if her seeing him brought down the heavens.

It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long hours
they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get ready
to start.

Only those who have taken such a step can understand the  of
deciding, the  of  in the execution, the trembling that
Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door and lifted
the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for it was near the
door of her mother's room--and then crept out like a guilty  into
the dark dampness of the night, groping her way to the gate, and
stumbling along down the road. It had been raining, and there was not
one star-twinkle in the sky; the only light was that of -worms
illuminating here and there two or three blades of grass by feeble
shining. Now and then a -fly made a spot of light in the blackness,
only to leave a deeper spot of blackness when he shut off his
intermittent ray. And when at last Julia found herself at the place
where the path entered the woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more
frightful. She had to grope, recognizing every deviation from the
well-beaten path by the rustle of