off in search of him, and found him, as she expected, pacing the
pavement in front of the church. There was no great distance in
which to utter her explanations and cautions, warning him of her
promise that the intelligence of the husband's being alive was to be
withheld for a fitter time, but he promised dutifully, and his aunt
then took him in with her.

The recognition of her claims was a less stunning shock to Alice
Egremont than to her aunt. Shielded by her illness, as well as by
her simplicity and ignorance, she had never been aware of her aunt's
attempted correspondence with the Egremonts, nor of their deafness to
appeals made on her behalf. Far less had it ever occurred to her
that the validity of her marriage could be denied, and the heinous
error of her elopement seemed to her quite sufficient to account for
her having been so entirely cast off by the family. The idea that as
wife or widow she had any claims on them, or that Ursula might have
rights above those of Mark, had not come into her mind, which,
indeed, at the moment was chiefly occupied by the doubt whether the
milk was come in, and by ordering in the best teacups, presented by
the boarders.

Thus she was in the passage when Mark entered, and his exclamation
instantly was 'Oh, Edda, dear old Edda! You aren't a bit altered!'
and he put his head under her hat and kissed her, adding, as she
seemed rather startled, 'You are my aunt, you know; and where's my
cousin? You are Ursula?'

He advanced upon Nuttie, took her by the hand and kissed her forehead
before she was aware, but she flashed at him with her black eyes, and
looked stiff and defiant. She had no notion of kisses to herself,