It was quite late before the pastor would allow his visitors to leave. And then he followed them to the gate, bidding them return in the morning, as he had much to say. He passed his hand lovingly over Helen's abundant tresses, before he allowed his wife to take the young girl to her heart for a good-night kiss. "She is overflowing with affection," he said, when with Sybil they had turned back to the house. "Something has changed her," dryly remarked the practical Sybil. "I haven't yet made up my mind whether the change is for the better or for the worse." Nurse Johnson had lived in the family of Mrs. Edmond's mother. She had followed the young wife to Woodbine Cottage, and been an early friend to Frank and Helen. In her sixtieth year, her kind master fitted up a small house formerly used by the gardener, and gave her a life-lease of it. It was a terrible trial to her when the old home was broken up, and her children, as she fondly called them, moved away. Eyes less sharp than hers would have discovered a change in the once lively Helen. It is not strange, therefore, that her love for her youthful mistress led the affectionate woman to wonder what had occurred during the few months since her master's decease. "Here is your room," she said, leading the way to a tiny chamber under the eaves, "and Frank's is close by. Everything is sweet and clean, so you wont mind for once that it is small." "No, indeed, nurse, I shall not mind anything, now I am where people love me for myself. I can lie here in the morning, and smell the fragrant honeysuckle, and hear the birds warbling their pleasant songs. Carry out the light, nurse, and let me see the trees waving in the moonlight, What pretty shadows the leaves make on the floor. Nurse, I call this a paradise, and I would like to live here always." She threw her arms around the neck of her old friend, and sobbed quietly to herself. "I knew ye weren't quite happy, darling. Ye couldn't deceive yer old nurse, with all yer smiles and gay tones. I seed right through inter yer heart; and when yer was out walking with yer brother, says I to myself, 'My pet isn't sitiwated as she oughter be, her eyes don't dance permiscuous as they used to do; and I can hear a plaint of sadness through her laugh.' Now sit down on yer bed, darling, and tell yer old nurse all about it." For one instant Helen was tempted to yield and unburden her heart of its load. But a moment's reflection convinced her that her partial friend would be a most injudicious confident. Nurse would be sure to espouse her views, right or wrong; to endorse her own conduct, to hate whoever she fancied had injured one she loved, and thus be incapable of giving any good advice. Still she would not wound the feelings of a friend so devoted, by refusing to place confidence in her, and therefore answered cautiously: "It has been hard for me, nurse, to live with strangers, and I miss dear papa every hour in the day."