"Yes; Mr Hallett asked me to look at them, to see if I knew the handwriting as well as he; and, besides, in one of her intervals of reason, poor Linny clung to her brother, and begged him never to let Mr Lister see her again." "Did she say why?" asked Miss Carr hoarsely. "Yes; she said he had such power over her that she was afraid of him." A half-hysterical sob seemed to rise to Miss Carr's lips, but her face was very stern and unchanged. Then, rising quickly, as if a sudden thought occurred to her, she crossed the room to a little Japanese cabinet, and took out a short, thick cord, as it seemed to me; but, as she placed it in my hands, I saw that it was a short hair watch-guard, finished with gilded swivel and cross. She placed it in my hands without a word, looking at me intently the while, as if questioning me with her eyes. "That is Linny Hallett's chain," I said. "She made that guard herself, of her own hair. How did it come here?" "Mr Lister dropped it, I suppose," she said, with a look of scorn flashing from her eyes. "It was found by one of my servants in the hall after he was gone, and brought to me. I had forgotten it, Antony, until now." There was again a deep silence in the room, but at last she broke it with an eager question. "Tell me about this Linny Hallett," she said. "You have often told me that she is pretty. Is she good?" "Oh yes, I am sure she is," I said; "but she is weak and wilful, and she must have loved Mr Lister very much to turn as she has from so true a brother as Mr Hallett." "And--Mr Hallett--is he a good brother to her?" "Good brother!" I exclaimed, my admiration for my friend carrying me away; "he is all that is noble and patient and good. Poor Hallett! he is more like a father to Linny than a brother, and then his patience with his poor mother! Oh, Miss Carr, I wish you knew him, too!" She darted an inquiring look at me and then turned away her head, speaking no more, but listening intently as I told her of poor Hallett's patience under misfortune, relating the story again of his noble sacrifice of self to keep those who were dear to him; of the anxiety Linny caused him, and of his tenderness of the unreasonable invalid he made his care. Then, being thus set a-going, I talked, too, of the model, and our labours, and again of my ambition to get to be an engineer in order to help him, little thinking how I had turned myself into a special pleader to the advancement of my poor friend's cause. At last, half-ashamed of my earnestness, I looked inquiringly in my companion's face, to find that she was listening intently, and she looked up at me as I ceased. "And this Mr--Mr Hallett," she said softly, "is still a workman in Messrs. Ruddle and Lister's employ?" "Oh _no_! Miss Carr," I exclaimed; "he told me he could never enter the place again, and that he dared not trust himself to meet Mr Lister face to face. He has not been there since, and he never will go there now."