Early the next morning Rowton returned home. Nance was standing in the garden when she suddenly saw her husband cross the lawn; he had walked over from Pitstow. Nancy, whose face was very pale, and under whose eyes were large black shadows, looked, when she suddenly beheld his face, as if a ray of the spring had got into her heart. She uttered an almost inarticulate cry of joy, and sprang into his arms. “At last,” she panted, “at last. Oh! how cruelly I have missed you.” “And I you, sweetheart,” he answered. “Let us forget the past now we are together again.” “Yes, at last,” she panted. She laid her head on his breast. Her happiness was so intense that her breath came fast and hurriedly. “Look me in the face, little woman,” said Rowton. “Why darling, you are changed; how thin you have got, and your eyes so big—too big. What is it, Nancy?” “I have been starving,” said Nancy. “Ah, I might have guessed,” he said, clasping her again to him. “Well, I have returned. I, too, have starved and suffered; but this is plenty after famine. Kiss me, Nance, kiss me many times.” “You are never going away again?” she asked after a pause. “I cannot live if you do it again, Adrian.” “Let us think of nothing gloomy to-day. I am pretty safe to remain for a time.” The new footman, whose name was Jacob, was seen at that moment crossing the lawn bearing a letter on a salver. “From Lady Georgina Strong, and the messenger is waiting,” he said to Nance. Nance took the letter impatiently, opened it, glanced through its contents, and spoke: “Lady Georgina wants to dine here to-night—shall we have her?” she asked, as she glanced up at her husband. “Yes,” he replied, “we must not make ourselves hermits. Tell the messenger to wait,” said Rowton, speaking to the servant, whose eyes, after glancing at him, were fixed on the ground. “Say Mrs. Rowton will send a note in a moment.” Jacob turned obediently and went back to the house. “A new footman?” said Rowton. “Have you engaged another servant, or has one of the other domestics left us?” “Yes, George has gone,” said Nance. She had forgotten all about Jacob, to whose presence she had become quite accustomed, but at her husband’s words a great flush of colour rose to her cheeks. “George went for a silly reason,” she said; “he was quite nervous about the plate. This man has come in his stead—he seems a good servant.” “Doubtless, dearest,” said Rowton. “Now let us go into the house. I must send to the station for my luggage, and you had better scribble a line to Lady Georgina. Tell her the prodigal has returned, and that to-night we kill the fatted calf.” Nance laughed a laugh of pure pleasure. The note was despatched, and a messenger sent for Rowton’s luggage; after which the pair had lunch together and then went out into the grounds. The day was a spring one, warm and balmy; crocuses and snowdrops bloomed gaily in the garden; the trees were putting out their first spring buds.