"Do you come to see him daily?" "Not daily; but as often as I can. It is some distance from here." "It is a long way. But I got misdirected. "You surely did not walk?" exclaimed Oswald. "To be sure I walked. How else should I come?" "There are conveyances--cabs and omnibuses." "But they cost money," she answered, with that frank, open plainness, which, in her, seemed so great a charm. "I am not come away to England devoid of means, but they will find plenty of outlets in necessary things, without being spent in superfluities. Anyway, they must be made to last both for me and Frank, until I can leave him and go out again. I'd not speak of these things to you, Mr. Oswald Cray, but that you must know all the particulars of our position." She had risen as she spoke, and was now tying her bonnet-strings. Oswald picked up a glove which she dropped. "And now I'll wish you goodnight," she continued, putting her hand frankly into his. "And I'd like to thank you with all my heart for what you have done for Frank; for the good friend you have been to him. You have brought to him help and comfort when there was nobody else in the world to bring it. I shall always thank you in my heart, Mr. Oswald Cray." Oswald laughed the words off, and attended her downstairs, catching up his hat as he went through the hall. Mrs. Benn and her black bonnet came up the kitchen stairs. "Goodnight," repeated Jane Allister. "I am going with you," said Oswald. She resisted the suggestion at first, saying she could find her way back quite well; but Oswald quietly carried his point. He closed the door behind him, and offered his arm. She took it at once, thanking him in a staid old-fashioned manner. Mrs. Benn drew the door open and looked after them. "Arm-in-arm!" ejaculated that lady. "And he bending of his head down to her to talk! Who on earth can she be?--coming after him to his house--and stopping up there in the parlour--and keeping up of the tea-things! It looks uncommon like as if he had took on a sweetheart. Only----So it's you at last, is it, Joe Benn! And what do you mean by stopping out like this?" The concluding sentences were addressed to a respectable-looking man who approached the door. It was Joseph Benn, her husband, and the faithful servant of the firm. "I couldn't make more haste," he quietly answered. "Not make more haste! Don't tell me. Mr. Oswald Cray expected you were home an hour ago." "Mr. Oswald Cray will be quite satisfied that I have not wasted my time when I tell him where I've been. Is he upstairs?" "No, he is not," she sharply answered. "Satisfied, indeed! Yes, he looked satisfied when he saw me going up to wait upon him in this guise, and to show in his company? And me waiting a good mortal hour for his dinner-things, which he forgot was up which couldn't have happened if you'd been at your post to wait at table. You go and stop out again at his dinner-time, Joe Benn."