Meanwhile Godwin had arrived at the mill of his uncle, who received him in blank silence, took him into a little room, where books and papers were ominously displayed, and talked with him privately. On which Godwin learned that when at the utmost verge of ruin, as the books and papers proved, his uncle had appropriated the moneys which had been confided to him irresponsibly, in justifiable hope (as the papers also proved) of immediate restitution; that to refund, as affairs then stood, would be as certain ruin, without benefit to any one; but the prospect was opening, and if John would only accept twenty pounds or so, and kindly wait a single year, said the old man, fairly crying, why every thing would be made right. So what could John do but quietly button his pocket over the twenty pounds or so--quietly button his coat over a fallen heart, and go home again? It was a brilliant afternoon when the disappointed man came to the end of his dreary journey, resolved, after much painful deliberation, to confide the whole truth of the case to his wife. Young, and with a knowledge of many things, he was not without hope after all. He had hitherto made no exertion of the talents he was conscious of possessing; and who could say that good might not come out of this evil, at last, in necessitating their vigorous exercise? So, already ashamed of past inaction, and with some show of cheerful resignation to misfortune, he laid the twenty-pound instalment on the table before Sybilla on arriving home, and began the story; which, however, he had occasion to conclude with less and less cheerfulness. Naturally, perhaps, from fore-described circumstances, the contrast between a flushed and victorious soldier in uniform, and a weary druggist in nothing describable, struck Sybilla acutely as her husband entered the door; as, also, distance lends enchantment to the view, the contrast was so much the more prejudicial to the latter. And, unluckily for her, before she had time fairly to extinguish a comparison, which some kind instinct told her was injurious and wrong, Godwin had declared himself not only a weary, unornamental druggist, but a beggared one. His quick eye, rapid in the interpretation of every symptom of thought, was not slow to perceive, however, the change that passed over Sybilla’s handsome countenance--returning over it again and again, spite of all her really laudable endeavors at banishment--ere half the recital was ended; and grief poured into his heart like water into a stricken ship. To dissolve without discontent the day-dreams she had been indulging all day long--dreams long cherished, but never approaching reality till she had abandoned for ever the power of fixing them--would of itself, Sybilla felt, have been a task; but this bitter fact, failing in the very midst of her prideful fancies, thoroughly overcame her. She burst into a flood of tears too plainly rebellious and indignant, and, saying not a word, went up into her chamber.