The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1884-06-13
CHAPTER NH.


Frank. left alone. sat down by Mad
caps little table, all thought Of Mr.
Eyre gone in the delight that her words
had given him.
on have made me very happy" she
had said, and more than that he could
not have done, even to giving her up
his life, and tonight it seemed to him
very little thing that he had taken up
on himself, and the reward out of all
proportion to the sacrifice.
His thoughts went back to that day
in the copse. when she had known her
one short, sharp, bitter space of misery
misery so quickly turned to joy as to
be over almost before she had tasted it;
and if afterward she had sorrowed for
Hester's sake, and his sin, that sorrow
had touched no vital part of her life,
and she was Madcap still, in her bright
ness, innocence and youth, as she
should always be in heart so long as he
ment, though scarcely of evil, that
seemed to possess her tonight, meant
nothing; it was only passing mood,
and tomorrow she would be as bright
as she had been that morning. And
then his thoughts travelled back over
the day that had begun happily by his
meeting her with the boys in the vii
lage, and he had persuaded her to so
with him to see pretty sight that he
had CHANGED upon an hour before.
1t was no less than a group of three
young chestnuts that had burst out in
a complete new suit of leaves and flow
ers, affording marked contrast to the
russet-brown matrons standing by, who
had an air of by no means approving Of
such out-of-season frivolity.
L.. 4 -, Ill 1xot H.
Gus and beautiful sight. then Madcap,
looking up with something very sweet
and solemn in her face, had said to him,
Frank, don't these trees make you
think of human life in more ways
than one? of a life that has been hap
py, and all at once trouble came to it,
and stripped it of everything-just as
| the chaffers came in spring and de-
stroyed the leaves of these trees-leav-
| ing them bare when those aror nd were
| beautiful and happy; but now, in au-
| tumn, just when all the others are sober
and dull, these have their youth renew
ed, just as that life might be even more
beautiful and happy in its autumn than
its spring"
"But there are some lives, as there
are certain trees, that cannot be 80 re-
newed," Frank had said sadly; "once
stripped Of happiness, the heart never
stirs in them again, and after all these
seem to me the grandest trees, the
noblest hearts,"
"Now Madcap had cried; "that which
has once loved for loves sake, been
happy for another's sake, may have
thought it has lost all, but yet carries
in itself the power to produce as beauti-
full fruit as any that have gone before,
and second youth is possible as to
that tree which has so boldly reversed
the edict Of fate"
But Frank had shaken his head: there
could be no second Madcap to him in
the world.
And then they had stood still to watch
| the children 60 down the glade, dancing
! over the yellow leaves with feet as light
as the hearts that winged them, and no
instinct told the mother that this was
the last time the little brothers would
pass that way-the last time her eyes
| would follow them.
He wished now that he had gone all
the way home with her, and so have
averted that meeting which he feared
| had taken place. and that accounted for
| the excitation of mood Mr.. Eyre had
displayed that night. To Frank it was
lamentable failing in that strong
mind. the incessant fear Of what Hes
ter might say or do; but he forgot that
Mr.. Eyre had only seen her in those
fiercer moods when anger had swayed
her, or when that mad, reckless deter
| mination to move him. that will often
make a woman willfully degrade her
self in a mans eyes, had carried her be-
yond both truth and honor. And to.
night all his sleeping dread of that ca
tastrophe to which he had feared Mr..
Eyre's violence of hatred might impel
him, was once more awakened. This
lethargy that Mr.. Eyre had thought to
mean decay, Frank knew to be natural
as the snow-wreath that covers the
earth, while. beneath it. busy life is at
work, silently preparing its forces
against the coming struggle; for even
inanimate creation, as in our insolence
we term 1t, does not achieve existence
at aleap; aud while brain and heart
rested sluggishly, Mr.. Eyre's strength
was secretly renewing itself, whether
for good or evil. The Necessarian, IN
effect, says. "Given the whole or the
antecedents, the action can be predict
| Al - Thu EofaIiot ada that fha m on