"I am very glad he did," I replied, involuntarily.

"He said you would be more than ready to come back in the first cutter
that sailed," she went on. "I suppose you have just come in?"

"Yes," I said, "and I'm half numbed with cold, and nearly famished with
hunger. You don't give me as good a welcome as the Prodigal Son got,
Julia."

"No," she answered, softening a little; "but I'm not sorry to see you
safe again. I would turn back with you, but I like to do the marketing
myself, for the servants will buy any thing. Martin, a whole cartload of
our furniture is come in. You will find the invoice inside my davenport.
We must go down this afternoon and superintend the unpacking."

"Very well," I said; "but I cannot stay longer now."

I did not go on with any lighter heart than before this meeting with
Julia. I had scrutinized her face, voice, and manner, with unwonted
criticism. As a rule, a face that has been before us all our days is as
seldom an object of criticism as any family portrait which has hung
against the same place on the wall all our lifetime. The latter fills up
a space which would otherwise be blank; the former does very little
else. It never strikes you; it is almost invisible to you. There would
be a blank space left if it disappeared, and you could not fill it up
from memory. A phantom has been living, breathing, moving beside you,
with vanishing features and no very real presence.

I had, therefore, for the first time criticised my future wife. It was a
good, honest, plain, sensible face, with some fine, insidious lines