"The subject is strange. I was at Worcester, you know, at Mary West's, and we thought he had come. That night I had the pleasantest dream. We were no longer seeking for him; all the anxiety, the distress of that was gone. We saw him; he seemed to be with us--though yet at a distance. When I awoke, I said in my happiness, 'Ah, those sad dreams will visit me no more, now he is found.' I thought he was, you see. Since then, though the dreams continue, he is never lost in them. I see him always; we are often talking, though we are never very close together. I will be indoors, perhaps, and he outside in the garden; or maybe I am toiling up a steep hill and he stands higher up. I seem to be _always going towards him_ and he to be waiting for me. And though I never quite reach him, they are happy dreams. It will not be very long first now." I knew what she meant--and had nothing to say to it. "Perhaps it may be as well, Johnny," she went on in speculative thought. "God does all things for the best." "Perhaps what may be as well?" "That he should never have come back to marry me. I do not suppose I should have lived long in any case; I am too much like mamma. And to have been left a widower--perhaps--no, it is best as it is." "You don't give yourself a chance of getting better, Ellin--cherishing these gloomy views." "Gloomy! They are not gloomy. I am as happy as I can be. I often picture to myself the glories of the world I am hastening to; the lovely flowers, the trees that overshadow the banks of the pure crystal river, whose leaves are for the healing of the nations, and the beautiful golden light shed around us by God and the Lamb. Oh, Johnny, what a rest it will be after the weary sorrow here--and the weakness--and the pain!" "But you should not wish to leave us before your time." "I do not wish it; it is God who is taking me. I think if I had a wish it would be to stay here as long as papa stays. For I know what my death will be to him. And what it will be to you all," she generously added, holding out her hands to me, as the tears filled her eyes. I held them for a minute in mine. Ellin took up her parasol, preparatory to moving away; but laid it down again. "Johnny, tell me--I have often thought I should like to ask you--what do _you_ think could have become of William? Have you ever picked up an idea, however faint, of anything that could tend to solve the mystery?" It was a hard question to answer, and she saw my hesitation. "I cannot admit that I have, Ellin. When looking at the affair in one light, I whisper to myself, 'It might have been this way;' when looking at it in another, I say, 'It might have been that.' Difficulties and contradictions encompass it on all sides. One impediment to elucidation was the length of time that elapsed before we began the search in earnest. Had we known from the first that he was really lost, and gone to work then, we might have had a better chance."