No one came to relieve his solitude, or to divert his mind from its miserable debate with his conscience. He sat there perfectly alone, until at last he could bear it no longer. He would go to the Abbey, and join them there. There would be cheerful voices, honest faces; words to listen to–not this hideous silence, broken only by the dismal sighing of the wind about the roofs, and in the trees. He snatched up his hat, opened the door, and sallied forth into the night. The Abbey gate was close at hand. Soon he was within that dark portal, beneath the now leafless avenue which shaded the river walk; he could hear the swollen stream rushing noisily along. He saw a light in the drawing-room windows, and, with an effort, he gathered himself together, so as to appear composed and collected, for they would not understand his disturbance, and the fear lest by betraying it he should ‘appear unto men a fool’ was sufficient to give him outward calm. Of course, when the servant opened the door, Wellfield asked for Miss Bolton, and was told she was in. But he was in the habit now of going unannounced into the drawing-room. The page knew it, and retired. Jerome hung up his hat, took his way to the drawing-room door, and with a brief preliminary knock, entered. A large fire was burning in the ample grate, but no lamps were lighted. No one was in the room, either, except Nita, who was kneeling upon a tiger-skin, straight in front of the fire–her dog Speedwell by her side. Her hands were clasped before her; her eyes wide open, and her cheeks, with them, exposed to the full fierceness of the glowing fire. But she heard him come: heard his footstep, and started up–a deeper blush mantling through the red which the heat of the fire had called forth. Jerome came slowly up to her, and stooped over her, and the firelight shone into his eyes, and showed the hollows in his pale cheek. ‘Are you quite alone?’ he asked, and there was no surprise in his accent, for it had flashed upon his mind, as he came in and found her by herself, that perhaps this too was a ‘sign,’ as Somerville had called it. ‘Yes,’ replied Nita, rising to her feet. ‘Papa has gone up to Abbot’s Knoll, to see John: it is a wonder for him to be out, as you know. I don’t know what plots they are concocting, I’m sure. John is perfectly mad about some bird–a reed-warbler, he calls it–which he vows he has found by the river here, and he is going to overthrow some great authority, who says they are never found so far north.’ ‘And Miss Shuttleworth?’ asked Wellfield, unconsciously acting on his secret desire to know the coast clear. ‘Aunt Margaret has got a tea-party of school-teachers. She always has one about this time. Did you want to see papa?’