“I am not sure you will not have decided wisely, Miles,” she said—­“the picture being one too precious to destroy.  You will be gratified in knowing, however, that Grace resembles an angel quite as much in death as she did in life; all who have seen her being struck with the air of peaceful tranquillity her features now present.”

“Bless you—­bless you, Lucy—­this is all-sufficient.  I did wish for some such assurance, and am now content.”

“Several of your family are in the house, Miles, in readiness to attend the funeral; a stranger has just arrived who seems to have some such desire, too, though his face is unknown to all at the place.  He has asked to see you with an earnestness that my father scarce knows how to refuse.”

“Let him come here, then, Lucy.  I can only suppose it to be some one of the many persons Grace has served; her short life was all activity in that particular.”

Lucy’s face did not corroborate that notion; but she withdrew to let my decision be known.  In a few minutes a large, hard-featured, but not ill-looking man approaching fifty, entered my room, walked up to me with tears in his eyes, squeezed my hand warmly, and then seated himself without ceremony.  He was attired like a thriving countryman, though his language, accent, and manner denoted one superior to the ordinary run of those with whom he was otherwise associated in externals.  I had to look at him a second time ere I could recognise Jack Wallingford, my father’s bachelor cousin, the western land-holder.

“I see by your look, cousin Miles, that you only half, remember me,” my visitor remarked; “I deeply regret that I am obliged to renew our acquaintance on so melancholy an occasion.”

“There are so few of, us left, Mr. Wallingford, that this kindness will be doubly appreciated,” I answered.  “If I did not give orders to have you apprised of the loss we have all sustained, it is because your residence is so far from Clawbonny as to render it improbable you could have received the intelligence in time to attend the solemn ceremony that remains to be performed.  I did intend to write to you, when a little better fitted to perform such a duty.”

“I thank you, cousin.  The blood and name of Wallingford are very near and dear to me, and Clawbonny has always seemed a sort of home.”

“The dear creature who now lies dead under its roof, cousin John, so considered you; and you may be pleased to know that she wished me to leave you this property in my will the last time I went to sea, as of the direct line, a Wallingford being the proper owner of Clawbonny.  In that particular, she preferred your claims to her own.”

“Ay, this agrees with all I ever heard of the angel,” answered John Wallingford, dashing a tear from his eyes, a circumstance that gave one a favourable opinion of his heart.  “Of course you refused, and left the property to herself, who had a better right to it.”