Salem Chapel

so forcibly all the events which accompanied the parting, could soften to him the wonderful thrill of surprise, almost a shock, with which he looked upon two of the party. The widow, in her close white cap and black bonnet, was unchanged as when she fell, worn out, into his arms on her first visit to Carlingford. She gave a little cry of joy as she saw her son. She trembled so with emotion and happiness, that he had to steady her on his arm and restrain his own feelings till another time. The other two walked by their side to the hotel where they were to rest all night. He had kissed Susan in the faint evening light, but her brother did not know that grand figure, large and calm and noble like a Roman woman, at whom the other passengers paused to look as they went on; and his first glance at the younger face by her side sent the blood back to his heart with a sudden pang and thrill which filled him with amazement at himself. He heard the two talking to each other, as they went up the crowded pier in the twilight, like a man walking in a dream. What his mother said, leaning on his arm, scarcely caught his attention. He answered to her in monosyllables, and listened to the voices⁠—the low, sweet laughter, the sound of the familiar names. Nothing in Susan’s girlish looks had prophesied that majestic figure, that air of quiet command and power. And a wilder wonder still attracted the young man’s heart as he listened to the beautiful young voice which kept calling on Susan, Susan, like some sweet echo of a song. These two, had they been into another world, an enchanted country? When they came into the lighted room, and he saw them divest themselves of their wrappings, and beheld them before him, visible tangible creatures and no dreams, Vincent was struck dumb. He seemed to himself to have been suddenly carried out of the meaner struggles of his own life into the air of a court, the society of princes. When Susan came up to him and laid her two beautiful hands on his shoulders, and looked with her blue eyes into his face, it was all he could do to preserve his composure, and conceal the almost awe which possessed him. The wide sleeve had fallen back from her round beautiful arm. It was the same arm that used to lie stretched out uncovered upon her sickbed like a glorious piece of marble. Her brother could scarcely rejoice in the change, it struck him with so much wonder, and was so different from his thoughts. Poor Susan! he had said in his heart for many a day. He could not say poor Susan now.

“Arthur does not know me,” she said, with a low, liquid voice, fuller than the common tones of women. “He forgets how long it is ago since we went away. He thinks you cannot have anything so big belonging to you, my little mother. But it is me, Arthur. Susan all the same.”

“Susan perhaps, since you say so⁠—but not all the same,” said Arthur, with his astonished eyes.

“And I daresay you don’t know Alice either,” said his sister. “I was little and Alice was foolish when we went away. At least I was little in Lonsdale, where nobody minded me. Somehow most people mind me now, because I am so big, I suppose; and Alice, instead of being foolish, is a little wise woman. Come here, Alice, and let my brother see you. You have heard of him every day for three years. At last here is Arthur; but what am I to do if he has forgotten me?”

“I have forgotten neither of you,” said the young man. He was glad to escape from Susan’s eyes, which somehow looked as if they were a bit of the sky, a deep serene of blue; and the little Alice imagined he did not look at her at all, and was a little mortified in her tender heart. Things began to grow familiar to him after a while. However wonderful they were, they were real creatures, who did not vanish away, but were close by him all the evening, moving about⁠—this with lovely fairy lightness, that with majestic maiden grace⁠—talking in a kind of dual, harmonious movement of sound, filling the soft spring night with a world of vague and strange fascination. The window was opened in their sitting-room, where they could see the lights and moving figures, and, farther off, the sea⁠—and hear outside the English voices, which were sweet to hear to the strangers newly come home. Vincent, while he recovered himself, stood near this window by his mother’s chair, paying her such stray filial attentions as he could in the bewilderment of his soul, and slowly becoming used to the two beautiful young women, unexpected apparitions, who transformed life itself and everything in it. Was one his real sister, strange as it seemed? and the other⁠—? Vincent fell back and resigned himself to the strange, sweet, unlooked-for influence. They went up to London together next day. Sunshine did not disperse them into beautiful mists, as he had almost feared. It came upon him by glimpses to see that fiery sorrow and passion had acted like some tropical tempestuous sun upon his sister’s youth; and the face of his love looked back upon him from the storm in which it died, as if somehow what was impossible might be possible again. Mrs. Mildmay, a wandering restless soul as she was, happened to be absent from London just then. Alice was still to stay with her dearest friends. The Nonconformist went back to his little home with the sensation of an enchanted prince in a fairy tale. Instead of the mud-coloured existence, what a glowing, brilliant firmament! Life became glorious again under their touch. As for Mrs. Vincent, she was too happy in