"It's mulled wine,--thick and stupid." "Nonsense." "Will there be tea, at supper?" "You shall have some." "Ask Ben to order it." "Heaven forgive us all, Cassandra!" "Remember the tea." Charles stood near his wife; wherever she moved afterwards he moved. I saw it, and felt that it was the shadow of something which would follow. At last the time came for us to return. Helen had plied me with tea, and was otherwise watchful, but scarcely spoke. "It is an age," I said, "since I left Rosville." She raised her eyebrows merely, and asked me if I would have more tea. "In my room," I thought, "I shall find myself again." And as I opened my door, it welcomed me with so friendly and silent an aspect, that I betrayed my grief, and it covered my misery as with a cloak. CHAPTER XX. Helen was called home by the illness of her father and did not return to Rosville. She would write me, she said; but it was many weeks before I received a letter. Ben Somers about this time took a fit of industry, and made a plan for what he called a well-regulated life, averring that he should always abide by it. Every hour had its duty, which must be fulfilled. He weighed his bread and meat, ate so many ounces a day, and slept watch and watch, as he nautically termed it. I guessed that the meaning of his plan was to withdraw from the self-chosen post of censor. His only alienation was an occasional disappearance for a few days. I never asked him where he went, and had never spoken to him concerning his mysterious remark about having been in Surrey. Neither had I heard anything of his being there from father. Once he told me that his father had explained the marriage of old Locke Morgeson; but that it was not clear to him that we were at all related. In consequence of his rigorous life, I saw little of him. Though urged by Alice, he did not come to our house, and we rarely met him elsewhere. People called him eccentric, but as he was of a rich family he could afford to be, and they felt no slight by his neglect. There was a change everywhere. The greatest change of all was in Charles. From the night of the sleigh-ride his manner toward me was totally altered. As far as I could discern, the change was a confirmed one. The days grew monotonous, but my mind avenged itself by night in dreams, which renewed our old relation in all its mysterious vitality. So strong were their impressions that each morning I expected to receive some token from him which would prove that they were not lies. As my expectation grew cold and faint, the sense of a double hallucination tormented me--the past and the present. The winter was over. I passed it like the rest of Rosville, going out when Alice went, staying at home when she stayed. It was all one what I did, for my aspect was one of content.