And next day it appeared indeed that Mab had been right. Mr. St. John came down to breakfast as usual; saying cheerfully that he was quite well, and went out "into the parish" as usual. The day's rest had done him "all the good in the world;" it had "set him up;" nor did he say anything more again about feeling tired. How quickly the days past during that last fortnight! They seemed to tumble on each other, one following on another's heels, holding so little of all the work they ought to see completed. It was settled that the curate was to leave on the 25th of September, in order that the sale should be over and everything cleared away before the quarter-day. Mildmay wrote again a pleading note to Cicely, a guarded but anxious one to her father, pointing out with abject civility that it would be the greatest possible advantage to himself if Mr. St. John would consent to stay. Mr. St. John only smiled and shook his head, and handed the letter over to Cicely, who was not so confidential in return. "Write to him for me, my dear, for I have not time. Say how obliged I am, but that it is impossible." "Is that all, papa?" said Cicely, faltering. "All? What could be said more? And that everything will be ready by quarter-day--everything ready." As he said this he gave a strange bewildered look round him at the solid mahogany furniture which stood steadfast against the walls, looking as if it never could be changed or taken away. This look was still in his eyes when he went out to the parish, and when he came back--a sort of dreamy wonder and confusion. Cicely thought he had the same look next morning, and the next and next, as if he had somehow got astray from his moorings in life, and could not make out what was going to happen to him, or why it was going to happen. Mab said, "Nonsense, you are getting fanciful. Papa looks exactly as he has always looked;" and indeed everything went on just the same as usual, showing no other difference except this look, if there was a difference at all. He went about just as usual, preached his two little sermons on the Sunday, went to the schools, kept up all the occupations he had been used to for twenty years; but nevertheless continued to have that dazed look in his eyes, sometimes only bewildered, sometimes startled, like the look of an animal who dumbly foresees something approaching which it knows to be malign, but can neither avert nor understand. This, at least, was what Cicely saw in her father's eyes; no one else dreamt of looking at his eyes particularly, or cared what they meant. Perhaps his usually tranquil manners were disturbed a little, but how natural that was! In the evening when they were sitting together he would grow quite talkative, telling the girls little stories of his first coming here, and of their mother's trials in the new parish, and would even laugh softly over them, saying, "Poor Hester! You grow more and more like her,