He looked passively calm, heroically enduring, as we went past him. From his eyes came scintillations of a joy whose root is not in our planet.
He simply said,—
"Mrs. Wilton is with my sister; she will be glad to see you."
We went on. Sophie had made a very nest of repose in the sick-room. Miss Axtell looked so comfortable, so untired of life, so changed from the first glimpse I had had of her, when I thought her face might be such as would be found under Dead-Sea waves. There was no more of the anxious unrest. She spoke to Mr. Wilton, thanking him for the "good gift," she named Sophie, that he had lent to her.
Miss Lettie called me to her. She wished to say something to me only. I bent my head to listen.
"I am ill," she said,—"better just now, but I feel that it will be weeks before I shall leave this place; it is good for me to be here, but this troubles me,—I don't like to think that I must take care of it; will you guard it sacredly for me?—and the letter of last night, add it to the others."
She gave me a small package, carefully closed, and I saw that it was sealed.
From her manner, I fancied it was to be known to me alone, and, concealing it, I said,—
"I will keep it securely for you."
Sophie came playfully up, and said,—