The housemaid and cook sate below, Norah hardly knew where.  She was always engrossed in the nursery, in tending her two children, and in sitting by the restless, excitable Ailsie till she fell asleep.  Bye-and-bye, the housemaid Bessy tapped gently at the door.  Norah went to her, and they spoke in whispers.

“Nurse! there’s some one down-stairs wants you.”

“Wants me!  Who is it?”

“A gentleman—­”

“A gentleman?  Nonsense!”

“Well! a man, then, and he asks for you, and he rung at the front door bell, and has walked into the dining-room.”

“You should never have let him,” exclaimed Norah, “master and missus out—­”

“I did not want him to come in; but when he heard you lived here, he walked past me, and sat down on the first chair, and said, ’Tell her to come and speak to me.’  There is no gas lighted in the room, and supper is all set out.”

“He’ll be off with the spoons!” exclaimed Norah, putting the housemaid’s fear into words, and preparing to leave the room, first, however, giving a look to Ailsie, sleeping soundly and calmly.

Down-stairs she went, uneasy fears stirring in her bosom.  Before she entered the dining-room she provided herself with a candle, and, with it in her hand, she went in, looking round her in the darkness for her visitor.

He was standing up, holding by the table.  Norah and he looked at each other; gradual recognition coming into their eyes.

“Norah?” at length he asked.

“Who are you?” asked Norah, with the sharp tones of alarm and incredulity.  “I don’t know you:”  trying, by futile words of disbelief, to do away with the terrible fact before her.

“Am I so changed?” he said, pathetically.  “I daresay I am.  But, Norah, tell me!” he breathed hard, “where is my wife?  Is she—­is she alive?”

He came nearer to Norah, and would have taken her hand; but she backed away from him; looking at him all the time with staring eyes, as if he were some horrible object.  Yet he was a handsome, bronzed, good-looking fellow, with beard and moustache, giving him a foreign-looking aspect; but his eyes! there was no mistaking those eager, beautiful eyes—­the very same that Norah had watched not half-an-hour ago, till sleep stole softly over them.

“Tell me, Norah—­I can bear it—­I have feared it so often.  Is she dead?” Norah still kept silence.  “She is dead!” He hung on Norah’s words and looks, as if for confirmation or contradiction.

“What shall I do?” groaned Norah.  “O, sir! why did you come? how did you find me out? where have you been?  We thought you dead, we did, indeed!” She poured out words and questions to gain time, as if time would help her.

“Norah! answer me this question, straight, by yes or no—­Is my wife dead?”

“No, she is not!” said Norah, slowly and heavily.

“O what a relief!  Did she receive my letters?  But perhaps you don’t know.  Why did you leave her?  Where is she?  O Norah, tell me all quickly!”