.'

As that reply passed his lips, the old nurse appeared again at the
door, announcing another visitor.

'I'm sorry to disturb you, my dear. But here is little Mrs. Ferrari
wanting to know when she may say a few words to you.'

Agnes turned to Henry, before she replied. 'You remember Emily
Bidwell, my favourite pupil years ago at the village school, and
afterwards my maid? She left me, to marry an Italian courier, named
Ferrari--and I am afraid it has not turned out very well. Do you mind
my having her in here for a minute or two?'

Henry rose to take his leave. 'I should be glad to see Emily again at
any other time,' he said. 'But it is best that I should go now. My
mind is disturbed, Agnes; I might say things to you, if I stayed here
any longer, which--which are better not said now. I shall cross the
Channel by the mail to-night, and see how a few weeks' change will help
me.' He took her hand. 'Is there anything in the world that I can do
for you?' he asked very earnestly. She thanked him, and tried to
release her hand. He held it with a tremulous lingering grasp. 'God
bless you, Agnes!' he said in faltering tones, with his eyes on the
ground. Her face flushed again, and the next instant turned paler than
ever; she knew his heart as well as he knew it himself--she was too
distressed to speak. He lifted her hand to his lips, kissed it
fervently, and, without looking at her again, left the room. The nurse
hobbled after him to the head of the stairs: she had not forgotten the
time when the younger brother had been the unsuccessful rival of the
elder for the hand of Agnes. 'Don't be down-hearted, Master Henry,'
whispered the old woman, with the unscrupulous common sense of persons
in the lower rank of life. 'Try her again, when you come back!'

Left alone for a few moments, Agnes took a turn in the room, trying to
compose herself. She paused before a little water-colour drawing on
the wall, which had belonged to her mother: it was her own portrait
when she was a child. 'How much happier we should be,' she thought to
herself sadly, 'if we never grew up!'

The courier's wife was shown in--a little meek melancholy woman, with
white eyelashes, and watery eyes, who curtseyed deferentially and was
troubled with a small chronic cough. Agnes shook hands with her
kindly. 'Well, Emily, what can I do for you?'

The courier's wife made rather a strange answer: 'I'm afraid to tell
you, Miss.'

'Is it such a very difficult f