After dinner, which had driven Leonard to lie on his bed, Aubrey
persuaded his sister to come to see his greatest prize; a quaint old
local naturalist, a seafaring man, with a cottage crammed with pans
of live wonders of the deep in water, and shelves of extinct ones,
'done up in stane pies,' not a creature, by sea or land, that had
haunted Coombe for a few million of ages, seemed to have escaped him.
Such sea-side sojourns as the present, are the prime moments for
coquetries with the lighter branches of natural science, and the
brother and sister had agreed to avail themselves of the geological
facilities of their position, the fascinations of Hugh Miller's
autobiography having entirely gained them during Aubrey's
convalescence. Ethel tore herself away from the discussion of
localities with the old man, who was guide as well as philosopher,
boatman as well as naturalist, and returned to her patient, whom she
found less feverish, though sadly low and languid.

'I wish I knew what to do for you,' she said, sitting down by him.
'What would your sister do for you?'

'Nothing,' he wearily said, 'I mean, a great deal too much.' The
tone so recalled Norman's dejected hopelessness, that she could not
help tenderly laying her cold hands on the hot brow, and saying,
'Yes, I know how little one can do as a sister--and the mockery it is
to think that one place can ever be taken!'

The brown eyes looked at her with moist earnestness that she could
hardly bear, but closed with a look of relief and soothing, as she
held her hand on his forehead. Presently, however, he said, 'Don't
let me keep you in.'