The air comes laden with delicate odors and thrilling with bird melodies, and, turn the eye as it will, there is a feast of beauty.
Yet, the odors are not perceived, nor the music heard, nor the beauty seen by that musing old man and his silent daughter.

Their thoughts are not in the present, but far back in the unhappy past, the memories of which, awakened by the scene and season, have come flowing in a strong tide upon them.
Two years! They have left the prints of their heavy feet upon the life of Irene, and the deep marks will never be wholly obliterated.
She were less than human if this were not so.

Two years! Yet, not once in that long, heart-aching time had she for a single moment looked backward in weakness.

Sternly holding to her act as right, she strengthened herself in suffering, and bore her pain as if it were a decree of fate.

There was no anger in her heart, nor anything of hardness toward her husband.