Every day Beatrice came to the Forrest House, evincing almost as much interest in Rosamond’s education as Mrs. Markham herself, and giving her a great deal of instruction with regard to her French accent and music. Every Sunday Everard dined with her, and called upon her week days when business required that he should do so; and he looked forward to these visits with the eagerness of a schoolboy going home. In some respects Everard was very happy, or, at least, content, during the first months of the new life. He was honorably earning a very fair livelihood, and at the same time advancing with his profession. No young man in town was more popular than himself, for the people attached no blame to him for his father’s singular will, which they thought unjustifiable. There was, of course, always present with him a dread of the day which must come when his secret would be known,—but Holburton was an out-of-the-way place, where his friends never visited, and it might be months or even years before Josephine heard of his father’s death, and until that time he meant to be as happy as he could. Josephine did not trouble him often with letters which he felt obliged to answer. He took care to supply her frequently with money, which he sent in the form of drafts, without any other message, and she seemed satisfied. He had sold his horse, his stock was yielding him something regularly now, and with the percentage due him for his services as administrator, he was doing very well, and would have been quite content but for that undefinable sense of loss ever present, with him. He had lost the child Rossie, and he wanted her back again, with the short gingham dress and white apron, and cape bonnet, and big boots, and little tanned hands; wanted the girl whom he had teased, and petted, and domineered over at will; who used to romp the livelong day with the dogs and cats, and teach even the colts and calves to run and race with her; who used to chew gum, and burst the buttons off her dress, and eat green apples and plums, and cry with the stomach-ache. All these incidents of the past as connected with Rossie came back to him so vividly, that he often said to himself: “What has become of the child Rossie?”