“I am afraid it is too true,” said Nathanael, leaving his wife, to whom he had been talking by the window. “I shall have to hunt him out, and use all my persuasions before he will come home; because he is too proud to return poor as he went out. What shall I say to him, Anne? I shall start to-morrow.” Agatha turned quickly round. Her husband did not see her anxious look--he was watching Miss Valery. “Tell him, Nathanael, that his brother is dead, and his presence needed in the family. Once make him understand that it is right to come, and he will come. No one was ever more able to do or to suffer _for the right_, than Brian Harper.” Marmaduke shook her hand heartily. “Anne, you are as wise as a man, and as faithful as a woman. If poor Brian were going to be hanged for murder, I do believe-his old friend would find a good word to say for him!” “Well,” said Nathanael, after a silence, “I shall go to Havre to-morrow. You can spare me, Anne? And for my wife”-- Agatha hung her head. A vague dread smote her. She would have given worlds to have courage enough to beg him not to go. “Havre is across the sea,” she murmured. “Surely Uncle Brian would come home in time, if you waited.” Waited! she caught a sight of Anne's bent profile, marble-like, with the shut eyes. Waited! Agatha crept to her husband's side. “No--no waiting,” she whispered. “Go. I would not keep you back an hour. Bring him. Quick--quick.” Could Anne have heard, that she wakened up into such a life-like smile? “No, dear, you must not send your husband away so hastily. Let him sail from Southampton to-morrow; that will do. He wants to talk to you to-day.” Nathanael looked surprised. “It is true, I did; and I told my brother to meet me here this afternoon. Did you know that too?” “I guessed it. You are doing right, quite right. I knew you would. I knew _you_, Nathanael.” She held out her hand to him, warmly. “Dear Anne! But you forget--it is not I only who have to do it.” “Not a word! Go and tell her all. Let her be the first to hear it. Away with you! the sun is coming out. Run and talk in the garden-alleys, children!” Her manner, so playful, yet full of keen penetration, drove them away like a battery of sunbeams. “What does she mean?” said Agatha, looking up puzzled, as they stood in the hall. “She reads people's minds wonderfully clear; she always did, but clearer than ever now. It is strange. Agatha, do you think”-- “I think all sorts of things about her--different and contrary every hour. But the chief thought of all is, that you must go to Havre at once. I long for Uncle Brian's coming. How soon can you return?” “As soon as practicable, you may be sure of that. But you must relax your interest even in Uncle Brian just now; I want to talk to you. Shall we go, as Anne said, into the garden-alleys?” “Anywhere that is sunny and warm,” said Agatha, with a light shiver. Her husband regarded her with that serious pathetic smile which was one of his frequent moods.