"Back yesterday. Good as new. English business well started. Cyclone in New York papers this morning. Please don't abuse the Maker of it. Look out for His children. Lightning doesn't strike twice in the same place. Do you want anything from here? Answer. If not, I start West at once. "CALEB." "'Tis evident he hasn't given up his habit of early rising," said Philip, as he gave the despatch to his wife. When she had read it, Grace said:-- "Dear Caleb! His return is absolutely providential, and his despatch is very like him." "I'm not quite sure of that," Philip replied, shaking his head doubtingly, yet smiling under his mustache. "To be entirely like Caleb, it should have said that the cyclone was a means of grace." "I think he distinctly intimates as much, where he refers to the Maker of the storm." "True. Well, he expects an answer, and I will make it exactly as you wish." Grace rubbed her drowsy eyes and instantly became alert. She looked inquiringly at her husband, and said:-- "Exactly as I wish? May I write it?" "May you? What a question! Was there ever a time when your wish was not law to me?" "Never--bless you!--but some laws are hard to bear." "Not when you make them, sweetheart. Aren't we one? Write the answer." Grace's eyes became by turns melting, luminous, dancing,--exactly as they had been of old, at the rare times when Philip would come home from the office with a pleasing surprise,--opera-tickets, perhaps, or the promise of an afternoon and night at the seashore, or a moonlight trip on the river. They reminded him of the delightful old times of which they seemed to promise a renewal, and his heart leaped with joy at the hope and belief that the answer Grace would write would break the chains that bound her and him to Claybanks. While Grace wrote, Philip closed his eyes and imagined himself and his wife spending a restful, delightful summer together, far from the heat, dust, shabbiness, and dilapidation of their part of the West. Certainly they would have earned it, and was not the laborer worthy of his hire? He was aroused from his dreams by a bit of paper thrust into his hand. He opened his eyes and read:-- "Count on me to do as you would in the same circumstances. Will reopen for business at once. Duplicate in New York your purchases of a few weeks ago. Refer to ---- Bank, in which I have a large deposit. Then hurry home. "PHILIP." Apparently Philip read and re-read the despatch, for he kept his eyes upon the paper a long time. When finally he looked from it he saw his wife's countenance very pale and strained. He sprang toward her, and exclaimed:-- "My dear girl, you are sacrificing yourself!" "Oh, no, I am not," Grace whispered. "Then why are you trembling so violently?--why do you look like a person in the agony of death?"