Lady Amabel retired with her young and mourning guest to the shades of Newlands. Eleanor never accompanied her friend to the busy scenes of Government House. Her father and mother soon established themselves in a lovely spot within a day's journey of Cape Town, and here she hoped to find that seclusion and repose, which she had vainly sought before. Marion and Ormsby were married, and embarked for England; soon afterwards, Lady Amabel and Eleanor bade them adieu, as they stepped into the boat awaiting them in the treacherous waters of Table Bay; poor Marion's cheeks were flooded with tears. Eleanor was calm and pale, but it seemed now as though she never could weep. Lady Amabel longed to see some change in her demeanour, but nothing seemed to move her. The evening after her sister's departure she sat so still within the embrasure of a window, that her kind friend thought she must be asleep; but no, the large mournful orbs were fixed on the darkening heavens in which the sentinel stars were mustering their radiant hosts. Her thoughts were not of earth--they were with her angel boy--her lost Francis--that link between herself and the mysterious world, of which we know nothing, save that there is no sin there, and therefore no sorrow. The dwelling purchased and improved by the Daveneys commanded a magnificent view of the sea. Eleanor sat in one of her mournful reveries, as was usual with her at eventide. In the daytime she resolutely employed herself--mechanically, if possible. She never sang now, but she would play whole pages of difficult music, then work in the garden; walking, or riding for miles with her father, filled up the afternoons; but the evening time was truly the dark hour with her. She loved best to be alone at this time. So there she sat, her book dropped listlessly on her knee, and her melancholy gaze fastened on the shining waters of the moonlit ocean, that washed the rocky boundary of the grounds she had helped to fashion and to plant with orange-groves. Her father and mother were in an adjoining room; she heard a door open, and some one, not of the household, spoke in a low voice; but she recognised it--it was May's. She went to meet him, and give him welcome; the poor little bushman cried and laughed with joy. And Fitje came, and Ellen, and they sat down in the doorway, and said they would stay, if they might. May was going to Cape Town, and would come back again, and be gardener and groom, and everything, if Daveney would have him. "Going to Cape Town?" "Yes, with Master--Master Frankfort." They were travelling by land from Algoa Bay, and had come to see the Knysna River, and May had a letter for the _Bass_. It contained an inclosure. Eleanor retreated into the other room. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Eleanor's Note to Frankfort. "Most generous Friend,--