After that, Roy did not touch Edna’s hair, or talk of tossing her in his arms. Whatever it was which Georgie said to him with regard to Miss Overton,—and she did say something,—it availed to put a restraint upon his manner, and caused him to keep to himself any wishes he might have with regard to Edna. But he watched her when she went out, and when she came in, and listened to her voice when reading or singing to his mother, until there would, at times, come over him such a feeling of restlessness,—a yearning for something he could not define,—that he would rush out into the open air, or, mounting his swift-footed steed, ride for miles down the river road, until the fever in his veins was abated, when he would return to Leighton, and, if Georgie was there, sit dutifully by her, and try to behave as an engaged man ought to do, and get up a little enthusiasm for his bride-elect. But whether he held Georgie’s white jewelled hand in his, as he sometimes did, or felt her breath upon his cheek, as she leaned her beautiful head upon his breast in one of her gushing moods, he never experienced a glow of feeling like that which throbbed through every vein did “Brownie’s” soft, dimpled hands by any chance come in contact with so much as his coat-sleeve, or “Brownie’s” dress sweep against his feet when he was walking with her. He did not ask himself whither all this was tending. He did not reason at all. He was engaged to Georgie; he fully intended to keep his engagement; he loved her, as he believed, but that did not prevent his being very happy in Miss Overton’s society; and as the days went by he drifted farther and farther from his betrothed, who, with all her shrewdness, was far from suspecting the real nature of his feelings. During all this time, no answer had come from Edna to Roy, who wrote again and again, until he grew desperate, and resolved upon a second visit to Aunt Jerry Pepper, hoping by bribe or threat to obtain some clue to Edna’s whereabouts. This intention he communicated by letter to the worthy spinster, who replied: