“It is rather a singular arrangement, isn’t it? but I have gone into these details that you might see that Elmington is, for all the purposes of hospitality, as much Charley’s as my grandfather’s. I hope it will not be long,” I added, rising, “before you will be able to go down and see how the arrangement works, though I am sorry I shall not be able to join you till Christmas week, being detained by professional engagements, or, rather, the hope of such, as I have but recently opened a law office.” “You may rest assured that I shall not lose a day, when once my physician has given me leave to go. Can’t you sit longer? Another visit yet? Ah, I am sorry.” And he accompanied me to the door of his sitting-room. As we stood there for a moment, exchanging the customary civilities of leave-taking, my eye fell upon the little book the Don had laid upon a shelf of his book-case. It was a copy of the New Testament. ----- [1] The quail is unknown in Virginia—both bird and word.—_Ed._ CHAPTER XVII. At about the hour at which I was taking leave of the Don my grandfather was sitting alone in his dining-room, reading; his snow-white hair and beard, as they glistened in the lamp-light, affording a strong contrast to the vivacity of his dark eyes and the ruddy glow of his complexion. But the book before him was hardly able to fix his attention. Every now and then he would raise his eyes from its pages, with the look of one who fancied that he heard an expected sound. Several times he had risen from his seat, gone to the door, opened it, and listened. Something like this he had been doing now for nearly a week. “Dick!” called he at last, opening the door: “Dick!” Uncle Dick emerged from the kitchen, where, for several days past, he had had orders to sit up till ten o’clock in the hope that Charley might arrive. “Yes, mahster!” “Dick, I thought I heard some one coming.” Uncle Dick, who very naturally (and correctly) supposed that this was another false alarm, threw his head into an attitude of pretended listening. “Do you hear anything?” asked the old gentleman. “Ain’t dem de horses a-stompin’ down at de stable?” “I believe you are right,” sighed the old gentleman, as he turned to re-enter the dining-room. “Marse Charley ain’t sont you no letter, is he?” asked Uncle Dick, advancing deferentially towards my grandfather, across the space that separated the kitchen from the “Great-House.” “Why, no; but I thought he might come. He wrote me a week ago that the gentleman was getting well.” “Adzackly!” replied Dick, scratching in the fringe of white wool that bordered his bald head. “Jess so! Does you think it rimprobable, mahster,” he began again after a moment of seeming reflection, “dat Marse Charley would come without he writ fust and ’pinted de day, and de ferry ’most twenty miles from here, and nothin’ to hire dere ’cep’n ’tis dat old flea-bitten gray, and he a-string-halted?” “True enough.”