"Do you chance to know," he said carelessly, as at last we rose from the table and he flung his napkin down, "Mrs. Sloman's niece, Miss Stewart?" "Excellently well," I said smiling: "in fact, I believe I am engaged to be married to her." "My dear fellow," said the doctor, bursting out laughing, "I am delighted to hear it! Take my carriage and go. I saw you were a lawyer, and you looked anxious and hurried; and I made up my mind that you had come over to badger the old lady into making her will. I congratulate you with all my soul--and myself, too," he added, shaking my hand. "Only think! Had it not been for your frankness, I should have taken a five-mile ride to watch you and keep you from doing my patient an injury." The good doctor quite hurried me into the carriage in the effusion of his discovery; and I was soon rolling away in that luxurious vehicle over the bridge, and toward Bessie at last. I cannot record that interview in words, nor can I now set down any but the mere outline of our talk. My darling came down to meet me with a quick flush of joy that she did not try to conceal. She was natural, was herself, and only too glad, after the _contretemps_ in New York, to see me again. She pitied me as though I had been a tired child when I told her pathetically of my two journeys to Philadelphia, and laughed outright at my interview with Dr. R----. I was so sure of my ground. When I came to speak of the journey--_our_ journey--I knew I should prevail. It was a deep wound, and she shrank from any talk about it. I had to be very gentle and tender before she would listen to me at all. But there was something else at work against me--what was it?--something that I could neither see nor divine. And it was not altogether made up of Aunt Sloman, I was sure. "I cannot leave her now, Charlie. Dr. R---- wishes her to remain in Philadelphia, so that he can watch her case. That settles it, Charlie: I must stay with her." What was there to be said? "Is there no one else, no one to take your place?" "Nobody; and I would not leave her even if there were." Still, I was unsatisfied. A feeling of uneasiness took possession of me. I seemed to read in Bessie's eyes that there was a thought between us hidden out of sight. There is no clairvoyant like a lover. I could see the shadow clearly enough, but whence, in her outer life, had the shadow come? _Between_ us, surely, it could not be. Even her anxiety for her aunt could not explain it: it was something concealed. When at last I had to leave her, "So to-morrow is your last day?" she said. "No, not the last. I have changed my passage to the Saturday steamer." The strange look came into her face again. Never before did blue eyes wear such a look of scrutiny. "Well, what is it?" I asked laughingly as I looked straight into her eyes. "The Saturday steamer," she said musingly--"the Algeria, isn't it? I thought you were in a hurry?"