“Yes: but you don’t mean that you are really going to die? I am sure something might be done to persuade the king to take some of your stone-ware, if you have not the money. I am sure they would let you out in that way. And my mother is so miserable! Every footstep that I am apt to take for Aaron’s, she thinks must somehow be Louise; and then she thinks of how proud it would make her to see Louise’s husband setting all right, and——” “Poor child! She taunts you with having no lover here! No wonder you look for Aaron back! She finds fault with you again for sending away poor François, who would indeed have been a great help to us now. But no wonder you look for Aaron back!” “It was such a disappointment last night, father! There was a soft tap at the door, just before we went to bed; and we never doubted its being Aaron. I told him through the key-hole that I would open the door in a minute; and when I did, it was Mr. Studley. And now he will have it, from what I said, that Aaron is with us sometimes; and he would stay——” “Your mother would not let him in, to be sure? She would not let the rascal in?” “She could not lawfully prevent his coming in; but she would not allow him to stay there. I never saw such a spirit in her before. But we heard him outside for three hours after. If I could have persuaded my mother to go into the back room, so that he could not have heard her cry, I should not have minded it so much.” “What! has the fellow overheard our lamentation? I thought your mother had——That should never have happened if I had been at home.” “Then I wish you would come home, father. Never mind the loss. Never mind the ruin, if it must be ruin.”