Alarmed at his coming, doubtful of Aunt Martha’s intention, Amy Waring suddenly cried, “Oh!  Aunt Martha!” and was gone in a moment.  Lawrence Newt dashed round, and knocked at the door.

“Come in!”

He rushed into the room.  Some sweet suspicion had winged his feet and lightened his heart; but he was not quick enough.  He looked eagerly about him.

“She is gone!” said Aunt Martha.

His eager eyes drooped, as if light had gone out of his life also.

“Mr. Newt,” said Aunt Martha, “sit down.  You have been of the greatest service to me.  How can I repay you?”

Lawrence Newt, who had felt during the moment in which he saw Amy at the window, and the other in which he had been hastening to her, that the cloud was about rolling from his life, was confounded by finding that it was an account between Aunt Martha, instead of Amy, and himself that was to be settled.

He bowed in some confusion, but recovering in a moment, he said, courteously,

“I am aware of nothing that you owe me in any way.”

“Lawrence Newt,” returned the other, solemnly, “you have known my story; you knew the man to whom I supposed myself married; you have known of my child; you have known how long I have been dead to the world and to all my family and friends, and when, by chance, you discovered me, you became as my brother.  How many an hour we have sat talking in this room, and how constantly your sympathy has been my support and your wisdom my guide!”

Lawrence Newt, whose face had grown very grave, waved his hand deprecatingly.

“I know, I know,” she continued.  “Let that remain unsaid.  It can not be unforgotten.  But I know your secrets too.”

They looked at each other.

“You love Amy Waring.”

His face became inscrutable, and his eyes were fixed quietly upon hers.  She betrayed no embarrassment, but continued,

“Amy Waring loves you.”

A sudden light shot into that inscrutable face.  The clear eyes were veiled for an instant by an exquisite emotion.

“What separates you?”

There was an authority in the tone of the question which Lawrence Newt found hard to resist.  It was an authority natural to such intimate knowledge of the relation of the two persons.  But he was so entirely unaccustomed to confide in any body, or to speak of his feelings, that he could not utter a word.  He merely looked at Aunt Martha as if he expected her to answer all her own questions, and solve every difficulty and doubt.

Meanwhile she had resumed her sewing, and was rocking quietly in her chair.  Lawrence Newt arose and found his tongue.  He bowed in that quaint way which seemed to involve him more closely in himself, and to warn off every body else.

“I prefer to hear that a woman loves me from her own lips.”

The tone was perfectly kind and respectful; but Aunt Martha felt that she had been struck dumb.