cheeks. She was
listening with a beating heart for the well-known footsteps; as they
sounded at last in the corridor and she heard his voice speaking to
Ellerton, she sat up, flushed and trembling, and under the soft shawl
something that lay hidden stirred uneasily as she moved.

"You must not excite yourself, my lady," observed the nurse,
anxiously; but she might as well have spoken to the wind, for Fay
seemed to have forgotten her presence.

"Oh, Hugh, my darling husband!" she exclaimed, as the door opened; and
the tender rose flush deepened in her cheeks as she stretched out her
hand to him with her old smile.

Hugh stooped over the couch and kissed her, and then sat down with
rather a dissatisfied expression on his face; he thought they had made
a fuss to frighten him, and bring him home--she did not look so very
ill after all.

"I could not come to meet you, love," she said, with a little clasp of
his hand, and she kissed it in her old way and laid it against her
face.

"My dear Fay," he remonstrated, and bit his lip. "Nurse, you can trust
your patient in my care. I will ring for you in a little while." Then,
as the door closed behind her, he said in a vexed tone, "Fay, why will
you be so childish? you know that I object to demonstration before the
servants, and have told you so, and yet you never seem to remember; do
try to be a little more dignified, my dear, and wait until we are
alone." And this to her who had come back to him through "The Valley
of the Shadow of Death," bringing his boy with her!

Fay became very white, and drew her hand away. "You do not seem to
remember how very ill I have been," she faltered. And their the baby's
blind wandering touches over her breast soothed her.

Hugh grew a little remorseful.

"My dear, I assure you I have not forgotten it: I was very grieved to
hear it, and to know that you should have been alone in your trouble;
but was it my fault, Fay? Did you keep your promise to me not to fret
yourself ill when I Was gone?"

"I kept my promise," she replied, quietly; "the fretting and the
mischief were done before. We will not talk about my illness; it is
too bad even to think of it. Have you nothing else to say to me, Hugh?
do you not wish to see our boy?"

Hugh started, conscience-stricken--he had forgotten his child
altogether; and then he laughed off his confusion.

"Our boy! what an important Wee Wifie. Yes, show him to me by all
means. Do you mean you have go