He closes the shop door, seizes the box which has been deposited in the shop, swings it round on his shoulders, and marches up-stairs with it two steps at a time, and whistling the while. On the landing, outside the sitting-room, and double-bedded room, which his father occupies, Ann Packet, domestic servant, meets him with a light. "Lor a mussy on us!--is that you, Master Sidney?" "Go a-head, up-stairs, wench, and let us find a place to put the box down. This is Miss Harriet's box." "Orful heavy, ain't it, sir?" "Well--it's not so light as it might be," asserts Master Sidney; "forward, there." Meanwhile, too tired to repair to her room for any toilette arrangements at that hour of the night, Harriet Wesden sits down between her mother and father, holding her bonnet on her lap. Mr. and Mrs. Wesden regard her proudly, as well they may, Harriet being a girl to be proud of--tall, graceful, and pretty, something that makes home bright to the parents, and has been long missed by them. No one is aware of all that they have sacrificed in their desire to make a lady of their only child--or of one-half of the hopes which they have built upon concerning her. "This always seems such an odd, _little_ box to come back to after the great Brighton school," she says, wearily; "oh, dear! how tired I am!" "Get your supper, my dear, at once, and don't sit up for anybody to-night," suggests the mother. "I don't want any supper. I--I think I'll go up-stairs at once and keep all my little anecdotes of school and schooling till the morrow. Shall I?" "By all means, Harriet, if you're tired," says the father, "but after a long journey I would take something. You don't feel poorly, my dear?" "Who?--I--oh! no," she answered, startled at the suggestion; "but I have been eating biscuits and other messes all the journey up to London, and therefore my appetite is spoiled for the night. To-morrow I shall be myself again--and we will have a long talk about all that has happened since I left here last year--by to-morrow, we shall have settled down so comfortably!" "I hope so." She looks timidly towards her father, but he is smoking his pipe, and placidly surveying her. She kisses him, then her mother, lastly Mattie, and leaves the room;--the instant afterwards Mattie remembers the unwieldy box, which Master, or Mr. Hinchford has carried up-stairs. "She'll never uncord the box--I should like to help her, if you can spare me." "Knots always did try the dear girl," affirms Mrs. Wesden, "go and help her by all means--my dear." Mattie needs no second bidding; she darts from the room, and in a few minutes is at the top of the house; in her forgetfulness inside the room without so much as a "By your leave, Miss Wesden." "Oh! dear, I forgot to knock--and oh! dear, dear!" rushing forward to Harriet sitting by the bedside and rocking herself to and fro, as though in pain, "what is the matter?--can I help you?--what has happened!" CHAPTER II. A GIRL'S ROMANCE.