"Bessy, Bessy!" cried the voice of our good old maiden hostess. "Sir Richard, if you have had your chat out, will you come in to breakfast? We have a guest here who knows you." Bessy and I would both have dispensed, I believe, with the breakfast and the guest; for that morning, as a Persian poet says, in speaking of the conversation of happy lovers, we had certainly "fed on roses," and we desired no company but our own. However, we were forced to go; and, after Bessy had made me assure her that her eyes did not look very red, we returned to the house. CHAPTER XLII. The sheriff was standing with his sister at the door, and his first unceremonious exclamation was,-- "Why, Bessy, my young friend, you look as if you had been crying." "If I have been crying, they have not been unhappy tears, Mr. Sheriff," answered Bessy; "and you know happy tears are out of your jurisdiction. You have plenty to do with unhappy ones, I have no doubt." "Go along for a saucy girl," said the sheriff, laughing; "wash your eyes, and then come to breakfast; for we have a great critic of female beauty here, and you may miss a chance, you know, if you don't look your best." "I'm not in the market," answered Bessy, running into the house. "And who is your guest, Mr. Sheriff?" I inquired. "You say he is a friend of mine, which saves my question from impertinence." "Oh, we have no secrets in Virginia," answered the sheriff. "This is Mr. Wheatley, of Norfolk. He says, as we have been cutting each other's throats here, he has just come up to see all his dead friends; for, as I dare say you have found out, Wheatley must have his jest, even on the most serious subject. But here he comes." While the sheriff had been speaking, his sister had retired to the breakfast-room, and Mr. Wheatley joined us, as brisk, as gay, and as composed as ever. "Ah, Sir Richard," he said, "how are you? You have had some shooting affairs lately on a grander scale than when I last saw you. But I dare say this is nothing to India, where you make a battle of Rajpoots for your afternoon's amusement, and shoot a score or two of rajahs before breakfast; to say nothing of a sultan or two as a big head of game." I laughed, saying, that of course such sport as we had lately had was rather flat after the amusements he mentioned. Then, turning to the sheriff, I remarked,-- "What a beautifully organized country this is, Mr. Sheriff, where, on going and demanding the assistance of a public officer, instead of a long bill of costs, we get a good breakfast, a hearty welcome, a towel, and some cold water." "Oh, the bill will come by-and-by," said the sheriff. "By way of desert?" asked Mr. Wheatley. "Well, if it does, we must try to swallow and digest it." "But, if there be no secret, what is it all about, Mr. Wheatley?" asked the sheriff.