When he came to leave he asked Emma, who strangely enough had now become the most talkative of the two, whether there was not something he could do for her in New York or elsewhere before he came again.
She shook her head, but in another moment, Hermione having stepped aside, she whispered:
"Make my sister smile again as she did a minute ago, and you will give me all the happiness I seek."
The words made him joyous, and the look he bestowed upon her in return had a promise in it which made the young girl's dreams lighter that night, for all the new cause of anxiety which had come into her secluded life.
X.
DORIS.
Frank Etheridge walked musingly towards town. When half-way there he heard his name pronounced behind him in tremulous accents, and turning, saw hastening in his wake the woman who had brought him the message which first took him to Miss Cavanagh's house. She was panting with the haste she had made, and evidently wished to speak to him. He of course stopped, being only too anxious to know what the good woman had to say. She flushed as she came near to him.
"Oh, sir," she cried with an odd mixture of eagerness and restraint, "I have been wanting to talk to you, and if you would be so good as to let me say what is on my mind, it would be a great satisfaction to me, please, and make me feel a deal easier."
"I should be very glad to hear whatever you may have to tell me," was his natural response. "Are you in trouble? Can I help you?"
"Oh, it is not that," she answered, looking about to see if any curious persons were peering at them through the neighboring window-blinds, "though I have my troubles, of course, as who hasn't in this hard, rough world; it is not of myself I want to speak, but of the young ladies. You take an interest in them, sir?"