This Laura had died within a year of her marriage, but Lottie had claimed relationship to the family just the same, grandmaing Mrs. Richards and aunty-ing the sisters.  John, however, was never called uncle, except in fun.  He was too near her age, the young lady frequently declaring that she had half a mind to throw aside all family ties and lay siege to the handsome young man, who really was very popular with the fair sex.  During this discussion of Lottie, Anna had sat listlessly looking up and down the columns of an old Herald, which Dick, Eudora’s pet dog, had ferreted out from the table and deposited at her feet.  She evidently was not thinking of Lottie, nor yet of the advertisements, until one struck her notice as being very singular.  Holding it a little more to the light she said:  “Possibly this is the very person I want—­only the child might be an objection.  Just listen,” and Anna read as follows: 

  “Wanted—­By an unfortunate young married woman, with a child a few
  months old, a situation in a private family either as governess,
  seamstress, or lady’s maid.  Country preferred.  Address—­”

Anna was about to say whom when a violent ringing of the bell announced an arrival, and the next moment a tall young man, exceedingly Frenchified in his appearance, entered the room, and was soon in the arms of his mother.

John, hastening to where Anna sat, wound his arms around her light figure, and kissed her white lips and looked into her face with an expression, which told that, however indifferent he might be to others, he was not so to Anna.

“You have not changed for the worse,” he said.  “You are scarcely thinner than when I went away.”

“And you are vastly improved,” was Anna’s answer.

His mother continued:  “I thought, perhaps, you were offended at my plain letter concerning that girl, and resented it by not coming, but of course you are glad now, and see that mother was right.  What could you have done with a wife in Paris?”

“I should not have gone,” John answered, moodily, a shadow stealing over his face.

It was not good taste for Mrs. Richards thus early to introduce a topic on which John was really so sore, and for a moment an awkward silence ensued, broken at last by the mother again, who, feeling that all was not right, and anxious to know if there was yet aught to fear from a poor, unknown daughter-in-law, asked, hesitatingly: 

“Have you seen her since your return?”

“She’s dead,” was the laconic reply, and then, as if anxious to change the conversation, the young doctor turned to Anna and said:  “Guess who was my fellow traveler from Liverpool?”

Anna never could guess anything, and after a little her brother said: 

“The Rev. Charles Millbrook, missionary to Turkey, returning for his health.”