SHE tucked up her petticoats, put some jelly into a little covered basket, took her parasol and set out.

       The day was very warm, but there had been rain the night before, and country roads are apt to be muddy. Miss Browne was a very particular little person, and did not like to get her dress splashed, or her boots dirty.

       "It looks so untidy," she said.

       The roses nodded at her from the wall, and the jessamine made the air sweet with its fragrance. They were very grateful for the rain.

       "It is a beautiful world," said Miss Browne; "and a beautiful year — almost like the Jubilee."

       Somehow, everything had had a tendency to look beautiful in her eyes of late. Perhaps because — but no — that could not be the reason.

       Miss Browne was charitably disposed, and to-day seemed propitious to good works. It was rather a long walk to Mrs. Peat's, but then she always counted upon a visit once a week. The days were very long when she had to lie there, blind and bedridden, with only an occasional "look in" from the next-door neighbour.

       Parish-visiting formed an important item of the day's work for most of the ladies in the village. Not that the parish was large, but there really was not much else to do, and one cannot stay at home all day long.

       This year, however, the village seemed to have blossomed out into an unusual number of afternoon teas and small garden parties.

       "We really seem to have had a great many," soliloquized Miss Browne as she went on her way. "There has been something every day: Mrs. Mason's tea on Monday, and the garden-party at the Hall on Tuesday, and luncheon at the Priory. Yes, there has been something or other going on ever since the major came."

       Ever since the major came!

       That was it. She had gone to the root of the matter at once. The major was responsible for this sudden outburst of hospitality. He must account for the flutter among the ladies; the abrupt interruption of their charitable works; the sudden awakening to the fact that society demanded something of them.

       If his opinion had been asked, poor man, he would have much preferred being let alone. It was quite a relief to come in for country quiet after the endless dances, polo and gymkhanas at Umballa.

       But then, it is not every day that you have an officer home from India in a quiet country village. And when it is only on six months' leave, the very least you can do is to show him that he is not forgotten, and that his old neighbourhood is ready to welcome him with open arms. So the ladies gave their tea-parties, and the cottages did not get so many visits.

       Perhaps it was good for them. They would appreciate it all the more again, by-and-bye, after the interruption.

       "Only I hope Mrs. Peat will not feel herself neglected," said Miss Browne.

       She would go to her to-day whatever happened, and pay her quite a long visit, and sing her some hymns — which she always liked — and read her the last chapter of the serial in the parish magazine.

       And all this time the disturber of the general peace was smoking his pipe in the happiest possible fashion, only conscious that he was enjoying himself in the way he liked best, and profoundly thankful for another warm day after yesterday's damp.

       The major's visit to his native village had not been all bliss — nothing is. With the strange inconsistency to which we all adhere, despite any amount of experience, he had come back expecting to find everything exactly as he left it. We may change, but home must not. Consequently his anticipations were daily receiving small shocks. In the main, everything was the same; but even a small country village must move on with the times. People die, and a new generation crops up before we can realize they are out of pinafores. The Tom, Dick and Harry of our recollection are either young men themselves or fathers of a new family carrying on the old names.

       These small changes constantly worried the major. He was continually accosting some young labourer, "whose face he knew perfectly well," with inquiries after a father dead five years or more; or responding to the smiling courtesy of a buxom bride by asking if her first baby, held up in proud hope of some notice, were her youngest sister!

       But perhaps the biggest shock of all was when he first saw Miss Browne. Of course he knew she had had rather a hard time of it nursing an invalid mother and sister — home letters kept him acquainted with all the little gossip. But then, many women are quite young at forty-two. Why, he had seen some who would have passed for thirty without any question. That was with the help of dress, and care, and — yes, happiness. Ease, comfort, happiness are wonderful preservers of youth.

       A large proportion of these had not fallen to Miss Browne's share. Years of anxious nursing have a tendency to fade the brightest cheek and trace lines on the smoothest forehead. When death took away her mother and sister there was, of course, a long rest for her; but it is lonely work tending even roses and jessamine by yourself, and the lilies do not seem half so beautiful when there is no one to say, "How lovely!"

       So Miss Browne settled down in The Cottage with the two old servants, and unconsciously fell into quiet, sober little ways, with a touch of primness in them. Her dress was always nice: it could never be untidy. But it took a decided turn towards quaker greys and browns, with an entire absence of the blue ribbons of former days.

       The major felt it almost as a personal affront to himself when they first met. Sometimes, during his wanderings, when he thought of Miss Browne, he had always pictured the trim little figure in its favourite blue and white, flitting over the tennis-court, gayest of the gay. It seemed absurd that a few short years had made such a difference. Why, for himself — he looked in the glass after that first tea-party and settled his tie with satisfaction — those same years had only deepened the bronze on his cheek and turned him into a distinguished-looking man — and he was her senior by three years. He could not understand her having gone off like that: those small, fair women generally looked younger than they really were. The girl used to have plenty of "go" in he : never flagged at the end of a dance.

       Only the major forgot that the dawn is apt to look different creeping into a ball-room and watched for by a sick bed.

       Somehow, Miss Browne forgot all those long hours after the major came back. They slipped back into the shadows and left in their place memories which had been consigned to the past long ago — locked up and put away on a shelf.

       Back they came, softly trooping, all these memories. Back, with noiseless footstep and spirit-bodies. It was like a soft west wind, damp with tears and sweet with the breath of flowers. In the night it whispered to Miss Browne and left her smiling. By day it painted a pink blush on her cheeks and made her eyes shine.

       The major began to think he was mistaken. Miss Browne had not "gone off" quite so much. Why, her complexion was quite good still; and her summer gowns were much more becoming than the winter ones. He called at The Cottage with his sister and had a long talk over old days. There is something very pleasant in being able to say, "Do you remember?"

       Distance will ever have a wonderful power of gilding a past view.

       Miss Browne, picking her way along the road, found it very hot.

       "I don't think the rain can be over yet," she said to herself. "It feels like a thunderstorm and the sun is so scorching. I will go across the end of the park and out into the lane. That will be much more shady."

       The grass in the park was damp and cool to the feet, a great improvement on the road. Under the trees a few cows flicked their tails lazily and chewed the cud. It was very peaceful.

       "This is very pleasant," said Miss Browne, with a sigh of satisfaction.

       She reached the end of the park and put down her basket to open the gate. It was high and red and somewhat stiff. Miss Browne pulled valiantly at the latch. It would not stir. Her parasol was put down by the basket, leaving both hands free for the refractory lock. Still it did not move.

       "This is very funny," said Miss Browne; "it has always opened before!"

       Then she tried to lift it, but it was too heavy. Through the bars she could see the white bridge, and the little stream, called by courtesy a "river," rippling gaily along, and the farm buildings standing like pictures of rural repose. Perhaps some of the men might be there working. She listened. No sound, except the soft gurgling of the water, or the hum of the bees in the limes. Everything seemed to be slumbering in the summer heat.

       Miss Browne shook the gate with all her might.

       "You must open," she said, but it did not seem to produce the smallest effect.

       Her exertions were making her very warm. It was too hot and too far to go back and retrace her way by the road, and Mrs. Peat must be visited to-day. The high park paling offered no solution of the difficulty.

       Miss Browne looked all round. She peered through the bars — up the lane — across the water, at the farm building. Not a soul in sight. The parasol and basket were put gently through the gate on to the ground.

       "I must do it," said Miss Browne.

       Then she began to climb. It seemed a long way up. Her cheeks became quite pink, her hands trembled a little with excitement. It took much longer than was absolutely necessary, because her petticoats were such an anxiety. Suppose they should ascend even the eighth of an inch beyond what decorum prescribed!

       The top was reached at last; it seemed a fearful height. Three more bars down on the other side and then Miss Browne jumped. What a relief to be on terra firma again! She paused a moment to recover breath after all her exertions, then took up parasol and basket and went briskly down the lane.

       Exactly five minutes after she had disappeared round the corner, the major came out from the farm-yard, and stood gravely contemplating the red gate.

       "Eight feet, if it's an inch," he said decisively. "Well, a woman who climbed that must have plenty of go left in her!"

*       *       *       *      *

       It was the next day. The thunderstorm had come and gone, and they were walking by the river in the evening light.

       Under the trees on the hill the long shadows lay darkly, but down there in the low meadows a flood of light from the ruddy west made the water golden. Every now and then came the quick note of a partridge from a distant field.

       "Yes, I go back to India in October," the major had been saying; "but I hope to have three happy months first."

       His hands were full of pale cuckoo flowers and yellow iris and forget-me-nots, which they had picked from the river's brim.

       Miss Browne had a little knot of wild roses and honeysuckle at her neck. She had not worn flowers for so long.

       "You will be glad to get back?" she said interrogatively.

       The major hesitated.

       "For some things — yes. But, after all, a man gets tired of knocking about the world and wants to be quiet."

       "I think," said Miss Browne a little wistfully, "that Gordon was right when he said, 'It is hopeless to seek quiet in places; it must be quiet in one's self.'"

       The buttercups and daisies and tall brown grasses nodded to her a sleepy assent from out the hay. "Yes," they whispered, "yes."

       "Yes," answered the major's voice beside her. "Yet one feels as if nothing could disturb a peaceful scene like this. It is almost too good to last."

       Miss Browne felt she would not mind if it went on for ever.

       "It is nice," she said dreamily, "and cool after the rain."

       They were walking up the lane now, going home.

       "That thunderstorm yesterday afternoon cleared the air," answered the major. "By-the-bye, I hope you did not get caught in it, Miss Browne? That road with all the trees over-hanging it is not a pleasant place during a storm."

       A cloud seemed to cover Miss Browne's sky.

       "You — you — were out yesterday afternoon?" she queried, as, if it were an unusual thing. Through her mind rushed the thought, "he saw!" Then reason came to the rescue. There were two entrances to the lane. "Two ends." repeated Miss Browne firmly. She breathed freely again.

       "I only went down to the farm to find the bailiff," the major said.

       He could have bitten out his tongue the next moment rather than confessed the fact.

       Miss Browne flushed scarlet.

       "It was such a long way round — and Mrs. Peat expected a visit — and there had been so much to do — and the heat —–"

       Miss Browne blundered on in an incoherent and unnecessary explanation, oblivious of the fact that she was in no way answerable for her actions to the major, who only gave a grave assent when she paused for breath.

       "Of course you could not go back all that long way."

       "And I have never done such a thing before," went on the little woman hurriedly. "It was so high up, and I was afraid my legs — I mean —–"

       Miss Browne stopped in the direst confusion she had ever experienced.

       The major behaved beautifully. Not a muscle of his face moved. He looked straight before him in apparently utter unconsciousness of the flaming cheeks by his side.

       "The only way to conquer obstacles is to get over them," he began gravely, as if he were reading from an essay. And then he went on talking at random of obstacles in the abstract, and how they were conquered, and who had done it in the world. Probably a good deal was nonsense, but it led the conversation away from dangerous ground and cooled Miss Browne's cheeks, so that by the time The Cottage was reached she was quite happy again.

       The major hid a gentle, chivalrous way with women, which they all liked, and made Mrs. Grant at the Rectory declare "he was the most perfect gentleman she had ever met." And now he made Miss Browne feel in some unconscious manner that he not only did not ridicule her adventure of yesterday, but very much admired people for not letting themselves be daunted by obstacles.

       The fact of the case was that, while walking through the farm, he had heard the gate rattle, and going to find out the cause, was just in time to see Miss Browne, begin the descending portion of her exploit. His first impulse had been to go forward and help; his second, a feeling that, having accomplished so much, she would rather be left alone unnoticed; whereupon he retreated into an adjacent barn.

       He did not tell her all this in so many words, but Miss Browne had a comfortable feeling that she had not been laughed at: only pitied.

       "And so, Miss Browne," finished the major, "you must remember in future that I shall like to help you over any difficulties; even such prosaic ones as gates."

       He said that with the spell of the June evening upon him, and one hand full of her flowers, while the other held Miss Browne's in a firm, strong clasp.

       And the little woman, with pink cheeks and shining eyes, went in humming a bit of an old song:

"There was but a smile, one sweet swift smile  As we parted at the door,"

and wondered why she felt so happy.

       "Years don't make one old," she whispered to the moonlight two hours later. "I feel like a girl to-night.

       The roses over the porch waved their long tendrils to and fro and softly kissed her face.

       "And if you please, ma'am, mother does hope you'll be able to come immediate, for she don't know what's the matter with Emma Jane."

       It was no unusual thing for Miss Browne to be summoned to act the part of nurse or doctor by some anxious mother, but this morning Maggie Smith's voice seemed to belong to another world.

       Mechanically, and from force of habit, she put on her hat and followed the girl, who trotted along by her side, talking volubly.

       "Mother's had no rest with her these three nights, and she ain't been well for days; not since she went into Hengate."

       The flowers smiled at her with friendly eyes; the trees rustled their green leaves soothingly.

       "You will see him to-day," they told her.

       "She be all over spots, she be," continued Maggie, but here her explanations ceased abruptly, by reason of their arrival at the door.

       When Miss Browne came out again, she was her own brisk, vigorous self.

       "I am sure that will be best," she said to the doctor as they walked down the little path.

       "It is a great risk," he said hesitatingly, having exhausted all his other arguments and secretly knowing she was right.

       "One cannot always think of risk," answered Miss Browne decidedly. "There is no one to nurse the child, and I have no one to think of except myself. The family cannot move out of their. cottage; and that empty house on the hill is sufficiently isolated to serve as a hospital. We must think of the village; it would be an awful thing to have small-pox here."

       And the doctor could not contradict her.

       By the evening everything was done: the cottage disinfected, the mother properly cautioned about allowing the children to mix with others, and Miss Browne established with her patient in the empty house on the hill.

       "We shall be there some weeks, Eliza, so I trust everything to you and cook," she had said, in the brief moments spent at home putting things away preparatory to her absence. "No, you must not try to stop me, for I shall come back quite right, please God."

       She said that to herself again several times, as she looked out of her lonely windows on the hill and watched the village life going on below her. And then she said something else too, which never left her mind. "Going back to India in October; but three happy months first."

       Every week of those months now was one lost to her. They went so fast, though each day dragged. Not a soul to speak to. Nothing to do but sit and watch the little sufferer and read the daily paper brought by the doctor.

       He told her she was a heroine, shut up there by her own will, fighting the foe for the sake of the village. But she laughed at him incredulously.

       "Not a heroine, oh no! doctor. You see I have no one else to think of."

       "But you are one," thought the doctor to himself, as he looked round the bare room. No carpet, no curtains; only the bed, a chair, and absolute necessities: nothing that could carry the smallest fear of infection.

       He went away and fiercely repeated his opinion to the first person who suggested that Miss Browne's conduct was "eccentric," "foolish."

       "Foolish, yes, perhaps so. But if the world were made up of fools like that, perhaps it would be a better place."

       Emma Jane, being naturally strong, soon threw off her illness, and after a fortnight at the sea, was restored to her family fresh and rosy. But the mantle of sickness fell down on Miss Browne and wrapped her tightly in its folds.

       People were very kind, they sent flowers and fruit and all kinds of delicacies, and the doctor brought his cleverest nurse; and between them all they pulled Miss Browne out of the demon's clutches, and pronounced her — lying back like a shadow in the big chair — "quite convalescent."

       "And when you have had a little sea air you will be able to go home as well as ever," cried the doctor triumphantly. It was a feather in his cap, and there had not been a single other case in the village.

       But Miss Browne on1y smiled back and thanked him for his kindness and care; then looked away out of her window.

       Every day she had watched the trees through those long weeks. They were the only things visible from her bed, and the green had begun to turn golden and brown. "Three months." There was not one left. Then India. But she went to the sea obediently, and tried to enjoy the invigorating breezes, and was more than glad to come back to be fussed over by her faithful domestics. They had taken such care of everything, and the flowers seemed brighter than ever.

       "Only she's so altered, I wouldn't have known her," sobbed cook to Eliza in the kitchen.

       It was not only the thin little hands and tired feet, but the smooth pink cheeks were gone for ever. The deep1y-scarred skin served to show in what battle the warrior had fought. Miss Browne tied her bonnet-strings with trembling fingers and arranged her veil to hide its ravages.

       "For you really must come and have tea with us before my brother goes," Mrs. Fairbeach said that morning. "It is so nice to have you amongst us again, dear Miss Browne; and I shall send the carriage, so that you may not be tired."

       There were no months or weeks left, only days. Perhaps that did not matter now.

       Miss Browne shivered a little as she drove to the Hall. She was shivering more when she came back.

       "Good-bye," she repeated, as the major helped her into the carriage; "good-bye." And they both knew it was a real farewell.

       She kept up bravely, trying to smile, that the servants might not see.

       "It's all right. Only I wonder why people mind so much about the bodies when the hearts are just the same," said Miss Browne.

       She had known it all along. Known it, though her hungry heart clung to a last hope as a drowning man clutches at a straw. Known it, when she lifted her poor face to the major's and saw his involuntary start at the change. Known it, by the pitying kindness with which her chair, her cup, and every attention had been tended.

       She hummed the last words of the old song to herself, as she went into the house:

"So far apart our pathways since that summer eve have been,  Such joys have been lost,  Such sweet dreams crossed,  So much we have done and seen. Perhaps we two shall never walk through a sunset hour again, But I can recall each step of it all : is the memory joy or pain?"

       Pain was uppermost this evening.

       "I am forty-two," she said deliberately to her looking-glass, sitting down in front of it; "and perhaps I shall spend just as many years over again: only —–" And then came the long, long pause, and the face bent down on the trembling hands. "Only," sobbed Miss Browne through her scalding tears, "it seems as if the love had been thrown away and wasted."

       By-and-bye, when Eliza came in for orders, she was calmer.

       "Nothing more to-night, thank you, Eliza," she said gently. "I am very tired, and shall go to bed."

       And she did; taking such a long rest that Eliza and cook were frightened, and sent for the doctor; who came, and talked about over-excitement and a weak heart. And with an unnecessary use of his handkerchief, "She would never have been very strong again, poor soul."

       So sleep on, Miss Browne. Sleep quietly under your green grave, while the wind softly rustles through the grass, and the daisies open their gold eyes every morning to greet the sun. I don't think your scarred face will matter in the land to which you have gone; because we know that everything there is made perfect.

       And your wasted love? Well, some one has told us that God gathers up the" wasted loves" for Himself; and perhaps you will find yours waiting for you when you wake up "satisfied."

(THE END)