It was, then, as a disappointed man that Dr Prosser sat with his feet on the drawing-room polished fender with his chair tilted back. Moodily gazing at the cheerless fire, he had become sunk deep in absorbing meditation, when a rushing step on the stairs roused him from his reverie, and scattered for the time all painful thoughts. "My dear, dear John, how delighted I am to see you back; I hardly expected you so soon!" exclaimed Agnes Prosser, after exchanging a most loving salutation with her husband. "Why, I thought," was the answer, with somewhat of reproach in its tone, "that you knew I should be here this afternoon." "Oh yes; but hardly so soon. Well, I am so sorry; it was too bad not to be at home to welcome you. And, I declare, they've nearly let the fire out. What can that stupid boy have been about? And the room in such confusion too! Well, dearest, you shan't find it so again. Just ring the bell, please, and we'll make ourselves comfortable.--William," to the boy who answered the summons, "bring up a cup of tea, and a glass of sherry, and the biscuit box.--You'll like a cup of tea, John.--And, by- the-by, William, tell Mrs Lloyd I should like dinner half an hour earlier.--You won't mind dinner at half-past five to-day, dearest?" "No, my dear Agnes, not if it is more convenient to yourself." "Why, the fact is, I've promised to meet a select committee of ladies this evening at seven o'clock, at Lady Strong's." "What!--this evening!" exclaimed her husband. "Why, it's Christmas-eve! Whatever can these good ladies want with one another to-night away from their own firesides?" "Ah now, John, that's a little hit at your poor wife. But a man with your high sense of duty ought not to say so. You know it must be `duty first, and pleasure afterwards.'" "True, Agnes, where the duty is one plainly laid upon us, but not where it is of one's own imposing. I can't help thinking that a wife's first and chief duties lie at home." "Oh, now, you mustn't look grave like that, and scold me. I ordered a fly to call for me at a quarter to seven, and I shan't be gone much more than an hour, I daresay. And you can have a good long snooze by the dining-room fire while I'm away. I know how you enjoy a snooze." William now appearing with the tray, she passed the tea to her husband, and took the glass of sherry herself. A cloud settled for a moment on the doctor's brow. He wished that the constant drain on his wife's energies, physical and mental, could be restored by something less perilous than these stimulants, resorted to, he could see, with increasing frequency. But she always assured him that nothing so reinvigorated her as just one glass of sherry. "And what are these good ladies going to meet about?" he asked, when the tray had been removed.