Twice Loved

■Coiné, Bessie, nurse is waiting! Run now, and let lier attend to your curls, you must look very neat, or Mr. Irvmg will not love you. It is almost dinner f time,' said Bessie's mother. Immediately the cbild aróse, raised ( her sweet lips to kiss her mamma, and followed the nurse from the room. 'It is perfeetly wonderful how much ; influence Mr. Irving has over that child! Just teil her to do anything, and say it will please him, and that is enough. I never saw anything like it,' said Mrs. Wallace to a friend sitting beside her, who aiiswered - 'I have, andl woiild not eucourage - or rather I would endeavor to overeóme that influenee.' 'Now, my dear Georgia, what is troubling that wiste head of yours? What means that grave look and anxious light in your eye?' 'Fannie, I'm perfeetly astonished at people whose duty it is to watch over and guard their little ones, especially their girls, from jprrows, planting in their young hearts seeds which may grow to be thorns, and treating children as though they were void of any deeper thought and feeling than the appreciation of a dolí or box of toys. I am sure some children of five years have hearts that love as devoutedly and suffer as keenly as many of maturer years. You are shaking your head. I want to teil you a little story to prove my assertion. We have half an hour before dinner, will vou listen?' 'Yes, certainly; but it must have a happy endiDg,' answered Mrs. Wallace. 'I cannot promise; perhaps the end hasnotyet come. You know Hettie Le Roy?' 'I do, certaiuly; a lovelier girl I nev.er knew. Why she never married has been a source of wonder lo me.' 'Twenty-üve years ago, when just as loving, too, a young man crossed her paLh. We will cali him Jos Hewberry. He was the classmate anddearestfriend of Hettie's brother. At a party given during the Christmas hohdays by Mrs. La Eoy, Joe, to pique one of the girls, attached himselí' for the evening to little Hettie, dancing with her, promenading tlirough the rooms, with her tiny hands clasped in his, much to the annoyance of many bright-eyed maidens, who really were envious of the babyairl. 'Joe wa3 handaorne aud very fascinating, a universal favorite with the ladies, young and old. Several mammas tried to draw him away f rom his 'ñttle love,' as lie called her, and manoeuvering to get her from him. But all in vain, until wearily the sunny head dropped, and with her arms around his neck, her sweet lipa giving the good night kiss, she sank to sleep. Silently then heresigned her to her nurse's care. 'Every day from tliat time he carne to the house. His home was quite near. At the sound of tas voice Hettie sprang forward with outstretched arma to meet him. I have seen her, with her hand in his, looking up in his face for hours, seemingly perfectly happy. 'Of course this was noted by the f amily and commented upon. The child's older sisters and brcthers could win her to do their will by saying, '111 teil Mr. Hewberry if you don't, and he won't love you then.' Daily she gathered a little bouquet f or him, and when the autumn days came and flowers were few, the 'little love' would watch closely the siowly opening buds, lest some one else should get them. So the days passed by for two years, and then for a time she was separated f rom the one she had giown to love so dearly. 'Better than a brother?' they would sometimea ask her. 'Yes,' would come the whispered answer. 'But thau sister?' 'Yes.' Without any hesitatiou the whispered answer come. 'Than father and mother?' 'And then the deep blue eyes would grow so earnest, and the pretty lips would part and close again, as if uuwilling to utter the words she f eared might wound. When pressed to answer, her eyes sought mamma and papa, as if imploring their forgiveness, and 'I can't help it just a hule more,' sáe murmurea, and buried her head in Joe's bosom. She clung around his neck and begged to be with him when the hour of parting came. With promises of a speedy return he managed to soothe her. 'Perhaps the child might have in time been weancd from this strange attachment if they had ceased to talk to her of biin. But possessing, as it were, magie wand to guide her actions, they used it freely. 'How well I remember her as she stood eagerly watching the postman, as he eame from door to door. As nearer he drew, she became more excited and anxious that her heart trembled lest she should be disappointed. But the letter carne, and with a wild cry of joy she pressed it to her bosom, and ran with it for her mammy to read, 'His absence was short. He returned bringing her for a Christmas pressnt a pretty little chain to which was attached a locket with his portrait. For Joe she learned to read, to write ; for him she would grow brave, and with his hand holding hers, she had her flrst teeth drawn. 'When ill with fever, tossing restlessly from side to side, his hand could ways quiet, bis voice sootbe. Without a murmur she would take f rom him the nauseous doses. 'How will all this end?' I asked her mother once, and lightly she replied : 'Oh, all rigbt, of course. She will learn to love some one nearer her own age when the proper time comes, and he will be married long beforethen. He has a distant coasin whom, I am inclined to think, he is engaged to. I am very sure their parents are anxious for their union.' 'As Hetty grewolder, alittle shyness crept gradually into her marmer. Still the love was there. Once, in a moment of conQdence, she came to me and asked : 'Do you believe Mr. Hewberry loves Cora Cushing better than he loves me? Fred says he does - that he remained by her all the time at the party last night I wish I was old OL.ough to go to parties And I wish- indeed I do - ' What, Ilettie? I asked, as sne nestated. 'I wish Cora Cusliiug dida't live iu bis world- indeed I do!' nodding her iead decidedly, while striving to f orce Dack the tears. Oh! Oh! Ilettie, this is dreadful!' I said, drawing her within my arms. 'Well, then, I wish Mr. Hewberry and I lived somewhere else, where Cora Cushing would'nt come,' she sobbed. 'I assured her that Joe did not love Cora Cushing; that Fred was only teasing her. - When she was tenyears old, Joe was suddenly called away by the severe 111ness of his nearest relative, an uncle. There was only time for a hasty goodby, my 'little love!' Make haste to grow fast and be a tall girl when I come back, he said, ki&sing her. His going was so sudden sbe did not eem to realize it. 1 was glad it waa. 3ut how I pitied the UUle thing, when lay af ter day, as she bad done for years, he sat and watchod. 'Maybe he might come,' she n.uid once ,o me. 'Letters came often to F red, witli messages of love for her, with sometimes a little note accompanying a gift Food enough to keep her loving little heart from the suffering he gave, aud f uel enough to keep the love brightly burning. But he carne not, nor prom ised of hia coming. Time passed on; the pretty child grew to be a beautif ui malden. Youthi gathered about her, and friends had ceased totalk of Joe. Other name were mentioned as his had been, ye none could win an answering smile o blush. I kiiew for whom her love wa kept. 'The waiting, yearniug look in he eves eave way at last, aud a joyou light broke forth. Joe was comin back. A letter to Fred brought th glad tidiDgs. He wrote- 'I've a secret to teil you, dear boy But no- I'll keep it for a surprise, i which you will rejoice for my sake, am sure. Ia a fewdays I shall be wit you.' 'Again, as in her baby days, Hettie began her watching. Oh, I kuow her beart was siDging a joyous soug, tïiough the sweet lips gave no sound. 'She stood in the porch, waiting his coming, clothed in tleecy white, roses in her hair, and a bright smile playing. upon her face, 'Hettie!' Tred came toward her. The boy's face had lost its usual look of merriïnent - his voice, its careless tone. 'Hettie, Joe, came by the train a while ago' - he paused, darting an anxious, searchingglance at his sister' e face 'and he was not alone, l'll not let him surprise you little sis. l've hurried home to teil you his wife is with him.' 'The light yf ent. out of eye and heart. The blush faded quickly on the young face, and.whiter than the dress she wore, she put iorth her hand to grasp the balustrade. Tred sprang forward to catch her fainting form. Likea broken lily, he bore her in. And when Joe came she knew it not. 'ï'or many daya her geatle spirit hovered between the shores. Sometirnes, since, l've almost regretted that it passed not away to the other and brighter one. But she was lef t with us f or a wise purpose, I know "She has never scen Joe Hewberry since his marriage. Three years af ter, she sent to his little girl who bears her name, the chain and locket she usecl to wear.' 'Where is he now ?' Mrs. Wallace asked. 'I have not heard oí hiin for years. I know not if he Uves." 'Thanks for your story, Georgia. But I wish its lesson would have been powerful.' 'True. I must proflt by it without delay. I will flend Bessie home to-morrow with mother. The change will do her good, and break the spell.' # A few days after this George Claxk came to see Bessie's mother, and said, with a bright srmle - Tve come to change the ending of my story of the other day. In f act, the end had not then come. Here are Hettie's wedding cards; her Joe haa been a widower over two years. Hear what she writes to me: 'Forgive me f or keepiug my happiness from you, my dear friend, but I have not been able to realize sufficiently that this great joy was for me to speak of to others. Now that it is so near, and he is with me, surely it must be. You, who have known so rauch, muat know all now. He loved and was pledged to ïerbeforeheknewme. Had I known it, it would have soothed greatly the agony of bygone days.' 'We were at Hettie's wedding yesterday, a happier, lovelier bride 1 never saw.' ;