driven
every friend of yours away!'

'John!' she laid her hand hastily upon his lips, 'for my sake! In
remembrance of our long companionship!' He was silent 'Now, let me tell
you, dear,' quietly sitting by his side, 'I have, as you have, expected
this; and when I have been thinking of it, and fearing that it would
happen, and preparing myself for it, as well as I could, I have resolved
to tell you, if it should be so, that I have kept a secret from you, and
that we have a friend.'

'What's our friend's name, Harriet?' he answered with a sorrowful smile.

'Indeed, I don't know, but he once made a very earnest protestation to
me of his friendship and his wish to serve us: and to this day I believe
'him.'

'Harriet!' exclaimed her wondering brother, 'where does this friend
live?'

'Neither do I know that,' she returned. 'But he knows us both, and our
history--all our little history, John. That is the reason why, at his
own suggestion, I have kept the secret of his coming, here, from you,
lest his acquaintance with it should distress you.

'Here! Has he been here, Harriet?'

'Here, in this room. Once.'

'What kind of man?'

'Not young. "Grey-headed," as he said, "and fast growing greyer." But
generous, and frank, and good, I am sure.'

'And only seen once, Harriet?'

'In this room only once,' said his sister, with the slightest and most
transient glow upon her cheek; 'but when here, he entreated me to suffer
him to see me once a week as he passed by, in token of our being well,
and continuing to need nothing at his hands. For I told him, when he
proffered us any service he could render--which was the object of his
visit--that we needed nothing.'

'And once a week--'

'Once every week since then, and always on the same day, and at the
same hour, he his gone past; always on foot; always going in the same
direction--towards London; and never pausing longer than to bow to me,
and wave his hand cheerfully, as a kind guardian might. He made that
promise when he proposed these curious interviews, and has kept it so
faithfully and pleasantly, that if I ever felt any trifling uneasiness
about them in the beginning (which I don't think I did, John; his manner
was so plain and true) It very soon vanished, and left me quite glad
when the day was coming. Last Monday--the first since this terrible
event--he did not go by; and I have wondered whether his absence can
have been in any way connected with what has happened.'