Aunt Sarah had gone on a visit to a neighbor; the hired girl was in the distant wash-house; and Charley considered it his duty to linger within easy reach of his cousin, should she need him for any purpose. To guard her from all chance of intrusion, he stationed himself on the front porch steps, with his book on his knee. For an hour he read on uninterruptedly; then, glancing up as he turned a leaf, he saw a gentleman coming down the gravel walk. He looked thin and anxious, and his restless eye wandered from door to windows, as in expectation of seeing some one beside the boy. With a ready apprehension of his infirmity, only to be accounted for by some prior knowledge of the person he saluted, he took from his pocket a card, which he presented before he shook hands with the silent host. Charley's intelligent face was one beam of pleasure as he read, and his warm grasp showed his sympathy in the happiness he fancied was in store for his cousin. Inviting the guest by a gesture to follow him, he went softly to the parlor-door, tapped lightly--too lightly, indeed, to attract the notice of the musing occupant of the room, then drew back the bolt, admitted the stranger, and delicately withdrew. Sarah heard the door open and Charley's retreating footsteps, and, supposing that he had peeped in to see that she was comfortable and wanted for nothing, she did not look around. The intruder stood still one step within the room, as if unable to advance or speak. The languid attitude of the figure before him, so unlike the self-poise and quiet energy of her former deportment, her black dress, even the wasted hands dropped so wearily upon her lap, told of the storm that had passed over her, the utter revolution in her life and nature. A struggling sigh he could not repress broke from the gazer's breast, and Sarah turned hastily towards him. She did not swoon, as he feared she would. A thrill, like an electric shock, shook her from head to foot; a wild inquiry looked from her eyes; a question or the reality of the appearance, succeeding so closely to--did it grow out of her revery? Lewis put this imagination to flight. "Sarah!" he said, pressing in his the hands she extended mutely. "They told me you were lost, and I hurried home to find you. I could not wait for your permission to come to you, when I learned in New York that I had a living wife! The loss of the child was heavy enough; but this"--He could say no more. "I am thankful! I am glad that you are here!" A faint, beautiful smile shone over her wan features. "And our baby, Lewis! We must remember that she is an angel now!" CHAPTER XX. To no one except Aunt Sarah were the facts of the estrangement and reconciliation of her relatives ever revealed, and within her faithful bosom the secret was hidden as securely as in a tomb.