"
Agnes wept tears of joy at this intelligence, but recovering herself,
and recollecting Mr. Clifford, who had accompanied her from the vessel,
and who, seated at the farthest end of the apartment, and partly in the
shade, had, on that account, escaped Arthur's glance, she said,
"I have been very remiss, indeed, Mr. Clifford."
Arthur started, as she pronounced the name, and turning round, for the
first time beheld the stranger.
"But you will excuse me, I am sure; for this return home, and the
meeting with an old friend, has quite bewildered me. Allow me, Mr.
Bernard to introduce to you my companion on the voyage, and one who like
myself, has known the privations of exile, though for a much longer
period than I."
Mr. Clifford advanced to Arthur, and the young men shook hands heartily.
"There needed no apology, Miss Wiltshire," said Ernest; "for your
emotion, at returning home again, is only natural. It has afforded me, I
assure you, the purest pleasure to witness it; a foretaste of what I
trust myself to experience, when I embrace my mother again; if, indeed,
she be yet in the land of the living.
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