birds answering each
other from the high furze-bushes, and the pee-wits came careering near
her with their broad wings, floating movement, and long melancholy note
like lamentation.

At length, far away, there sounded on the hard turnpike road a horse's
tread, coming nearer and nearer. Help was at hand! Be it who it
might, some human sympathy would be with her, and that most oppressive
solitude, which seemed to have lasted for years instead of minutes,
would be relieved. In almost an agony of nervousness lest the newcomer
might pass by, she gently laid her cousin's head on the grass, and flew
rather than ran towards the opening of the lane. She was too late, the
horseman had passed, but she recognised the shining hat, the form of the
shoulders, and with a scream almost wild in its energy, called "Philip!
O, Philip Carey!"

Joy, joy! he looked back, he turned his horse, and came up in amazement
at finding her there, and asking questions which she could only answer
by leading the way down the lane.

In another moment he was off his horse, and she could almost have adored
him when she heard him pronounce that Frederick lived.

A few moments passed whilst he was handling his patient, and asking
questions, when Beatrice beheld some figures advancing from the
plantation. She dashed through the heath and furze to meet them, sending
her voice before her with the good news, "He is alive! Philip Carey says
he is alive!" and with these words she stood before her father and her
Aunt Mary.

Her aunt seemed neither to see nor hear her; but with a face as white
and still as a marble figure, hastened on. Mr. Geoffrey Langford stopped
for an instant and looked at her with an expression such as she never
could forget. "Beatrice, my child!" he exclaimed, "you are hurt!"

"No, no, papa," she cried. "It is Fred's blood--I am quite, quite safe!"

He held her in his arms, pressed her close to him, and kissed her brow,
with a whispered exclamation of fervent thankfulness. Beatrice could
never remember that moment without tears; the tone, the look, the
embrace,--all had revealed to her the fervour of her father's affection,
beyond--far beyond all that she had ever imagined. It was but for one
instant that he gave way; the next, he was hastening on, and stood
beside Frederick as soon as his sister-in-law.

CHAPTER XIII.

The drawing-room at Knight Sutton Hall was in that state of bustle
incidental to the expectation of comp