‘Hurrah!’ I cried, ‘it’s all right. I shall get that poor child here after all, and be able to patch up her broken life. No, I sha’n’t, though,’ I continued, as I went on reading, and then, to my husband’s astonishment, I fell on his neck, and burst into tears. ‘Oh, Dick, Dick, Dick, I _am_ so glad!’ ‘Halloa! what’s up now?’ said that vulgar Dick, in his own way of expressing things. ‘My darling, she’s got him again.’ ‘Who’s got which?’ ‘Mrs Graham’s husband has returned. He wasn’t drowned, but let me finish the letter,’ and drying my eyes I went on— ‘Just imagine how awkward and unpleasant for me. The other evening there was an awful screaming in the kitchen, and when I went down, I found Mrs Graham fainted dead away in the arms of a man. I was very angry at first, naturally; but when she recovered I found it was her husband whom she thought was drowned at sea three months ago. It seems he was picked up insensible by some ship, and taken to Spain, where he had a fever, and was delirious, and all that sort of thing; and when he recovered, he worked his way home before the mast, and had only just found out where his wife lived. But I think it is excessively unreasonable of people to take situations, and say they’re widows, and then—’ ‘Oh, don’t read any more of that rubbish, for heaven’s sake!’ said Dick, irreverently. ‘The long and the short of the matter is, that the girl’s got her man again.’ ‘Oh! I _am_ so thankful!’ I exclaimed, with the tears still in my eyes; I couldn’t help it, they _would_ come. ‘Poor child! poor, desolate, heart-broken child! What a heaven earth must appear to her to-day. Dick, will you drive me over to the farm directly after breakfast? I want to see her and congratulate her.’ ‘You seem to take a vast interest in this Mrs Graham, and her joys and sorrows,’ said Dick; ‘why is it, Dolly?’ ‘Because I can sympathise with them so deeply. Because—because—oh, Dick, _you_ know—because God has given me—you, and I am the very happiest woman in all the world.’ THE END. [Illustration] LOST IN THE MARSHES.