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Mrs. Townsend sighed as she said she thought it was.

“But did he ever tell you the name of the woman who jilted him?”

“I know her first name.”

“What was it?”

“Maria.”

The plump little widow almost started out of her chair, the name was spoken so exactly as Sam would have said it.

“Did you know her, too?” he asked, looking keenly at her.

“Yes.”

“Intimately?”

“Yes.”

“Where is she now? Still happy with her husband, I suppose, and never giving a thought to the poor fellow she drove out into the world?”

“No,” said Mrs. Townsend, shading her face with her hand, and speaking unsteadily; “no, her husband is dead.”

“Ah! but still she never thinks of Sam.”

There was a dead silence.

“Does she?”

“How can I tell?”

“Are you still friends?”

“Yes.”

“Then you ought to know, and you do. Tell me.”

“I’m sure I don’t know why I should. But if I do, you must promise me, on your honor, never to tell him, if you ever meet him again.”

“Madam, what you say to me never shall be repeated to any mortal man, upon my honor.”

“Well, then, she does remember him.”

“But how?”

“As kindly, I think, as he could wish.”

“I am glad to hear it, for his sake. You and I are the friends of both parties: we can rejoice with each other.”

He drew his chair much nearer hers, and took her hand. One moment the widow resisted, but it was a magnetic touch, the rosy palm lay quietly in his, and the dark beard bent so low that it nearly touched her shoulder. It did not matter much. Was he not Samuel’s dear friend? If he was not the rose, had he not dwelt very near it, for a long, long time?

“It was a foolish quarrel that parted them,” said the stranger, softly.

“Did he tell you about it?”

“Yes, on board the whaler.”

“Did he blame her much?”

“Not so much as himself. He said that his jealousy and ill-temper drove her to break off the match; but he thought sometimes if he had only gone back and spoken kindly to her, she would have married him after all.”

“I am sure she would,” said the widow piteously. “She has owned it to me more than a thousand times.”

“She was not happy, then, with another.”

“Mr.–that is to say, her husband–was very good and kind,” said the little woman, thinking of the lonely grave out on the hillside rather penitently, “and they lived very pleasantly together. There never was a harsh word between them.”

“Still–might she not have been happier with Sam? Be honest, now, and say just what you think.”

“Yes.”

“Bravo! that is what I wanted to come at. And now I have a secret to tell you, and you must break it to her.”

Mrs. Townsend looked rather scared.

“What is it?”

“I want you to go and see her, wherever she may be, and say to her, ‘Maria,’–what makes you start so?”

“Nothing; only you speak so like some one I used to know, once in a while.”

“Do I? Well, take the rest of the message. Tell her that Sam loved her through the whole; that, when he heard she was free, he began to work hard at making a fortune. He has got it; and he is coming to share it with her, if she will let him. Will you tell her this?”

The widow did not answer. She had freed her hand from his, and covered her face with it. By and by she looked up again–he was waiting patiently.

“Well?”

“I will tell her.”

He rose from his seat, and walked up and down the room. Then he came back, and leaning on the mantel-piece, stroked the yellow hide of Bose with his slipper.

“Make her quite understand that he wants her for his wife. She may live where she likes and how she likes, only it must be with him.”

“I will tell her.”

“Say he has grown old, but not cold; that he loves her now perhaps better than he did twenty years ago; that he has been faithful to her all through his life, and that he will be faithful till he dies.”

The Californian broke off suddenly. The widow answered still, “I will tell her.”

“And what do you think she will say?” he asked, in an altered tone.

“What can she say but Come!”

“Hurrah!”

The stranger caught her out of her chair as if she had been a child, and kissed her.

“Don’t–oh, don’t!” she cried out. “I am Sam’s Maria!”

“Well–I am Maria’s Sam!”

Off went the dark wig and the black whiskers–there smiled the dear face she had not forgotten! I leave you to imagine the tableau; even the cat got up to look, and Bose sat on his stump of a tail, and wondered if he was on his heels or his head.

The widow gave one little scream, and then she–

But, stop! Quiet people like you and me, dear reader, who have got over all these follies, and can do nothing but turn up our noses at them, have no business here. I will only add that two hearts were very happy, that Bose concluded after a while that all was right, and so lay down to sleep again, and that one week afterward, on Christmas Eve, there was a wedding at the house that made the neighbors stare. The widow had married her First Love!