h the door between our two bedrooms, to bid
Laura good-night before she went to sleep. In stooping over her to
kiss her I saw the little book of Hartright's drawings half hidden
under her pillow, just in the place where she used to hide her
favourite toys when she was a child. I could not find it in my heart
to say anything, but I pointed to the book and shook my head. She
reached both hands up to my cheeks, and drew my face down to hers till
our lips met.

"Leave it there to-night," she whispered; "to-morrow may be cruel, and
may make me say good-bye to it for ever."

9th.--The first event of the morning was not of a kind to raise my
spirits--a letter arrived for me from poor Walter Hartright. It is the
answer to mine describing the manner in which Sir Percival cleared
himself of the suspicions raised by Anne Catherick's letter. He writes
shortly and bitterly about Sir Percival's explanations, only saying
that he has no right to offer an opinion on the conduct of those who
are above him. This is sad, but his occasional references to himself
grieve me still more. He says that the effort to return to his old
habits and pursuits grows harder instead of easier to him every day and
he implores me, if I have any interest, to exert it to get him
employment that will necessitate his absence from England, and take him
among new scenes and new people. I have been made all the readier to
comply with this request by a passage at the end of his letter, which
has almost alarmed me.

After mentioning that he has neither seen nor heard anything of Anne
Catherick, he suddenly breaks off, and hints in the most abrupt,
mysterious manner, that he has been perpetually watched and followed by
strange men ever since he returned to London. He acknowledges that he
cannot prove this extraordinary suspicion by fixing on any particular
persons, but he declares that the suspicion itself is present to him
night and day. This has frightened me, because it looks as if his one
fixed idea about Laura was becoming too much for his mind. I will
write immediately to some of my mother's influential old friends in
London, and press his claims on their notice. Change of scene and
change of occupation may really be the salvation of him at this crisis
in his life.

Greatly to my relief, Sir Percival sent an apology for not joining us
at breakfast. He had taken an early cup of coffee in his own room, and
he was still engaged there in writing