Ruth that she might perhaps love him some day; when he was worthy of it,

and when he could offer her something better than a partnership in his

poverty.

"I should work with a great deal better heart, Ruth," he said the morning

he was taking leave, "if I knew you cared for me a little."

Ruth was looking down; the color came faintly to her cheeks, and she

hesitated. She needn't be looking down, he thought, for she was ever so

much shorter than tall Philip.

"It's not much of a place, Ilium," Philip went on, as if a little

geographical remark would fit in here as well as anything else, "and I

shall have plenty of time to think over the responsibility I have taken,

and--" his observation did not seem to be coming out any where.

But Ruth looked up, and there was a light in her eyes that quickened

Phil's pulse. She took his hand, and said with serious sweetness:

Thee mustn't lose heart, Philip." And then she added, in another mood,

Thee knows I graduate in the summer and shall have my diploma. And if

any thing happens--mines explode sometimes--thee can send for me.

Farewell."

The opening of the Ilium coal mine was begun with energy, but without

many omens of success. Philip was running a tunnel into the breast of

519

The Gilded Age