"When our hour is at hand," he said at last, "as--as it must be one of these days. How shall we feel then, Miss Strange?" Barbara didn't know. "No," said the vicar, "we don't know. But we must think--we must think. Try to picture yourself in your uncle's position--what would your life look to you if you were lying there now?" She looked up with a sudden startled flash. "I haven't had my life--it would only look like a beginning," she said with a vision as of a rose-garlanded doorway to a vault. "If I were going to die directly I couldn't feel like Uncle Hayes." The passionate speech awoke the clergyman's instinct of assent. "No, no," he said, "certainly not. Certainly not." At that moment a message came: "Would Mr. Pryor kindly step up-stairs?" and he went, not altogether sorry to bring his little discourse to a close. Barbara, left to herself, sat gazing at the window, till at last the hinted smile, which had troubled her companion, betrayed itself in a tender, changeful curve. "Adrian!" she said softly, under her breath. "Oh, how could I? How could I? Adrian! and I thought you didn't care!" She was restless with happiness. She sprang up, and walked to and fro, too glad at heart to complain of the walls that held her, and yet feeling that she needed air and freedom for her joy. She leaned against the window, and looked out at the wintry world, murmuring Adrian's name against the chilly pane. There was no voice to give her back her tender speech, yet she hardly missed it. No praise is so sweet to a woman as the reproaches she heaps upon herself for an unjust suspicion of her lover. To defend him to others is a mixture of joy and pain, but to feel that she has wronged him, and that to trust him is safer than to trust her doubts, is a passionate delight. This joy had come to Barbara that very morning. She had been sitting in her uncle's room, reading a novel by the fireside, while the old man slept, as she thought. She softly turned page after page till a feeble voice broke the silence. "Where's your mamma?" said Mr. Hayes. "Down-stairs, writing letters. Do you want her?" And Barbara stood ready to go. "No, I don't want her. Writing her daily bulletins, eh? Well, well. What's the time? You haven't given me my medicine." "It's very nearly time," said Barbara, with a glance at the clock. There was a little clinking of bottle and glass, and then she came to the bedside, and stood looking down at the wrinkled, fallen face among the pillows. "Can I help you?" she asked. "Wait a bit, can't you?" said the old man. She waited, looking aside, yet watching for the slightest movement on his part. Her soft young fingers closed round the half-filled glass, and his dim eyes rested on them. Presently he raised himself with an effort, and the girl put another pillow behind him. He stretched out a trembling, dingy-white hand, carried the glass to his lips a little uncertainly, and emptied it.