"Oh no," said Rachel, with another burst of sorrow, "John has told me. They searched, they advertised, they suffered agony, and feared every terrible thing, till at last they were obliged to soothe one another by trying to think me, by speaking of me as, dead. Little Mopsie thinks I am dead. So it has been, and so it must be." "So it must not be," I persisted, and I fought with her all night. The dawn was in the room before she got up to leave me, pale, and worn, and weary, but promising that she would make yet one more great struggle with herself to break the chain of deceit with which one rash falsehood had so strongly bound her. CHAPTER XIV. I had the happiness of seeing my friends the Tyrrells depart for London without me. I think they were both, brother and sister, somewhat tired of my inconsistencies and vagaries, and I daresay they felt as little sorrow at parting as I did. The long hot days of summer followed one another in a slow wandering fashion. No news reached us from the farm. I had vaguely hoped that John would come and speak to me again; but we neither saw him nor heard from him. Mr. Hill was from home during these days, and there was no necessity for John to present himself amongst us, though there might have been many an opportunity if he had cared to seek one. All the light short nights I lay awake, wondering what was going to become of my life. And Rachel? Was she mindful of the promise she had given me on that night? Alas! no, my dears. She was absorbed in her Arthur. They went here and there together; they were ever side by side, dreaming away the time; seeming lost to every one else in their happiness. I should have thought that Rachel had forgotten all her confession to me, all that had passed between us on the subject, but for a piteous look which she gave me now and again when no one was by. At last an early day was fixed for the marriage, and a wonderful trousseau came down from London for Rachel. The pretty things were hardly looked at by her, and packed away out of sight. Then I saw that two warring spirits were striving within Rachel. The colour left her face, she grew thin, she started and trembled at a sudden word or noise. Sometimes in the middle of the summer nights, just as the earliest birds were beginning to stir, she would come into my room and throw herself weeping across my bed. But I dared not speak to her then. She would not tolerate a word. And so she took her way. One morning Arthur went off to explore some place alone--a most unusual event. I was in my own room when Rachel came in to me, suddenly and quickly, and very pale. "Come," she said, "come now, I have got courage to go this moment, but I must not delay. Come, come!" "Where are you going," I asked. "You know well," she said impatiently; "to my mother. See, I am taking nothing valuable with me." She had on a calico morning dress, and plain straw hat. She had taken the ear-rings out of her ears, the rings off her fingers.