Evening star., 1911-06-10

is 1t all? My life has no object. no end
or aim. No one needs me now Lois,
one man needs you-needs you, perhaps,
as much as he loves you. That man is
myself. II you say you have done moth
ing in the world. look into the soul that
/ open out to you and to you alone. There
is not q generous, honest deed or thought
which has not its origin in you. For
your sake I have beaten down the devil
under my feet-I have tried to live as
meant to live before the time when l,
too. found that there was no object in 1t
all. that no one cared whether l was
good or bad. This much have you
changed in met has been your uncon-
scious work. Are you going to leave the
task which surely God has left for you to
accomplish"
He had touched the chord in her which
could only give one response. and he
knew It. There lay the canker which
made her energy and cheerfulness a
mere task to hide the real disease. Half
unconsciously she had loved Stafford and
half unconsciously she had built her life
upon him. When he had been taken from
her the foundations had been shaken, and
she found herself crippled by a horrible
sense OF emptiness and purposelessness.
In England she would have flung herself
into some intellectual pursuit, as other
women do who have suffered heart ship
wreck. But she was in India, and in
India intellectual food is scarce. Pleas
ure Is the one serious occupation for the
womenkind; and though pleasure may be
a good narcotic for some. for Lois it was
worse than useless. She needed one be-
ing for whom she could bring sacrifices
and endless patient devotion, and there
was no one Her two guardians lived for
her. and that was not what she hungered
after with all the thwarted energy of he4
SOUL She wanted to work for somebody,
not to be worked for-and no one needed
her, no one except this man. She looked
at him. She saw that her long silence
was torture to him: she saw that he was
suffering genuinely. and her heart went
out to him in pity. Pity is a woman's in
variable undoing. How many women
sometimes happy. sometimes unhappy,
according to the rulings of an inscrutable
fate-have married, partly out of fiattered
vanity. but chiefly because they are good
hearted, and labor under the mistaken
conviction that mans happiness rests
on their decision? And in this particular
instance Lois was honestly attached to
Travers. She felt that to lose him would
be to lose a friend whom she could i'll
spare. Yet a blind instinct forced her to
q last resistance.
II do not love you." she repeated. al
most desperately.
Il do not ask for that now. because l
my lifelong friend and helper. Remem-
ber your promise. Lois! Has not the time
come when we need each other-when no
one else is left?" He took her hand
again. He felt that she was won
''If you need mel care for you enough
to try and love you as my husband"
'Thank you. Iois!''
His Unborn tact and knowledge of the
human character stood him again in good
stead. He made no violent demonstration
Of his triumph and happiness. thus break
ing roughly into q region which as yet
for him was dangerous ground. As he
had done months before, when the road
to success had seemed blocked. he lifted
her hand reverently and gratefully to his
lips.
Thus 1t was that Capt. Adam Nicholson
waited patiently but In vain for Travers'
return with his old plaYfelloW. AS one |