m the while deathly still, the
loosening of a pent-up breath now and then showing how tense was the
emotion. Then he went on:

"Are those wheels upon the road, Bertha?", cried Dot. "You've a quick
ear, Bertha--And now you hear them stopping at the garden gate! And now
you hear a step outside the door--the same step, Bertha, is it not--And
now--"

Dot uttered a wild cry of uncontrollable delight, and running up to
Caleb put her hand upon his eyes, as a young man rushed into the room,
and, flinging away his hat into the air, came sweeping down upon them.

"Is it over?" cried Dot.

"Yes!"

"Happily over?"

"Yes!"

"Do you recollect the voice, dear Caleb? Did you ever hear the like of
it before?" cried Dot.

"If my boy Edward in the Golden South Americas was alive--" cried Caleb,
trembling.

"He is alive!" shrieked Dot, removing her hands from his eyes and
clapping them in ecstasy; "look at him! See where he stands before you,
healthy and strong! Your own dear son! Your own dear, living, loving
brother, Bertha!"

All honor to the little creature for her transports! All honor to her
tears and laughter, when the three were locked in one another's
arms! All honor to the heartiness with which she met the sunburnt,
sailor-fellow, with his dark, streaming hair, halfway, and never turned
her rosy little mouth aside, but suffered him to kiss it freely, and to
press her to his bounding heart!

"Now tell him (John) all, Edward," sobbed Dot, "and don't spare me, for
nothing shall make me spare myself in his eyes ever again."

"I was the man," said Edward.

"And you could steal disguised into the home of your old friend,"
rejoined the carrier...

"But I had a passion for her."

"You!"

"I had," rejoined the other, "and she returned it--I heard twenty miles
away that she was false to me--I had no mind to reproach her but to see
for myself."

Once more Richard's voice faltered, and again it rang clear, this time
in Dot's tones:

"But when she knew that Edward was alive, John, and had come back--and
when she--that's me, John--told him all--and how his sweetheart had
believed him to be dead, and how she had been over-persuaded by her
mother into a marriage--and when she--that's me again, John--told him
they were not married, though close upon it--and when he went nearly
mad for joy to hear it--then she--that's me again--said she would go
and sound his sweetheart--and she did--and they were married an hour
ago!--