Poor Maurice! He came up the river early one glorious morning, and standing on the steamboat's deck watched for the first glimpse of the Cottage.

His heart was beating so that he could scarcely see, but he knew just where to look, and what to look for.

At this time of year there was no hope of seeing the fair figure watching on the verandah as it had done when he went away, but the curl of smoke from the chimney would satisfy him and prove that his darling was still in her old home.
He watched eagerly, breathlessly.

Everything was so bright, that his spirits had risen, and he felt almost certain he was in time.

There, the last bend of the river was turned, and now the trees that grew about the Cottage and his father's house were visible--now the Cottage itself.
But suddenly his heart seemed to grow still--there was the house, there was the garden where he and Lucia had worked, there was the slope where they had walked together that last evening--but all was desolate.