He arrived in Hamilton at nightfall, and proceeded at once to his office. There was in his manner none of the hesitation shown at his last entrance there, and when by chance he passed the mirror in his quick movements about the room he was pleased himself to note the calmness of his features, and the quiet air of dignified reserve once more pervading his whole appearance. “I have fought the battle,” he quietly commented to himself; “and now to face the new order of things!” He looked about the room, put a few matters in order, and then stepped out into the green space before his door. Glancing right and left and seeing nobody in the road or in the fields beyond the cemetery, he walked straight to the monument of Polly’s mother and sternly, determinately surveyed it. Then he glanced down at the grave it shaded, and detecting a stray leaf lying on its turf, he picked it up and cast it aside, with a suggestion of that strange smile which had lately so frequently altered his handsome features. After which he roamed through the churchyard, coming back to his door by another path. The chill of early September had touched many of the trees about, and there was something like dreariness in the landscape. But he did not appear to notice this, and entered in and sat down at his table with his former look of concentration and purpose. Evening came and with it several patients; some from need, some from curiosity. To both kinds he listened with equal calmness, prescribing for their real or fancied complaints and seeing them at once to the door. At ten o’clock even these failed to put in an appearance, and being tired, he was about to draw his shade and lock his door when there came a low knock at the latter of so timid and so hesitating a character that his countenance changed and he waited for another knock before uttering his well known sharp summons to enter. It came after a moment’s delay, and from some impulse difficult for himself to explain, he proceeded to the door, and hastily opened it. A tall, heavily veiled figure, clad in widow’s weeds, stood before him, at sight of which he started back, hardly believing his eyes. “Grace!” he ejaculated; “Grace!” and held out his arms with an involuntary movement of which he seemed next moment ashamed, for with a sudden change of manner he became on the instant ceremonious, and welcoming in his visitor with a low bow, he pushed forward a chair, with mechanical politeness, and stammered with intense emotion: “You are ill! Or your son! Some trouble threatens you or you would not be here.” “My son is well, and I—I am as well as usual,” answered the advancing lady, taking the chair he offered her, though not without some hesitation. “Clarke is with the horses in front and I have ventured—at this late hour—to visit you, because I knew you would never come to me, even if I sent for you, Oswald.”