Disturbed by these different reflections—inclining now to one course and then to another, and again recoiling from all as each successive consideration presented itself to her mind, Rose passed a sleepless and anxious night, and, after more communing with herself next day, arrived at the desperate conclusion of consulting Harry Maylie. “If it be painful to him,” she thought, “to come back here, how painful will it be to me! But perhaps he will not come; he may write, or he may come himself, and studiously abstain from meeting me—he did when he went away. I hardly thought he would; but it was better for us both—a great deal better.” And here Rose dropped the pen and turned away, as though the very paper which was to be her messenger should not see her weep. She had taken up the same pen and laid it down again fifty times, and had considered and re-considered the very first line of her letter without writing the first word, when Oliver, who had been walking in the streets with Mr. Giles for a body-guard, entered the room in such breathless haste and violent agitation, as seemed to betoken some new cause of alarm. “What makes you look so flurried?” asked Rose, advancing to meet him. “Speak to me, Oliver.” “I hardly know how; I feel as if I should be choked,” replied the boy. “Oh dear! to think that I should see him at last, and you should be able to know that I have told you all the truth!” “I never thought you had told us any thing but the truth, dear,” said Rose, soothing him. “But what is this?—of whom do you speak?” “I have seen the gentleman,” replied Oliver, scarcely able to articulate, “the gentleman who was so good to me—Mr. Brownlow, that we have so often talked about.” “Where?” asked Rose. “Getting out of a coach,” replied Oliver, shedding tears of delight, “and going into a house. I didn’t speak to him—I couldn’t speak to him, for he didn’t see me, and I trembled so, that I was not able to go up to him. But Giles asked for me whether he lived there, and they said he did. Look here,” said Oliver, opening a scrap of paper, “here it is; here’s where he lives—I’m going there directly. Oh, dear me, dear me! what shall I do when I come to see him and hear him speak again!” With her attention not a little distracted by these and a great many other incoherent exclamations of joy, Rose read the address, which was Craven-street, in the Strand, and very soon determined upon turning the discovery to account. “Quick!” she said, “tell them to fetch a hackney-coach, and be ready to go with me. I will take you there directly, without a minute’s loss of time. I will only tell my aunt that we are going out for an hour, and be ready as soon as you are.”