m, murmuring, "Poor child!"

"Ah, I was indeed a poor child! When, after being brought to life
again--for I fancy I must have been nearly dead--my nurse forbade me
ever to speak of what had happened, no one can tell into what a terror
it grew. I never shall overcome it, never! The very sight of the sea is
more than I can bear. To cross it---to be on it"--

"Hush, dear, quiet yourself," said her husband, soothingly. "Now, tell
me all you can remember about this."

"Scarcely anything more, except that when I came to myself I was lying
on the beach, with the stranger lady by me."

"Who was she?"

"I have not the slightest idea. Being so young, I recollect little about
her--in fact, only one thing: that just as she was leaving me to go on
in the little boat, my nurse called out, 'The ship is gone!' and the
lady fell flat down--dead, as I thought then. They carried me away, and
I never saw or heard of her again."

"How strange!"

"But," continued Agatha, gathering courage as she found her husband did
not smile at this story, and beginning to speak with him more freely
than she had ever done with any person in her life, "but you have no
idea what a vivid impression the circumstance left on my mind. For years
I made of this lady--to whom I feel sure I owed in some way or other the
saving of my life--a sort of guardian angel I believe I even prayed to
her--such a queer, foolish child I was--oh, so foolish!"

"Very likely, dear; we all are," said Mr. Harper, gaily. "And you are
quite sure you never saw your angel?"

"No, nor any one like her. The person most like, and yet very unlike,
too, in some things, was--don't laugh, please--was Miss Valery. That, I
fancy, was the reason why I liked her so from the first, and was ready
to do anything she bade me."

"Then when you consented to be married it was not for love of me but
of Anne Valery?" And beneath Nathanael's smile lingered a little sad
earnest.

His wife did not answer--even yet she was too shy to say the words, "I
love you." But she took his hand, and reverently kissed it, whispering,

"I am quite content. I would not have things otherwise than they are.
And all I mean by telling such a long foolish story is this--teach
me how to conquer myself and my fears, and I will go with you
anywhere--even across the sea."

"My own dear wife!" His voice was quite broken; so sudden, so unexpected
was this declaration from her, and by the tremblings which shook her all