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LIFE’S LITTLE IRONIES

“We onght to have come sooner!” said the conscience- stricken Cornelius, when they were quite exhausted, and dripping wet.

“I suppose we ought,” replied Joshua, heavily. He perceived hie father’s walking-stick on the bank; hastily picking it up he stuck it inte the mud among the sedge. Then they went on.

“Shall we-—say anything about thia accident ?” whispered Cornelius as they approached the door of Joshua's house.

“What's the use? It can do no good. We must wait until he is found.”

They went in-deors and changed their clothes; after which they started for the manor-house, reaching it about ten o’clock, Besides their sister there were only three guests; an adjoining land-owner and his wife, and the infirm old rector.

Rosa, although she had parted from them so recently, grasped their hands in an ecstatic, brimming, joyful manner, as if she had not seen them for years. “You look pale,” she said.

The brothers answered that they had had a long walk, and were somewhat tired. Everybody in the room seemed charged full with some sort of interesting knowledge; the squire’s neighbor and his wife locked wisely around, and Fellmer himsalf played the part of host with a preocoupied bearing which approached fervor. They left at eleven, not secepting the carriage offered, the distance being so short and the roads dry. The squire came rather farther into the dark with them than he need have done, and wished Rosa good-night in a mysterious manner, slightly apart from the reat.

When they were walking along Joshua aaid, with a desperate attempt at joviality, “Rosa, what's going on?”