like a chiding voice.

And a double sense of guiltiness was creeping over me. I must return
to New York to-morrow, and I had not told Bessie yet of the longer
journey I must make so soon. I put it by again and again in the short
flying hours of that afternoon; and it was not until dusk had fallen
in the little porch, as we sat there after tea, and I had watched the
light from Mrs. Sloman's chamber shine down upon the honeysuckles and
then go out, that I took my resolution.

"Bessie," I said, leaning over her and taking her face in both my
hands, "I have something to tell you."




CHAPTER III.


"I have something to tell you;" and without an instant's pause I went
on: "Mr. D---- has business in England which cannot be attended to
by letter. One of us must go, and they send me. I must sail in two
weeks."

It was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky, and Bessie gave a little gasp
of surprise: "So soon! Oh, Charlie, take me with you!" Realizing in
the next instant the purport of the suggestion, she flung away from my
hands and rushed into the parlor, where a dim, soft lamp was burning
on the table. She sat down on a low chair beside it and hid her face
on the table in her hands.