into sudden confusion.

"He went at five o'clock, on business. Said he must be there
to-morrow morning. But he'll tell you all about it in the letter,
ma'am."

Recovering herself, Mrs. Markland stepped from the side of the
carriage, and as it passed on, she broke the seal of her letter,
which she found to contain one for Fanny, directed in a hand with
which she was not familiar.

"A letter for you, dear," she said; for Fanny was now by her side.

"Who is it from? Where is father?" asked Fanny in the same breath.

"Your father has gone to New York," said Mrs. Markland, with forced
composure.

Fanny needed no reply to the first question; her heart had already
given the answer. With a flushed cheek and quickening pulse, she
bounded away from her mother's side, and returning into the house,
sought the retirement of her own chamber.

"Dear Agnes,"--so ran the note of Mr. Markland to his wife,--"I know
that you will be surprised and disappointed at receiving only a
letter, instead of your husband. But some matters in New York
require my attention, and I go on by the evening train, to return
day after to-morrow. I engaged to transact some important business
for Mr. Lyon, when he left for the South, and in pursuance of this,
I am now going away. In a letter received from Mr. Lyon, to-day, was