Master Caleb came to me early the next morning, and bade me get ready to go back with him to Morechester. 'I am going there again,' he said, 'and if anything occurs, which is far from likely, to detain me, I shall be glad to send you back with a message to my sister.' He was very quiet. All the hurry and excitement of last night were gone, and in their stead there had come over him a look and manner of grave calmness and resolution. 'Last night, Willie, I told my sister Janet what my feelings have long been; Janet said she knew already,' and Master Caleb paused for a moment in renewed wonder. 'I really am at a loss to conceive how, but so it was. And she has counselled me to go to Mistress Dorothy, and just to tell her all my story.' 'Oh, I am so glad!' I said, jumping up, 'so very glad.' 'Hush, hush, Willie; do not fancy that I have any hope. I know quite well how it must be. But perhaps Janet is right, and that the time has come when it is better that she should hear it. It may be, too, that in her loneliness the knowledge of a love as true, as strong, and faithful as I know mine is for her, will be a comfort to her.' We went to Morechester, my master saying, when we started, 'Willie, we will not talk, if you please.' Perhaps all that long silent journey he was getting ready the speech he meant to make to Mistress Dorothy. My thoughts, I know, had time to wander very far afield. They say that distance makes things look more beautiful. Alas! it also makes them seem far easier. Before we got near Morechester Master Caleb's composure was all gone. His resolution, doggedly held to, he had kept safe, but the morning's calmness, eloquence and steadiness were all lost by the way. We had settled that I was to wait in the poor Professor's study while he spoke to Mistress Dorothy in the parlour. I had scarcely been in the room since that day, that seemed so long ago, when Professor Bruce was beginning to pack up his books, and Mistress Dorothy laughed at him for making the room untidy. It was not untidy now. All was in dreary order, speaking sadly in its cold lifelessness of the master that would never return to it. No one was in the parlour, and Master Caleb came back to the study, walking on tiptoe and speaking almost in a whisper. 'I have sent to ask if she will see me,' he said; 'I expect that she will send for me immediately. You wait here, Willy: that's all you have to do. Just stay quietly where you are.' He was pushing me backwards all the time, without very well knowing what he was about. At last he got me into the window, and told me again to wait there for him. 'It won't take long,' he said, turning a shade greyer than before, 'and then'---- The door opened, and Mistress Dorothy herself came into the room. She moved so quietly that Master Caleb, staring out of window at the blank wall, clasping and unclasping his hands nervously, did not hear or see her until she spoke his name.