Two tears rolled down her cheeks as she spoke. "It is because I am so thankful," she said, wiping them away. Her long lace-bordered sleeves had been turned back, and Owen was struck with the old, withered look of her small wrists and hands. "I could not have borne it to lose him now," she went on, as if explaining. "You may think that existence such as his will be is no blessing, nothing to be desired for him or for me. But he is not suffering, he is even happy as a child is happy, and he knows me. He would be content himself to wait a little, if he could know how much it was to me, how much to have him with me, so that I can devote myself to him, devote myself entirely." "You have always done that, Madam Carroll," said Owen, touched by her emotion. "You will come, then--on whatever day the doctor makes up his mind," she said, controlling herself, and returning to her subject. Here Miss Carroll spoke. "Isn't it better not to make engagements for the present, mamma?" she said, warningly. "You will overtax your strength." "It is overtaxed at this moment far less than it has been for many a long month," answered Madam Carroll, as it seemed to Owen, strangely. She passed her hand over her forehead, and then, as if putting herself aside in order to consider her companions for a moment, she looked first at Sara, then turned and looked at Owen. "Do not stay any longer now," she said to him, gently, in an advising tone. He obeyed her, and went away. On the tenth day after this the doctor, whose conclusions, if slowly made, were sure, announced his decision: it tallied exactly with that of Madam Carroll. The Major was in no present danger; his physical health was fairly good; his condition would not change much, and he might linger on in this state for several years. And then the Far Edgerley people, knowing that no more pain would come to him, and that he was tranquil and even happy, that he recognized his wife, and that she gave to him the most beautiful and tender devotion--then these Far Edgerley people were glad and thankful to have him with them still; not wholly gone, though lying unseen in his peaceful room, which faced the west, so that the sunset could shine every day upon the quiet sunset of his life. And they thought, some of them, that thanksgiving prayers should be offered for this in the church. And they all prayed for him at home, each family in its own way.