.

*      *      *      *      *

There are no flowers in the garden now, for the garden of Homewood Manor and all the world beside lies under a pall of white, for the winter is here, the winter of seventeen hundred and five, which is remembered by all men as a winter of bitter cold, of great frosts and heavy snows.

In a tiny cottage that stands a bare quarter of a mile on the Stretton Road from the Homewood gates, a man is on his knees beside a bed.

And that bed holds all his world, all that the world can give him, all that makes life sweet, and his heart is black and bitter with suffering and despair and cries out against God that he, who was rich only in her and in her love, must lose her now, must spend the rest of his days solitary, and heartbroken.

His eyes are on the sweet white face, on those lips once so red and now so pale, but which even yet have a smile for him, a smile of wonderful tenderness and undying love. He takes no heed of the fretful cry that comes from the cradle, for there is no other in all his world now, but her, she who is so soon to leave him.

"Betty, my Betty, I cannot let thee go! Oh, remember, Betty, once when I would have left thee, you called me back and I came. I am calling, calling to you now, my life, my sweet, I cannot let you go! Stay with me, stay with me, for you are all my life and the world is black without you; stay with me!"

She would lift her thin little hand to caress, to touch his face, but the strength is not hers to do it.

"Allan, take me, hold me in your arms, hold me tightly, my dear, hold me tightly," she says.

And he puts his strong arms about her. God pity him, how light she is, how small, how fragile a thing this, that death is taking from him!

His very soul is in rebellion against fate, he is mad with the suffering, mad with his impotence. He can do nothing save watch her die, watch her fade out of his life; and it must be soon "A matter of hours," the doctor from Stretton had said and that was long ago and now, now it is but a matter of minutes.

"Allan, I wanted, always, to die like this, with your arms about me, your dear eyes the last of earth that I shall see—ah! Allan, it is now——"

"Betty, Betty, I am calling, calling to you, come back, beloved, come back!"

And then he knows that it is useless, she is leaving him, slipping away, no matter how tightly he may hold her. It is good-bye, their last good-bye and the sad word comes perhaps unconsciously to his lips.

And then, is it fancy? Is it some trick of his tortured brain? For as he watches, the dear lips move and it seems to him that the message they whisper to him with her dying breath is this: "It is not good-bye!"

He is holding her against his breast, he is kissing those lips that for the first time give not back kiss for kiss. He is calling to her from his aching, breaking heart, but she has passed beyond the sound of his voice, though the smile on her dead lips is still for him.

And those last words, were they real? Did they pass her lips with her dying breath, were they meant for him in pity and compassion and love?

"It is not good-bye!"

CHAPTER I

IN THE GARDEN OF DREAMS

A girl, a slip of a maid with sunny hair and wonderful blue eyes, stood beside a crumbling old rose-red brick wall. She looked up the long country road and she looked down it, there was no one, not a soul in sight. So she thrust the too of one small and broken boot into a crevice of the wall, made a little spring and caught at the top, then dragged herself up till she sat, flushed and triumphant, on the coping.

She was a village girl and her dress was of print, well washed, well mended, skimpy, too, for her slight figure, slender though it was, for it had been hers for three years, and a dress that is originally made for a maiden of fourteen is apt to be small when worn by a maid of seventeen.

It was a demure and a very sweet face, the eyes big and strangely dreamy, the white skin of her face and neck powdered lightly with tiny golden freckles, her hair a deep red gold.

And wonderful hair it was, wonderfully untidy, too, so rebellious that it spurned all hairpins and fretted and struggled agains ribbons and tapes.

So now, she sat on top of the old rose red wall and looked down on the other side and saw a green tangle of brambles and grass and other things that grew rankly and luxuriously in that deserted place.

It was easier to descend the wall than to climb it, for here was a friendly tree that held out an inviting branch. Sho seized it, with small brown hands and lightly swung herself to the ground and then drew a sigh of relief and pleasure.

It was forbidden ground! Were there not many notices that announced the fact that "Trespassers Would Be Prosecuted"? But she cared nothing for these, the notice that she dreaded most of all was "This Desirable Historical Family Mansion, with Seven Hundred and Fifty Acres of Land, to be Sold."

How she dreaded lest one day someone should come and see and covet this place and buy it and so shut her out forever from its delights and its pleasures. But that someone had not come yet.

So she made her way through the tangle of the growth, and came presently to a great garden, a wonderful garden once, but now a weed-grown place of desolation.

Always this garden attracted her; to-day it brought a soft, tender light into her eyes as she stood with clasped hands and looked at it! She could see the old broken stone-paved pathway that led through the heart of the garden. She knew where that stone pathway opened out into a great circle in the midst of which was set a sundial, a sundial of stone chipped and green and the gnomon of the dial rusted away so that never again should its shadow fall upon the dial and mark the passing of the brighter hours. And about this