At another time I asked her directly whether her husband was alive. She looked at me with deep sadness and shook her head. I do not know what position she holds here. She is not housekeeper; none of the servants pay any attention to her whatever. There is an impudent head servant who manages the rest. I noticed that the man who showed me to her room when I first came treats her differently from the rest. Once or twice I saw them talking in one of the halls. There was deep respect in his manner. What he does I have not yet found out. He has always shown great respect to me, though why I can not imagine. He has the same timidity of manner which marks Mrs. Compton. His name is Philips. I once asked Mrs. Compton who Philips was, and what he did. She answered quickly that he was a kind of clerk to Mr. Potts, and helped him to keep his accounts. “Has he been with him long?” I continued. “Yes, a considerable time,” she said--but I saw that the subject distressed her, so I changed it. For more than three months I remained in my room, but at last, through utter despair, I longed to go out. The noble grounds were there, high hills from which the wide sea was visible--that sea which shall be associated with his memory till I die. A great longing came over me to look upon its wide expanse, and feed my soul with old and dear memories. There it would lie, the same sea from which he so often saved me, over which we sailed till he laid down his noble life at my feet, and I gave back that life to him again. I used to ascend a hill which was half a mile behind the Hall within the grounds, and pass whole days there unmolested. No one took the trouble to notice what I did, at least I thought so till afterward. There for months I used to go. I would sit and look fixedly upon the blue water, and my imagination would carry me far away to the South, to that island on the African shore, where he once reclined in my arms, before the day when I learned that my touch was pollution to him--to that island where I afterward knelt by him as he lay senseless, slowly coming back to life, when if I might but touch the hem of his garment it was bliss enough for one day. Ah me, how often I have wet his feet with my tears--poor, emaciated feet--and longed to be able to wipe them with my hair, but dared not. He lay unconscious. He never knew the anguish of my love. Then I was less despairing. The air around was filled with the echo of his voice; I could shut my eyes, and bring him before me. His face was always visible to my soul. One day the idea came into my head to extend my ramble into the country outside, in order to get a wider view. I went to the gate. The porter came out and asked what I wanted. I told him. “You can’t go out,” said he, rudely. “Why not?” “Oh, them’s Potts’s orders--that’s enough, I think.” “He never said so to me,” I replied, mildly.