Miss Conyers was deeply engaged reading an “extra,” with further details of the great battle of Gettysburg. On hearing the door open, she looked up, and was at once shocked by seeing Justin enter, looking pale as death, and wearing the traces of deep grief upon his brow.
She threw down the paper and started up to meet him, exclaiming, breathlessly:
“Justin, what is the matter? What have you heard? Erminie?”
He crossed the room and threw himself upon the sofa.
“Erminie!” again gasped Miss Conyers, in breathless anxiety.
“Britomarte, Erminie is alive and well, but—fatherless!” he groaned, covering his face with his hands.
“Oh, Justin! Oh, Justin! Oh, my dear, dear brother!” she cried, and forgetting all her pride, she hastened to his side, put her arms around his neck, drew his head upon her bosom, and bending her face upon it, wept with him.
And her sympathy was an unspeakable consolation.
Later in the day Justin nerved himself to write a letter to his sister, and this letter he inclosed in another one directed to a clerical friend in Washington, to whom he announced his return, and whom he solicited to go and break the news cautiously to Erminie, and prepare her for his arrival. Having posted this letter with his own hand, to insure its going by the evening mail, he returned, and dined alone with Britomarte in their sitting-room.
Lieutenant Ethel, true to his engagement, came to spend the evening with them.