I believed all I heard.

I was desperate.

_I am married_, and all is over.

Only forget,--it is all that remains for either of us." And thus ended the whole romance and ideal of life for Augustine St.
Clare.

But the _real_ remained,--the _real_, like the flat, bare, oozy tide-mud, when the blue sparkling wave, with all its company of gliding boats and white-winged ships, its music of oars and chiming waters, has gone down, and there it lies, flat, slimy, bare,--exceedingly real.
Of course, in a novel, people's hearts break, and they die, and that is the end of it; and in a story this is very convenient.