for him, awakening feelings he did not understand and from which he
sought to escape? A factory fall swollen by the rain! What was there
in this to make his hand shake and cause the deepening night to seem
positively hateful to him? With a bang he closed the window; then he
softly threw it up again. Surely he had heard the noise of wheels
splashing through the pools of the highway. The coach was coming! and
with it--what?

His room was in the gable end facing the road. From it he could look
directly down on the porch of entrance, a fact which he had thankfully
noted at his first look. As he heard the bustle which now broke out
below, and caught the gleam of a lantern coming round the corner of the
house, he softly stepped to his lamp and put it out, then took his stand
at the window. The coach was now very near; he could hear the straining
of the harness and the shouts of the driver. In another moment it drew
lumberingly up. A man from the hotel advanced with an umbrella; a young
lady was helped out who, standing one moment in the full glare of the
lights thrown upon her from the open door, showed him the face and form
he knew so well and loved--yes, loved for all her mystery, as he knew by
the wild beating of his heart, and the irresistible impulse he felt to
rush down and receive her in his arms, to her great terror doubtless, but
to his own boundless satisfaction and delight. But strong as the
temptation was, he did not yield to it. Something in her attitude, as she
stood there, talking earnestly to the driver, held him spellbound and
alert. All was not right; there was passion in her movements and in her
voice. What she said drew the heads of landlady and maid from the open
door and caused the man with the lantern to peer past her into the coach
and backward along the road. What had happened? Nothing that concerned
the lawyer. Mr. Ransom could see him disentangling himself from the
coverings in front where he had ridden with the driver, but the sister
was not there. No other lady got out of the coach even after his young
wife had finished her conversation with the driver and disappeared into
the house.

"How can I stand this?" thought Mr. Ransom as the coach finally rattled
and swished away towards the stable. "I must hear, I must see, I must
_know_ what is going on down there."

This because he heard voices in the open hall. Crossing to his own
doorway, he listened. His wife and Mr. Harper had stepped into the