"Why, Ellie!" said her brother, "you must need some care to keep a straight line where your course lies now."
"Indeed I do, John," said Ellen, her eyes filling with tears; "Oh, how I have felt that sometimes! And then, how I wanted you!"
Her hand was fondly taken in his, as many a time it had been of old, and for a long time they paced up and down, the conversation running sometimes in the strain that both loved, and Ellen now never heard; sometimes on other matters; such a conversation as those she had lived upon in former days, and now drank in with a delight and eagerness inexpressible. Mr. Lindsay would have been in dismay to have seen her uplifted face, which, though tears were many a time there, was sparkling and glowing with life and joy in a manner he had never known it. She almost forgot what the morrow would bring, in the exquisite pleasure of the instant, and hung upon every word and look of her brother, as if her life were there.
"And in a few weeks," said Ellen at length, "you will be in our old dear sitting-room again, and riding on the Black Prince! and I shall be here! and it will be "
"It will be empty without you, Ellie; but we have a Friend that is sufficient; let us love him and be patient."
"It is very hard to be patient," murmured Ellen. "But, dear John, there was something else you wanted me to do, what is it? You said 'two or three' things."
"I will leave that to another time."
"But why? I will do it, whatever it be pray tell me."
"No," said he, smiling, "not now; you shall know by-and-by the time is not yet. Have you heard of your old friend Mr. Van Brunt?"
"No what of him?"