“Aunt Rachel will be less bitter when she knows. But oh, Reuben, to be parted in that way for so long! Do you see it all? He wrote to her asking her to be his wife, and she wrote back, and he never had her answer, and waited for it. And she, waiting and waiting for him, and hearing nothing, thinking she had been tricked and mocked, poor thing, and growing prouder and bitterer until she went away. I never, never heard of anything so sad.” She would have none of Reuben's consoling now, though the tears were streaming down her cheeks. “Go,” she begged him--“go at once, and take it to him. Think if it were you and me!” “It would never have happened to you and me, my darling,” said Reuben. “I'd have had 'Yes' or 'No' for an answer. A man's offer of his heart is worth a 'No, thank you,' though he made it to a queen.” “Go at once,” she besought him. “I shall be unhappy till I know he knows!” “Well, my dear,” said Reuben, “if you say go, I go. But I'd as lief put my hand in a fire. The poor old man will have suffered nothing like this for many a day.” “Stop an' tek a bit o' breakfast, lad,” cried Fuller, as Reuben hurried by him, at the door which gave upon the garden. “It'll be ready i' five minutes.” “I have my orders, sir,” said Reuben, with a pale smile. “I can't stop this morning, much as I should like to.” Like most healthy men of vivid fancy he was a rapid walker, and in a few minutes he was in sight of his uncle's house. His heart failed him and he stopped short irresolutely. Should he send the letter, explaining where he found it, and how? He could hardly bear to think of looking on the pain the old man might endure. And yet would it not be kinder to be with him? Might he not be in need of some one? and if he were, who was there but his nephew--the one man of his kindred left alive? “I'll do it at once,” said Reuben, and walking straight to the door, he knocked. He would have given all he had to be away when this was done, but he had to stand his ground, and he waited a long time while a hand drew back the shrieking bolts and clattering chain within. Then the key turned in the lock. The door opened and his uncle stood before him. “Beest early this morning,” he said, with a smile. “Theer's something special brings thee here so 'soon?” “Yes,” answered Reuben, clearing his throat, “something special.” “Come in, lad,” said Ezra. “No trouble, I hope. Theer's a kind of a troubled look upon you. What is it?” Reuben entered without an immediate answer, and Ezra closed the door behind him. The gloom and the almost vault-like odors of the chamber struck upon him with a cold sense of solitude and age. They answered to the thoughts that filled him--the thoughts of his uncle's lonely and sunless life. “Trouble!” said the old man, in an inward voice. “Theer's trouble everywheer! What is it, lad?”