That night Charlie had need of all his diplomatic talents. Before he returned from Oxford, his mother, by way of precaution lest Agnes should betray the sudden and mysterious visit of Miss Anastasia to Marian, contrived to let her elder daughter know mysteriously, something of the scope and object of the sudden journey for which it was necessary to prepare her brother, driving Agnes, as was to be supposed, into a very fever of suppressed excitement, joy, triumph, and anxiety. Mrs Atheling, conscious, hurried, and studying deeply not to betray herself--and Agnes, watching every one, stopping questions, and guarding off suspicions with prudence much too visible--were quite enough of themselves to rouse every other member of the little company to lively pursuit after the secret. Charlie was assailed by every shape and form of question: Where was he going--what was he to do? He showed no cleverness, we are bound to acknowledge, in evading these multitudinous interrogations; he turned an impenetrable front upon them, and made the most commonplace answers, making vast incursions all the time into Hannah’s cakes and Mamma’s bread-and-butter. “He had to go back immediately to the office; he believed he had got a new client for old Foggo,” said Charlie, with the utmost coolness; “making no secret of it at all,” according to Mamma’s indignant commentary. “To the office!--are you only going home, after all?” cried Marian. “I’ll see when I get there,” answered Charlie; “there’s something to be done abroad. I shouldn’t wonder if they sent _me_. I say, I wish you’d all come home at once, and make things comfortable. There’s my poor father fighting it out with Susan. I should not stand it if it was me.” “Hold your peace, Charlie, and don’t be rude,” said Mrs Atheling. “But, indeed, I wish we were at home, and out of everybody’s way.” “Who is everybody?” said Louis. “I, who am going myself, can wish quite sincerely that we were all at home; but the addition is mysterious--who is in anybody’s way?” “Mamma means to wish us all out of reach of the Evil Eye,” said Agnes, a little romantically. “No such thing, my dear. I daresay we could do _him_ a great deal more harm than he can do us,” said Mrs Atheling, with sudden importance and dignity; then she paused with a certain solemnity, so that everybody could perceive the grave self-restraint of the excellent mother, and that she could say a great deal more if she chose. “But no one thinks what I am to do when you are all gone,” said Rachel; and her tearful face happily diverted her companions from investigating and from concealing the secret. There remained among them all, however, a certain degree of excitement. Charlie was returning home to-morrow--specially called home on business!--perhaps to go abroad upon the same! The fact stirred all those young hearts with something not unlike envy. This boy seemed to have suddenly leaped in one day into a man.