As she lay quiet, watching the glimmering light upon the wall, it seemed
as though her room were suddenly filled with shadowy forms,--she saw her
mother's sweet, sad, suffering face,--then her father's sturdy figure
and fine, frank features,--then came the flitting shape of the hapless
Sigurd, whose plaintive voice she almost imagined she could hear,--and
feeling that she was growing foolishly nervous, she closed her eyes, and
tried to sleep. In vain,--her mind began to work on a far more
unpleasing train of thought. Why did not Philip return? Where was he? As
though some mocking devil had answered her, the words, "In the arms of
Violet Vere!" as uttered by Sir Francis Lennox, recurred to her.
Overcome by her restlessness, she started up,--she determined to get out
of bed, and put on her dressing-gown and read,--when her quick ears
caught the sound of steps coming up the stair-case. She recognized her
husband's firm tread, and understood that he was followed by Neville,
whose sleeping-apartment was on the floor above. She listened
attentively--they were talking together in low tones on the landing
outside her door.

"I think it would be much better to make a clean breast of it," said Sir
Philip. "She will have to know some day."

"Your wife? For God's sake, don't tell her!" Neville's voice replied.
"Such a disgraceful--" Here his words sank to a whisper, and Thelma
could not distinguish them. Another minute, and her husband entered with
soft precaution, fearing to awake her--she stretched out her arms to
welcome him, and he hastened to her with an exclamation of tenderness
and pleasure.

"My darling! Not asleep yet?"

She smiled,--but there was something very piteous in her smile, had the
dim light enabled him to perceive it.

"No, not yet, Philip! And yet I think I have been dreaming of--the
Altenfjord."

"Ah! it must be cold there now," he answered lightly. "It's cold enough
here, in all conscience. To-night there is a bitter east wind, and snow
is falling."

She heard this account of the weather with almost morbid interest. Her
thoughts instantly betook themselves again to Norway, and dwelt there.
To the last,--before her aching eyes closed in the slumber she so sorely
needed,--she seemed to be carried away in fancy to a weird stretch of
gloom-enveloped landscape where she stood entirely alone, vaguely
wondering at the dreary scene. "How strange it seems!" she murmured
almost aloud. "All snow and darkness