'I am bound to believe you,' returned Mr. O'Brien, looking thoughtfully at the girlish face and steadfast eyes; 'Prissy says it always gives her a comfortable feeling to talk out her troubles to you. It is a gift, I am thinking; but you are young to have it. Did I ever tell you, Miss Ross, what Susan said to me when she was dying?' 'No, I am sure you never told me that.' 'Well, Prissy had gone to lie down, and I was alone with Susan. It was the room above us where she died. I was sitting by the fire, thinking she was having a fine sleep, and would surely be better for it, when she suddenly spoke my name: "Tom," she said, "I know just what you are thinking about: you have got Mat in your mind." Well, I could not deny that, and Susan was always so sharp in finding me out; and then she begged me to sit by her a bit: "For you are very low about everything, dear Tom," she went on; "you've got to lose me, and there's Prissy, poor girl! with her bad husband; and when you have nothing better to do you think about Mat. Sometimes I wish you were back in the shop, when I see you looking at the fire in that way." "I was only wondering whether I should ever see the poor lad again," I returned, with a sigh; "that was all my thought, Susan." "I am sure you will see him again," she replied very earnestly, with a kind of solemnity in her voice; "I don't know why I think so, Tom, but they say the dying are very clear-sighted, and it is strong upon me that Mat will one day seek you out." Now, wasn't that strange, Miss Ross?' 'No,' replied Audrey, 'she may have spoken the truth; while there is life there is hope. Do not be disheartened, my dear friend; you have had great troubles, but God has helped you to bear them, and you are not without your blessings.' 'That's true,' he returned, looking round him; 'I would sooner live in this cottage than in a palace. I don't believe, as the Captain says, there is a prettier place anywhere. I like to think Susan lies so near me, in Brail Churchyard, and that by and by I'll lie beside her; and if I could only see my girl more cheerful----' 'Oh, you must give her time to live down her worries. There! I hear the carriage;' and Audrey went in search of her fur-lined cloak. This conversation had taken place about eighteen months ago, and though Audrey had never alluded to it of her own accord, it touched her greatly to notice how, when he was alone with her, Mr. O'Brien would drop a few words which showed how clearly he remembered it. 'There is no one else to whom I can speak of Mat,' he said one day; 'Prissy never cared much about him--I think she dislikes the subject; as sure as ever I mention Mat she cries and begins to talk of Joe.'