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ROBERT MEDIATES.
One lovely evening in the first of the summer Miss St. John had
dismissed him earlier than usual, and he had wandered out for a
walk. After a round of a couple of miles, he returned by a
fir-wood, through which went a pathway. He had heard Mary St. John
say that she was going to see the wife of a labourer who lived at
the end of this path. In the heart of the trees it was growing very
dusky; but when he came to a spot where they stood away from each
other a little space, and the blue sky looked in from above with one
cloud floating in it from which the rose of the sunset was fading,
he seated himself on a little mound of moss that had gathered over
an ancient stump by the footpath, and drew out his friend's papers.
Absorbed in his reading, he was not aware of an approach till the
rustle of silk startled him. He lifted up his eyes, and saw Miss
St. John a few yards from him on the pathway. He rose.
'It's almost too dark to read now, isn't it, Robert?' she said.
'Ah!' said. Robert, 'I know this writing so well that I could read
it by moonlight. I wish I might read some of it to you. You would
like it.'
'May I ask whose it is, then? Poetry, too!'
'It's Mr. Ericson's. But I'm feared he wouldna like me to read it
to anybody but myself. And yet--'
'I don't think he would mind me,' returned Miss St. John. 'I do know
him a little. It is not as if I were quite a stranger, you know.
Did he tell you not?'
'No. But then he never thought of such a thing. I don't know if
it's fair, for they are carelessly written, and there are words and
lines here and there that I am sure he would alter if he cared for
them ae hair.'
'Then if he doesn't care for them, he won't mind my hearing them.
There!' she said, seating herself on the stump. 'You sit down on
the grass and read me--one at least.'
'You'll remember they were never intended to be read?' urged Robert,
not knowing what he was doing, and so fulfilling his destiny.
'I will be as jealous of his honour as ever you can wish,' answered
Miss St. John gaily.
Robert laid himself on the grass at her feet, and read:--
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