It may be said here, that two days after the events just narrated, when Bell accompanied her to the sorceress, she did not see Richard Crawford. Thereafter, for many days, she did not visit the house at all, for reasons that will soon make themselves manifest; and consequently the awkwardness of any meeting with the invalid, which might have involved questions she did not care to answer at that moment, was avoided. Joe Harris felt that for once in her life she had a "mission"--something to do, and to do in her own way; and until that work was done, or she had utterly failed in the attempt, she did not mean to let that chattering tongue of hers say one word that could give a clue to her thoughts or intentions. We shall see, presently, how nearly and in what manner her plans were carried out. CHAPTER XXII. A LITTLE ARRANGEMENT BETWEEN TOM LESLIE AND JOE HARRIS--UP THE HUDSON-RIVER ROAD--A DETENTION AND A RECOGNITION--GOING TO WEST FALLS, AND A PEEP AT THE HALSTEAD HOMESTEAD. There are some things too sacred to be pryed into, and there are some things too difficult to make any progress in that attempt, even when the effort is made with the most determined will. Both these conditions will to some extent apply to the intimacy between Tom Leslie and Josephine Harris, which commenced on a day we well remember, and which may not close until their joint destiny is accomplished. The very next day after that adventure, he called at the house of Mrs. Harris, was introduced to her with great empressement by her daughter, and received by her with great cordiality. The good lady, whom we have no intention whatever of describing, was a splendid specimen of the widowed matron in comfortable circumstances, with just enough threads of silver shining amid her dark hair, to make her matron-hood sacred and all the more loveable. That she, who was not always pleased with a new-comer, chanced to like him from the first, completed the vanquishment of the journalist, if that object had not before been entirely accomplished; and within an hour after setting foot within that comfortable little home the young man felt that it had become dearer to him than any other building of bricks and mortar into which he had ever entered.