"Where are they now--the friends I loved so well? My outstretched hands clutch only empty air! I call on those who loved me--Like a knell The silence echoes to my question--Where?"
Isabella was sitting in her favourite place, a writing-board on her knees, a pen in her hand. On a low table beside her lay a pile of manuscript and several books, but the sheet of paper in front of her was blank. She had intended to work, but for once her mind refused to centre itself upon the task in hand. It was not often that she allowed her thoughts to tempt her to idleness, for experience had taught her that they were apt to lead far away from the straight grey road of the Actual into the shadowy realms of Might-Have-Been, and along paths paved with pain and bordered with regret.
But to-day as she sat there old memories crowded so thickly upon her that she could not drive them back, old scenes appeared before her mental vision blotting out the well-loved and familiar view of heath and sky and sea. There seemed to be no particular reason why the past should call to her so insistently to-day; there was, so far as she knew, nothing to account for it, nothing had happened to remind her particularly of the girlhood which lay so far behind her, and of bygone days when the hours had been all too short for the joy they had contained.
Since the day when Philippa had unfolded her plans for the future, Isabella had relinquished all hope of seeing Francis again, and had quietly schooled herself to accept the fact that in his life there was no place for her. His health had been restored, as by a miracle, and he remembered her existence, but that was all.
None but herself knew how greatly she had longed and hoped for the day when his clouded mind would once more awake to the recollection of her and of their friendship. How many times had she promised herself that when the moment came he would turn to his old comrade in his loneliness and grasp her strong hand for help and comfort! But the time had come and gone, and he had not wanted her; there was nothing she could do for him.
She had faced the bitter truth with all the courage she could muster, and forced herself into calmness and acquiescence. For her the memory of the past remained. In her inmost heart she had long ago erected a shrine--a shrine where Memory was enthroned--a boyish, virile figure with all the hope and joy of his young manhood on his beautiful, eager face.