"No, dear," he returned, soberly; "no one can ever go back to yesterday." Then, with a swift change of mood, he asked: "When shall we be married?"

"Whenever you like," she whispered, her eyes downcast and her colour receding.

"In the Fall, then, when the grapes have been gathered and just before school begins?"

He could scarcely hear her murmured: "Yes."

"I want to take you to town and let you see things. Theatres, concerts, operas, parks, shops, art galleries, everything. If the crop is in early, we should be able to have two weeks. Do you think you could crowd all the lost opportunities of a lifetime into two weeks?"

"Into a day, with you."

He drew her closer. This sort of thing was very sweet to him, and the girl's dull personality had bloomed like some pale, delicate flower. He saw unfathomed depths in her grey eyes, shining now, with the indescribable light that comes from within. She had been negative and colourless, but now she was a lovely mystery--a half-blown windflower on some brown, bare hillside, where Life, in all its fulness, was yet to come.

[Sidenote: What Will They Say?]

"Did you tell your Grandmother and Aunt Matilda?"

"No. How could I?"

"You'd better not. They'd only make it hard for you, and I wouldn't be allowed in the parlour anyway."

Rosemary had not thought of that. It was only that her beautiful secret was too sacred to put into words. "They'll have to know some time," she temporised.

"Yes, of course, but not until the last minute. The day we're to be married, you can just put on your hat and say: 'Grandmother, and Aunty, I'm going out now, to be married to Alden Marsh. I shan't be back, so good-bye."

She laughed, but none the less the idea filled her with consternation.

"What will they say!" she exclaimed.

"It doesn't matter what they say, as long as you're not there to hear it."

"Clothes," she said, half to herself. "I can't be married in brown alpaca, can I?"

[Sidenote: The Difference]

"I don't know why not. We'll take the fatal step as early as possible in the morning, catch the first train to town, you can shop all the afternoon to your heart's content, and be dressed like a fine lady in time for dinner in the evening."

"Grandmother was married in brown alpaca," she continued, irrelevantly, "and Aunt Matilda wore it the night the minister came to call."

"Did he never come again?"

"No. Do you think it could have been the alpaca?"

"I'm sure it wasn't. Aunt Matilda was foreordained to be an old maid."

"She won't allow anyone to speak of her as an old maid. She says she's a spinster."

"What's the difference?"

"I think," returned Rosemary, pensively, "that an old maid is a woman who never could have married and a spinster is merely one who hasn't."

"Is it a question of opportunity?"

"I believe so."

"Then you're wrong, because some of the worst old maids I've ever known have been married women. I've seen men, too, who deserve the t.i.tle."

"Poor Aunt Matilda," Rosemary sighed; "I'm sorry for her."

"Why?"

[Sidenote: Alden's Mother]

"Because she hasn't anyone to love her--because she hasn't you. I'm sorry for every other woman in the world," she concluded, generously, "because I have you all to myself."

"Sweet," he answered, possessing himself of her hand, "don't forget that you must divide me with mother."

"I won't. Will she care, do you think, because--" Her voice trailed off into an indistinct murmur.

"Of course not. She's glad. I told her this morning."

"Oh!" cried Rosemary, suddenly tremulous and afraid. "What did she say?"

"She was surprised at first." Alden carefully refrained from saying how much his mother had been surprised and how long it had been before she found herself equal to the occasion.

"Yes--and then?"

"Then she said she was glad; that she wanted me to be happy. She told me that she had always liked you and that the house wouldn't be so lonely after you came to live with us. Then she asked me to bring you to see her, as soon as you were ready to come."

The full tide overflowed in the girl's heart. She yearned toward Mrs.

Marsh with worship, adoration, love. The mother-hunger made her faint with longing for a woman's arms around her, for a woman's tears of joy to mingle with her own.

[Sidenote: Madame's Welcome]

"Take me to her," Rosemary pleaded. "Take me now!"

Madame saw them coming and went to the door to meet them. Rosemary was not at all what she had fancied in the way of a daughter-in-law, but, wisely, she determined to make the best of Alden's choice. Something in her stirred in answer to the infinite appeal in the girl's eyes. At the crowning moment of her life, Rosemary stood alone, fatherless, motherless, friendless, with only brown alpaca to take the place of all the pretty things that seem girlhood's right.

Madame smiled, then opened her arms. Without a word, Rosemary went to her, laid her head upon the sweet, silken softness of the old lady's shoulder, and began to cry softly.

"Daughter," whispered Madame, holding her close. "My dear daughter!

Please don't!"

Rosemary laughed through her tears, then wiped her eyes. "It's only an April rain," she said. "I'm crying because I'm so happy."

"I wish," responded Madame, gently, with a glance at her son, "that I might be sure all the tears either of you are ever to shed would be tears of joy. It's the bitterness that hurts."

[Sidenote: Tears]

"Don't be pessimistic, Mother," said Alden, with a little break in his voice. Rosemary's tears woke all his tenderness. He longed to shield and shelter her; to stand, if he might, between her and the thousand p.r.i.c.ks and stabs of the world.