ous--was losing heart,
and had begun to feel that a cold, dreadful wave of sorrow was poising
itself a little way off, and might presently break all over her, when,
one day, as she stood by the bedside of their patient,--much better
now and quite in his senses,--he looked at her with a sudden start of
recognition, and said:--

"Why, I know you. You are Mr. Bright's little girl,--are you not? You
are Eyebright! Why did I not recognize you before? Don't you recollect
me at all? Don't you know who I am?"

And, somehow, the words and the pleasant tone of voice, and the look
which accompanied them made him look different, all at once, to the
child, and natural, and Eyebright did know him.

It was Mr. Joyce!

CHAPTER XII.

TRANSPLANTED.

"It is strange that I did not recognize you before," said Mr. Joyce
next day; "and yet not so strange either, for you have grown and
altered very much since we met, two years and a half ago."

He might well say so. Eyebright had altered very much. She was as tall
as Mrs. Downs now, and the fatigue and anxiety of the last fortnight
had robbed her of her childish look and made her seem older than she
really was. Any one might have taken her for a girl of seventeen,
instead of fourteen-and-a-half. She and Mr. Joyce had had several long
talks, during which he learned all about their leaving Tunxet, about
her anxiety for her father, and, for the first time, the full story of
the eventful night which had brought him to Causey Island. He was
greatly startled and shocked when he comprehended what danger
Eyebright had run in doing his errand to the village. "My dear, dear
child," he said; "you did me a service I shall never forget. I could
never have forgiven myself had you lost your life in doing it. If I
had had my senses about me I would not have let you go; pray believe
that. That unlucky parcel came near to costing more than it's worth,
for it was on its account that I set out to row over from Malachi that
afternoon."

"To take the stage?" suggested Eyebright.

"Yes--to catch the stage. The parcel had money in it, and it was of
great consequence that it should reach Atterbury--where I live--as
soon as possible. You look curious, as if you wanted to hear more. You
like stories still, I see. I remember how you begged me to tell you
one that night in Tunxet."

"Yes, I like them dearly. But I hardly ever hear any now. There is no
one up here to tell them."

"Well, this isn't m