leaned her hands upon his shoulder, looking up with an affectionate,
appealing expression into his face.

"You're a dear, good girl, Mary," said Mr. Wilkinson, tenderly, and he
kissed the pure lips of his wife as he spoke. "I know it's wrong to
leave you alone here. But, I won't be gone more than half an hour.
Indeed I won't. See, now;" and he drew forth his watch; "it is just
eight o'clock, and I will be home again precisely at half-past eight,
to a minute."

Mrs. Wilkinson made no answer; but her husband saw that tears were in
the eyes fixed so lovingly upon him.

"Now don't, love," said he, tenderly, "make so much of just half an
hour's absence. I promised Elbridge that I would call around and see
him about a little matter of business, and I must keep my word. I had
forgotten the engagement until it crossed my mind while reading."

"If you have an engagement." There was a certain emphasis in the words
of Mrs. Wilkinson that caused her husband to partly turn his face away.

"I have, dear. But for that, I should not think of leaving you alone."

Almost instinctively Mrs. Wilkinson withdrew the hands she had placed
upon the shoulder of her husband, and receded from him a step or two;
at the same time her face was bent downwards, and her eyes rested upon
the floor.

For some moments Mr. Wilkinson stood as if in earnest debate with
himself; then he said, in a cheerful, lively tone--

"Good-by, love. I shall only be gone half an hour." And turning away,
left the room. He did not pause until he was in the street. Then a
spirit of irresolution came over him, and he said to himself, as he
moved slowly away,

"It isn't kind in me to leave Mary alone in this way; I know it isn't.
But I want to see Elbridge; and, in fact, partly promised that I would
call upon him this evening. True, I can say all I wish to say to him in
the morning, and to quite as good purpose. But--"

Wilkinson, whose steps had been growing more and more deliberate,
stopped. For some time he stood, in a thoughtful attitude--then slowly
returned. His hand was in his pocket, his dead-latch key between his
fingers, and his foot upon the marble sill of his door. And thus he
remained, in debate with himself, for as long a time as two or three
minutes.

"Yes; I must see him! I had forgotten that," he exclaimed, in a low
tone, and suddenly stepped back from the door, and with a rapid pace
moved down the street. A walk of ten minutes brought him to the h