Mildred stooped to gather, half mechanically, the blue-eyed gentian that Richard was crushing under his foot; and then a specimen of the soft-tinted campanella attracted her, its cluster of bell-shaped blossoms towering over the other wildflowers.
'Shall we go down into Podgill, Aunt Milly, it is shadier than this lane?' and Mildred, who was revolving painful thoughts in her mind, followed him, still silent, through the low-hanging woods, with its winding beck and rough stepping-stones, until they came to a green slope, spanned by the viaduct.
'Let us sit down here, Richard; how quiet and cool it is!' and Mildred seated herself on the grass, while Richard threw himself down beside her.
'How silent we have been, Richard. I don't think either of us cared to talk; but Dr. Heriot was right--I feel refreshed already.'
'I never knew any one so thoughtful. Richard, I want to speak to you; did you ever find out that Olive wrote poetry?'
'I want to show you this; it was written on a stray leaf, and I ventured to capture it; it may help you to understand that in her own way Olive has suffered.'
Richard took the paper from her without a word; but Mildred noticed his hand shook. Was it cruel thus to call his hardness to remembrance? For a moment Mildred's soft heart wavered over the task she had set for herself.
It was scrawled in Olive's school-girl hand, and in some parts was hard to decipher, especially as now and then a blot of teardrops had rendered it illegible; but nevertheless Richard succeeded in reading it.
'How speed our lost in the Unknown Land, Our dear ones gone to that distant strand? Do they know that our hearts are sore With longing for faces that never come, With longing to hear in our silent home The voices that sound no more? There's a desolate look by the old hearth-stone, That tells of some light of the household gone To dwell with the ransomed band; But none may follow their upward track, And never, ah! never, a word comes back To tell of the Unknown Land!
'We know by a gleam on the brow so pale, When the soul bursts forth from its mortal veil, And the gentle and good departs, That the dying ears caught the first faint ring Of the songs of praise that the angels sing; But back to our yearning hearts Comes never, ah! never, a word to tell That the purified spirit we love so well Is safe on the heavenly strand; That the Angel of Death has another gem To set in the star-decked diadem Of the King of the Unknown Land!