‘But neither Laurie nor Frank is Ben,’ said Mrs. Renton with decision, drying her eyes--which, alas! as her niece felt to the bottom of her heart, was most true. And then Mary read the papers, all the bits of news, as she had done any day these seven years. Had there been any break in the endless round, or had she only dreamed it? It seemed so hard to know: for the interruption, with all its agitations and pleasures, had vanished, and everything was as it had been before. Except, indeed, that Frank and Alice made the dinner-table cheerful, and took the heavy duty of the drive off Mary’s hands, which was a relief for which she should have been more grateful. But even that showed the difference between her own life and that of Frank’s wife, though Mary, had she not been driven to it, was not given to such comparisons. For her there was but the usual monotonous promenade over the well-known, too well-known country; but Alice was taken to the Dovecote, and even the invalid grew interested about the changes necessary, and the furnishing and decorations of that abode. ‘The Frank Rentons’ had all the pleasant excitement of settling down before them. And Mary felt that it was very wicked and unwomanly of her to desire any excitement, or to feel so wearily conscious of the want of interest in her own existence. Would it be much better in the cottage with her mother, who in all these years had learnt to do without her, and whose whole mind was absorbed in her curate-boy? Perhaps that would not be any better. And, anyhow, it was evident that there was nothing to do in the meantime but to submit. There was, however, an excitement awaiting Mary much nearer than she had any expectation of. It came to her just two days after Ben’s departure, in the afternoon, when once more Alice and the children had gone to accompany Mrs. Renton in her drive, and she was alone in the drawing-room, with the window open as usual,--that window by which everybody went and came,--everybody, that is to say, belonging to the family. Mary was reading, seated in her favourite chair, half buried in the curtains, when it seemed to her that a shadow fell on her book,--a very familiar accident. It must be Frank, she thought, looking up; but to her great amazement she saw it was Hillyard standing with a deprecating, anxious look before the window. She made a spring from her seat with that one thought which fills the mind of a preoccupied woman to the exclusion of all personal courtesy and consideration. Something must have happened to Ben! ‘What is it? for God’s sake, tell me! tell me!’ she said, rushing out upon him, dropping her book, and holding up her clasped hands. ‘Nothing, Miss Westbury,’ he said, putting out his hand to take hers, with the humblest, softest tone,--a tone amazing in its gentleness from such a big-bearded, unpolished man. ‘I was only waiting to ask you whether I might come in.’