stooped and gave a quick, furtive
kiss to the chair in which John always sat when at work on a sermon.

They neither of them spoke as they walked to the station, and no one
spoke to them. Helen knew there were shy looks from curtained windows and
peeping from behind doors, for she was a moral curiosity in Lockhaven;
but no one interrupted them. Just before she started, John took her hand,
and held it in a nervous grasp. "Helen," he said hoarsely, "for the sake
of my eternal happiness seek for truth, seek for truth!"

She only looked at him, with speechless love struggling through the pain
in her eyes.

The long, slow journey to Ashurst passed like a troubled dream. It was an
effort to adjust her mind to the different life to which she was going.
Late in the afternoon, the train drew up to the depot in Mercer, and
Helen tried to push aside her absorbing thought of John's suffering, that
she might greet her uncle naturally and gladly. The rector stood on the
platform, his stick in one hand and his glasses in the other, and his
ruddy face beaming with pleasure. When he saw her, he opened his arms and
hugged her; it would have seemed to Dr. Howe that he was wanting in
affection had he reserved his demonstrations until they were alone.

"Bless my soul," he cried, "it is good to see you again, my darling
child. We're all in such distress in Ashurst, you'll do us good. Your
husband couldn't come with you? Sorry for that; we want to see him
oftener. I suppose he was too busy with parish work,--that fire has kept
his hands full. What? There is the carriage,--Graham, here's Miss Helen
back again. Get in, my dear, get in. Now give your old uncle a kiss, and
then we can talk as much as we want."

Helen kissed him with all her heart; a tremulous sort of happiness stole
over the background of her troubled thoughts, as a gleam of light from a
stormy sunset may flutter upon the darkness of the clouds.

"Tell me--everything! How is Lois? How are the sick people? How is
Ashurst?"

Dr. Howe took up a great deal of room, sitting well forward upon the
seat, with his hands clasped on his big stick, which was planted between
his knees, and he had to turn his head to see Helen when he answered her.

"Mrs. Forsythe is better," he said; "she is certainly going to pull
through, though for the first week all that we heard was that she was
'still breathing.' But Denner is in a bad way; Denner is a very sick
man. Gifford has been with him a