the mere outline of our talk. My darling came down to meet me with
a quick flush of joy that she did not try to conceal. She was natural,
was herself, and only too glad, after the _contretemps_ in New York,
to see me again. She pitied me as though I had been a tired child when
I told her pathetically of my two journeys to Philadelphia, and
laughed outright at my interview with Dr. R----.

I was so sure of my ground. When I came to speak of the journey--_our_
journey--I knew I should prevail. It was a deep wound, and she shrank
from any talk about it. I had to be very gentle and tender before she
would listen to me at all.

But there was something else at work against me--what was
it?--something that I could neither see nor divine. And it was not
altogether made up of Aunt Sloman, I was sure.

"I cannot leave her now, Charlie. Dr. R---- wishes her to remain in
Philadelphia, so that he can watch her case. That settles it, Charlie:
I must stay with her."

What was there to be said? "Is there no one else, no one to take your
place?"

"Nobody; and I would not leave her even if there were."

Still, I was unsatisfied. A feeling of uneasiness took possession of
me. I seemed to read in Bessie's eyes that there was a thought between
us hidden out of sight. There is no clairvoyant like a lover. I could
see the shadow clearly enough, but whence, in her outer life, had the
shadow come? _Between_ us, surely, it could not be. Even her anxiety
for her aunt could not explain it: it was something concealed.

When at last I had to leave her, "So to-morrow is your last day?" she
said.

"No, not the last. I have changed my passage to the Saturday steamer."

The strange look came into her face again. Never before did blue eyes
wear such a look of scrutiny.

"Well, what is it?" I asked laughingly as I looked straight into her
eyes.

"The Saturday steamer," she said musingly--"the Algeria, isn't it? I
thought you were in a hurry?"

"It was my only chance to have you," I explained, and apparently the
argument was satisfactory enough.

With the saucy little upward toss with which she always dismissed a
subject, "Then it isn't good-bye to-night?" she said.

"Yes, for two days. I shall run over again on Thursday."

CHAPTER VII.

The two days passed, and the Thursday, and the Friday's parting,
harder for Bessie, as it seemed, than she had thought for. It was hard
to raise her dear little head from my shoulder when the l