his breast. He gently laid the emaciated form down again: it lay there. The eyes were closed, the lips too, and over the face was spread a look of unutterable sadness. Sara had died, carrying her grief with her, uncured, to the grave; and no sound was heard, save the low sobs of her mother, whom she had left alone.

CHAPTER IX.

'Swear me, Kate, like a lady, as thou art,
A good mouth-filling oath, and leave "in sooth,"
And such protest of pepper-gingerbread,

To velvet guards and Sunday citizens.'-King Henry IV.

WEEK after Sara's death, Hamer

ton was gaping and wondering

over the fact that Miss Healey had returned to her brother, and might be seen any day, by those who were curious enough to look, riding to or from the factory or the colliery, giving her orders to Butterworth, consulting with Earnshaw, exactly as she had done two months before.

The comments upon her conduct were varied and stringent, but all partook of surprise,

and generally of censure. One lady, much esteemed in Hamerton as an excellent church

woman, and a person of weight and importance, explained Katharine's return

on the principle that like seeks like,' and added that she would have left Wilfrid Healey to drink himself to death, or in any other way destroy himself; in which statement she was probably quite correct.

A general impression (and one founded on fact, in this case) was abroad that Wilfrid had lately made an immense sum by a successful speculation in coals, and that in the matter of cotton his business was almost

daily increasing. This was somewhat exercising to the average Hamerton mind, which was acquainted with the adage, Godliness is great gain,' and felt itself bound to believe the words, but which would, nevertheless, have seen the fitness of things much more distinctly if Mr. Healey's enterprises had turned out failures.

Ughtred Earnshaw, too, had been raised to a much more responsible post. Still in name the overlooker, it was understood by all that Mr. Earnshaw was, in the Hamerton phraseology, 'th' head mon,' and that his word had weight in other matters than the mere supervision of workmen and payment of wages. He still lived at his old lodgings with Mrs. Holden, who, aged and enfeebled as if with many years by the death of her daughter, clung to him as if he were a son.

Such was the state of affairs outside when Katharine came in from Healey one afternoon, and, going to her sitting-room, rang for some

tea.

Her reconciliation with Wilfrid was then complete? Yes, in so far that there was between them perfect peace, and more friendship and union than ever in the old days. She had taken up all her former duties again. All was as it used to be, but so

much better. She told herself a hundred

times a day how happy she ought to be. Was not the wish of her heart accomplished? Was not Wilfrid all, and more than all, that she had formerly longed for and dreamed of, hopeless of its ever coming to pass? She had never indulged in any very Utopian hopes or dreams. No ideas of vivid happiness, or anything like perfect content, had ever occupied her mind. Well, such dreams as she had allowed herself had come to pass. Her brother was her brother; he was kind and gentle to her; even deferential now and then, as if he reminded himself that he had wronged her very exceedingly, and repented him of it. Nearly all his evenings were passed with her. Katharine had indeed some exquisite moments now and then; moments in which all her pain seemed to her a cheap price to have paid for her present joy. How few must have been the joys of a woman who at three-and-twenty could brood with eyes swimming in happy