I do smile sometimes when a ray of real sunshine darts across my pathway.
"I should be very glad to try such a situation," I replied.
A look of relief, so vivid that it startled me, altered at once the whole character of his countenance; and perceiving how intense was the power and fascination underlying his quiet exterior, I asked myself who and what this man was; no ordinary personage, I was sure, but who?
Had Miss Davies purposely withheld his name?
I began to think so.
"I have had some experience," I was proceeding-- But he waved this consideration aside, with a change back to his former gloomy aspect, and a careful glance at the door which did not escape me.
"It is not experience which is so much needed as discretion." Again that word.
"The case is not a common one, or, rather,"-- he caught himself up quickly, "the circumstances are not.

My wife is well, but--she is not happy.

She is very unhappy, deeply, unaccountably so, and I do not know why." Anxious to watch the effect of these words, he paused a moment, then added fervently: "Would to God I did! It would make a new man of me." The meaning, the deep meaning in his tone, if not in the adjuration itself, was undeniable; but my old habit of self-control stood me in good stead and I remained silent and watchful, weighing every look and word.
"A week ago she was the lightest hearted woman in town,--the happiest wife, the merriest mother.

To-day she is a mere wreck of her former self, pallid, drawn, almost speechless, yet she is not ill.

She will not acknowledge to an ache or a pain; will not even admit that any change has taken place in her.