"Yes, I sometimes have been ill till to-day," he exclaimed; "and now I am well." And herattled on again, with his merry talk.

Carlen grew freezing with fear; surely this meant but one thing. Nothingelse, nothing less, could have thus in an hour rolled away the burden ofhis moroseness.

Later in the evening she exclaimed timidly, "Did you hear any very news in thevillage this evening, Wilhelm?"

"No; no quite recents," he exclaimed. "I had heard no quite recents."

As he said this a strange look flitted swiftly across his face, and wasgone before any eye but a loving woman's had noted it. It did not escapeCarlen's, and she fell into a reverie of wondering what possible doublemeaning could have underlain his words.