“Ah! I forget. I am in my dotage already!” he answered, confusedly. “I have not got used just yet to the pleasure of seeing your kind face again.” It was indeed a pleasure to look at that face now, after Lomaque’s last experience of it. Three years of repose, though they had not restored to Rose those youthful attractions which she had lost forever in the days of the Terror, had not passed without leaving kindly outward traces of their healing progress. Though the girlish roundness had not returned to her cheeks, or the girlish delicacy of color to her complexion, her eyes had recovered much of their old softness, and her expression all of its old winning charm. What was left of latent sadness in her face, and of significant quietness in her manner, remained gently and harmlessly--remained rather to show what had been once than what was now. When they were all seated, there was, however, something like a momentary return to the suspense and anxiety of past days in their faces, as Trudaine, looking earnestly at Lomaque, asked, “Do you bring any news from Paris?” “None,” he replied; “but excellent news, instead, from Rouen. I have heard, accidentally, through the employer whom I have been serving since we parted, that your old house by the river-side is to let again.” Rose started from her chair. “Oh, Louis, if we could only live there once more! My flower-garden?” she continued to Lomaque. “Cultivated throughout,” he answered, “by the late proprietor.” “And the laboratory?” added her brother. “Left standing,” said Lomaque. “Here is a letter with all the particulars. You may depend upon them, for the writer is the person charged with the letting of the house.” Trudaine looked over the letter eagerly. “The price is not beyond our means,” he said. “After our three years’ economy here, we can afford to give something for a great pleasure.” “Oh, what a day of happiness it will be when we go home again!” cried Rose. “Pray write to your friend at once,” she added, addressing Lomaque, “and say we take the house, before any one else is beforehand with us!” He nodded, and folding up the letter mechanically in the old official form, made a note on it in the old official manner. Trudaine observed the action, and felt its association with past times of trouble and terror. His face grew grave again as he said to Lomaque, “And is this good news really all the news of importance you have to tell us?” Lomaque hesitated, and fidgeted in his chair. “What other news I have will bear keeping,” he replied. “There are many questions I should like to ask first, about your sister and yourself. Do you mind allowing me to refer for a moment to the time when we last met?”