Agnes had too pure a heart, and loved her husband too entirely, to dream even that Frank had other feelings for her than those of friendship. The husband was unsuspecting—he knew not, could not know, how all in all his bright Agnes was to the heart of Frank. The husband and wife loved each other so truly there was no room for doubt in the heart of either. The winter months had nearly passed. Each day the little fairy Nina grew more interesting and lovely: and then she loved Frank so—he _must_ go and see her. The pretty Nina. “How remarkably fond your brother seems of solitary rambles,” said Miss Linwood to Clara one day. “Very,” quietly responded Clara. “He is a very singular young man: he has grown so melancholy and reserved, so different from what he used to be. Don’t you think so, Clara?” Clara _did_ think her brother had altered. He looked so pale and seemed so sad. Something must be the matter with him. Something _was_ the matter with him undoubtedly. At home he was gloomy, silent, abstracted. He lived only in the light of the brown eyes at the cottage. He loved without owning to himself he loved. And to _her_! He would sooner have torn out his tongue than to have sullied her pure ear with a whisper of the maddening love that devoured his soul. The cousins seemed to have changed characters. Edward chatted and laughed with his lively cousin Clara from morning to night. Frank was silent and thoughtful. The gay party at the Hall wondered not a little at the repeated absences of Frank. Edward declared his cousin had found some sweet simplicity of a being at whose shrine to worship. “I would be willing to wager my happiness for a year to come, that you _are_ in love, brother mine,” said Clara, one day when the inmates of the Hall were assembled in the library. “You are not the same brother Frank you were last autumn. I shall have to call you Francis, for you are not _frank_.” Frank smiled, made some gay repartee—half acknowledged, in a laughing way, Clara was right. The party grew more merry, and Francis, from being very low-spirited, became the merriest there. Sparkling words fell from his lips, and sparkling glances fell from his eyes, in uncontrolled profusion. “Let me take your hand, Francis,” said Clara. “Did you know I was a seer? No! then listen.”