Redclyffe, during the few days that he was to spend at the Hospital, previous to his visit to Braithwaite Hall, was conscious of a restlessness such as we have all felt on the eve of some interesting event. He wondered at himself at being so much wrought up by so simple a thing as he was about to do; but it seemed to him like a coming home after an absence of centuries. It was like an actual prospect of entrance into a castle in the air,--the shadowy threshold of which should assume substance enough to bear his foot, its thin, fantastic walls actually protect him from sun and rain, its hall echo with his footsteps, its hearth warm him. That delicious, thrilling uncertainty between reality and fancy, in which he had often been enwrapt since his arrival in this region, enveloped him more strongly than ever; and with it, too, there came a sort of apprehension, which sometimes shuddered through him like an icy draught, or the touch of cold steel to his heart. He was ashamed, too, to be conscious of anything like fear; yet he would not acknowledge it for fear; and indeed there was such an airy, exhilarating, thrilling pleasure bound up with it, that it could not really be so. It was in this state of mind that, a day or two after the feast, he saw Colcord sitting on the bench, before the portal of the Hospital, in the sun, which--September though it was--still came warm and bright (for English sunshine) into that sheltered spot; a spot where many generations of old men had warmed their limbs, while they looked down into the life, the torpid life, of the old village that trailed its homely yet picturesque street along by the venerable buildings of the Hospital. “My good friend,” said Redclyffe, “I am about leaving you, for a time,--indeed, with the limited time at my disposal, it is possible that I may not be able to come back hither, except for a brief visit. Before I leave you, I would fain know something more about one whom I must ever consider my benefactor.” “Yes,” said the old man, with his usual benignant quiet, “I saved your life. It is yet to be seen, perhaps, whether thereby I made myself your benefactor. I trust so.” “I feel it so, at least,” answered Redclyffe, “and I assure you life has a new value for me since I came to this place; for I have a deeper hold upon it, as it were,--more hope from it, more trust in something good to come of it.” “This is a good change,--or should be so,” quoth the old man. “Do you know,” continued Redclyffe, “how long you have been a figure in my life?” “I know it,” said Colcord, “though you might well have forgotten it.” “Not so,” said Redclyffe. “I remember, as if it were this morning, that time in New England when I first saw you.” “The man with whom you then abode,” said Colcord, “knew who I was.”