He arrived in the middle of the day,—­not timing his return at all after the usual manner of Government clerks, who generally manage to reach the metropolis not more than half an hour before the moment at which they are bound to show themselves in their seats.  But he had come back two days before he was due, and had run away from the country as though London in May to him were much pleasanter than the woods and fields.  But neither had London nor the woods and fields any influence on his return.  He had gone down that he might throw himself at the feet of Lily Dale,—­gone down, as he now confessed to himself, with hopes almost triumphant, and he had returned because Lily Dale would not have him at her feet.  “I loved him,—­him, Crosbie,—­better than all the world besides.  It is still the same.  I still love him better than all the world.”  Those were the words which had driven him back to London; and having been sent away with such words as those, it was little matter to him whether he reached his office a day or two sooner or later.  The little room in the city, even with the accompaniment of Sir Raffle’s bell and Sir Raffle’s voice, would be now more congenial to him than Lady Julia’s drawing-room.  He would therefore present himself to Sir Raffle on that very afternoon, and expel some interloper from his seat.  But he would first call in Burton Crescent and say farewell to the Ropers.

The door was opened for him by the faithful Jemima.  “Mr Heames, Mr Heames! ho dear, ho dear!” and the poor girl, who had always taken his side in the adventures of the lodging-house, raised her hands on high and lamented the fate which had separated her favourite from its fortunes.  “I suppose you knows it all, Mister Johnny?” Mister Johnny said that he believed he did know it all, and asked for the mistress of the house.  “Yes, sure enough, she’s at home.  She don’t dare stir out much, ’cause of them Lupexes.  Ain’t this a pretty game?  No dinner and no nothink!  Them boxes is Miss Spruce’s.  She’s agoing now, this minute.  You’ll find ’em all upstairs in the drawen-room.”  So upstairs into the drawing-room he went, and there he found the mother and daughter, and with them Miss Spruce, tightly packed up in her bonnet and shawl.  “Don’t, mother,” Amelia was saying; “what’s the good of going on in that way?  If she chooses to go, let her go.”

“But she’s been with me now so many years,” said Mrs Roper, sobbing; “and I’ve always done everything for her!  Haven’t I, now, Sally Spruce?” It struck Eames immediately that, though he had been an inmate in the house for two years, he had never before heard that maiden lady’s Christian name.  Miss Spruce was the first to see Eames as he entered the room.  It is probable that Mrs Roper’s pathos might have produced some answering pathos on her part had she remained unobserved, but the sight of a young man brought her back to her usual state of quiescence.  “I’m only an old woman,” said she; “and here’s Mr Eames come back again.”