When her eyes met his, he felt the presence of a nature indefinitely nobler than his own; not seldom he marvelled in his dim way that such a one called him father.

Could he ever after this day approach her with the old confidence?
Nay, he feared her.

His belief in her insight was almost a superstition.

Would she not read the falsehood upon his face?
Strange state of mind; at one and the same time he wished that he had thought of Emily sooner, and was glad that he had not.

That weight in his pocket was after all a joyous one, and to have been conscious of Emily as he now was, might--would--have made him by so much a poorer man.
She, as usual, was at the door to meet him, her face even ladder than its wont, for this morning there had been at the post-office a letter from Switzerland.