"Thank you, Dinah, you have done your best, no doubt; don't sell my ring, though; I shall want it back some day."

"La, chile, I done 'sposed ob it aready, an' dey give me a poun of backer an' a gole-piece fur it. It was good gole an' no mistake. I tells you all," adding aloud, "an' now, Miss Mirim, I has tole you ebbery syllable. I disremembered ob dat speritual ar. I is sorry you doesn't like dese crockets, fur de madame made un wid her own clean red hands."

"Say white hands, you old limb of Satan, or I shall be after you with a mop," cried the laughing voice of Mrs. Raymond from the side of the sick woman's bed, betraying at once how she had divided her attention. Then, advancing into my chamber, she added, as coolly as though she had been suggesting a visit to the theatre:

"Excuse me, Miss Monfort, for intruding, but I am about to ask you whether it would be agreeable to you to be married to-night at ten o'clock? This seems very sudden, but circumstances have forced the arrangement on us all, and I assure you, from the bottom of my heart, it is for both of us the preferable alternative of evils, as poor Sir Harry Raymond would have said. Alas, my dear! shall I ever again have such a helpmate as he was: so kind, so generous, so considerate"—and she clasped and wrung her large, rosy hands. "A second marriage is often a great sacrifice, and, in any case, a hazard, as I feel, as the time draws near, very sensibly. But you seem confounded, and yet you must have been somewhat prepared for this condition of things after your last interview with Dr. Englehart?"

The amazement of Dinah at this change in the programme, if possible, exceeded my own. She did not understand, as I did, that it was a measure prompted not only by humanity but self-interest, and that even the hard heart of Basil Bainrothe preferred a compromise to such violence and injustice as those he had otherwise meditated. Besides, what better or more sensible mode than this could there be, according to his views, of quashing the whole esclandre—quieting official inquiry as well as public indignation? As the wife of Gregory, I should be, of course, a forcat for life, walking abroad with the concealed brand and manacle, afraid and ashamed to complain and acknowledge my condition, and willing to condone every thing.

I saw, at a glance, that my true policy was to feign a reluctant consent to this proposition, and to determine later what recourse to take, as if indeed any remained to me in that den of serpents. I would consider, as soon as Mrs. Raymond was gone, what measures to pursue in order to elude the vigilance of McDermot, the detective; and then, if all proved vain, I could but perish! For I would have walked cheerfully over the burning ploughshares of old, lived again through the hideous nightmare of the burning ship and raft, nay, clasped hands with the spectre of La Vigne himself, had it offered to lead me to purgatory, rather than have married the knave, the liar, the half-breed Gregory!

My resolution was soon made.

"You will send me a suitable dress, I suppose," I said, calmly, "you know I am a pauper here."

"Yes, fortunately I have two almost alike. Which shall it be, a chally or barege?"

"It matters little, the color is all I care for. Let it be white; I have a superstition about being married in colors."

"So should I have, were this the first time, but, being a widow, I shall wear a lavender-satin, trimmed with blond, made up for a very different occasion."

"Yes, that will be quite suitable. Well, the long agony is over at last, and I am glad of it," and I drew a deep, free breath.

"You will have to sign the papers before you come down-stairs. Mr. Bainrothe told me to say this to you, and to ask you to have them ready; they will be witnessed below with the marriage, and at nine, precisely, expect me to appear with your gown, and make your toilet."

"Will not Bridget Maloney do as well?" I asked, desperately. She, at least, I thought, may be compassionate.

"It is strange you should know of her at all, or she of you. It is that girl, then, who has given us all this trouble," going to the bed, "when I did not suppose she knew of her existence. Explain this, Clayton, if you can."

"I suppose Ernie, who is fond of her, has mentioned her name to Miss Monfort; she thinks his mother is sick up-stairs, but knows no more, I am certain; besides, it's Dr. Englehart's establishment—such things are to be expected, and surprise no one of the attendants. Bridget is kept busy among them all." The farce was to be kept up, it seemed, to the end.

Old Dinah was evidently quaking in her shoes, and began to see her error, as she glanced reproachfully at me, but no further revelation seemed to be expected. It was, indeed, to divert, partly, immediate suspicion from one I still hoped to make my tool, that I mentioned the Irish girl at all, or craved her presence, but I soon found how futile in one instance was this trust. No sooner had Mrs. Raymond turned to depart, than Dinah followed her, protesting against being locked up the whole evening with the invalid, and begging leave to go out for an hour or two on business of her own, which she declared important.

"But Miss Monfort may need you in making her preparations," remonstrated Mrs. Raymond, "and Clayton and Ernie will want your attention; besides, fires will go down if not constantly mended, this cold evening."

"Dar's plenty of coal in de box, an' de tongs, wid claws, wat Ernie is so fond of handling ready and waitin' for dem wat's strong enough to use dem if dey choose, an' tea in de caddy, an' de kittle on de trivet, jes filled up, de brass toastin'-fork on de peg in de closet, 'sides bread an' butter, an' jam, an' new milk on de shelf, an' I is 'bliged to go anyway, case my ticklerest friend am dyin' ob de numony—I is jes got word; but at nine o'clock" (and she looked maliciously at me) "percisely Dinah'll be in dis pickin' patch—he! he! he! can't possumbly cum no airlier."

In a flash I saw the advantage her prolonged absence would give me, unless, indeed, she had become my confederate, so I beheld her depart with a feeling of relief which reacted in the next moment to positive helplessness and terror as the bolt was drawn, behind her. What could I do? What was there to be done? For a time I sat mute and crushed by consideration; then casting myself on my bed I slept for half an hour, the kind of slumber that confusion generates, and yet I woke refreshed, calmed, comforted, and with a clearly-formed resolution and plan of action. I rose and approached Mrs. Clayton, whose groans, perhaps, aroused me, and, as I stood beside her bed, the clock in the dining room-below struck six. I had still three hours for hope—for endeavor, before the circle of flame should close hopelessly around me forever! Three hours—were they not enough? Could I not compel them to concentration?

A cup of strong tea was hastily drawn and swallowed—another made for, and administered by my hand to, Mrs. Clayton, with toast ad libitum—a tedious process—and afterward Ernie's supper prepared and eaten—all in less than half an hour. By seven he was in bed and asleep, and I had taken my seat by Mrs. Clayton, for the purpose, apparently, of merciful ministry to her condition—a piece of self-abnegation, as it seemed, and as she felt it, scarcely to be expected on my blissful marriage-night.

"I feel very sorry for you; you suffer so, Mrs. Clayton," I had said, as I drew a chair beside her bed.

"And I for you, Miss Monfort; our fate seems equally hard, but we must bear it;" and she groaned heavily and closed her eyes, evidently in great pain.

"I have come to that conclusion, also, after a bitter struggle; physical pain is not so easily borne, however; the body has little philosophy."

"I thought all this was over," she rejoined, abstractedly, "when my hands were drawn as you see them by neuralgia ten years since. But I did not suffer as much then, I believe, as I do now; besides, I was younger, happier, better able to bear pain."

"Yes, that is true; the old should be at rest," at least my sense of justice whispered this; then, after a pause: "Does my rubbing ease your shoulder, Mrs. Clayton?"

"Somewhat—it is my head to-night, however, that troubles me chiefly. Be good enough to press my temples. Ah, that is great relief! You are very kind, Miss Monfort; yet, in reviewing the past, I hope you will not find that I have been wanting to you in my turn. I trust we shall part in peace and meet hereafter as friends. But you do not answer me."

"Pardon me, I was thinking. This is a crisis, you know—this night decides my fate for good or ill, all rests with merciful God!"

"Yes, all—of ourselves we are helpless, of course. It is a comfort to me, I confess, as I lie here, to feel that I have never willingly injured a fellow-being; to think that I—but, bless my soul, Miss Monfort, you must not hold me down in that way! you would not, I trust. But even if you did—no key this time, the door is fast without!"

"Oh, not for worlds! be still, the pain will pass. I have the gift, you know, of soothing physical suffering. There, rest, you must not stir; give yourself up to me, if you can—slumber will come."

"It must not come—see, we are all alone!"

Her glazing eye—her slower breathing began already to attest the influence of the electric fluid, so potent in my veins, so wanting in her own, both from temperament and disease, yet she resisted bravely and long, and, even when her limbs were powerless, her spirit rebelled against me in murmured words of defiant opposition; but this, too, yielded finally to silence and to stupor; and she slept the deep, calm, unmistakable slumber caused by magnetism.

Then, again, I went through the experiment of the preceding night, and strove to awaken her.

"Get up," I said, and yet without willing that she should do so. "Mrs. Raymond is here to show you her marriage-dress, and Mr. Bainrothe calls."

"Tell them to let me sleep; don't—don't—disturb me. I am so happy—so peaceful. It is sweet, too, to think that she will be married at last. Poor thing! it was no fault of hers, though—no fault. A young actress is exposed to so many temptations, and it was better so—Harry Raymond's mistress."

That secret would never have escaped her devoted lips had she been able to retain it.

As carefully as the eyes of the dead are closed, I drew down her gaping lids, and turned away. As I did so, the clock struck eight. Fatima never listened more anxiously to the toll of parting time than I did that night; but, alas for me! no sister Anne kept watch on the tower; no brother hastened to arrest the sword. I was deserted by all save God and desperation. One hour comprised my fate! Very quietly I closed the door between Mrs. Clayton's room and my own. The bolt was on the other side, so I could not secure my privacy, even for a moment, should she chance to wake, or should Mrs. Raymond or Dinah return unexpectedly. As rapidly as I could, I altered my dress—this time above my clothes—threw on the black silk frock and mantilla prepared for me on shipboard, tied a dark veil over my head, an old woolen scarf about my throat, provided for Ernie's sore-throat and croup, and stood equipped for my enterprise.

Neither bonnet, nor gloves, nor boots, did I possess—Mrs. Raymond's loan having long since been condoned on behalf of some one else, and my clothing, in my captivity, had been contrived to suit my circumstances.

Wheeling the bedstead very gently on its noiseless castors a few inches from the wall, I insinuated myself between them, and, sheltered by the head-board, loosened again the slightly-adhering covering of paper that concealed the door, and fitted into the key-hole the well-oiled wooden key, which once before had proved its efficiency. It did not fail me now, in my hour of extremity, for a moment later I had turned and removed it from its socket, stepped forth upon the landing, and relocked without the door of my prison; but, perhaps, with too much of nervous haste, too little caution, for, to my inexpressible confusion, the handle of the instrument of my emancipation remained in my hand, broken off at the lock, and useless forever more.

In delaying probable pursuit from within, I had cut off all possibility of my own retreat in case of failure. My bridges were literally burned behind me, and I had no alternative left between flight and detection. And yet there was something in the situation that, inconsistently enough, made me smile, albeit with a trembling heart.

I shook my head drearily, as a couplet from Collins's "Camel-Driver," with its strange appropriateness, irresistibly crossed my brain.

Why is it that, in times like these, such conceits beset us, such comparisons arise? Does the quality called presence of mind find root in the same source that impels us to apt quotation?—

"What if the lion in his rage I meet? Oft in the dust I see his printed feet."

I gained fresh heart from that trivial diversion of thought, and stood quietly contemplating alternately the hall below and that above (both of which were visible from my place on the intermediate platform; all was still in both of these wide corridors), to make sure of the safety of my enterprise; and now, once more my foot was on the brink of those mysterious stairs which led, I felt, to doom or to liberty. I commenced, very cautiously, to descend them. The study-door at their foot was closed, and all seemed silent within. The murmur of voices, and the remote rattling of china proceeding from the ell behind the hall, encouraged me to believe that on this bitter night the family was concentrated, for greater comfort, in the supper-room.

With my hand on the baluster, pausing at every step, I crept quietly down the stairway; then, as if my feet were suddenly winged with terror, I darted by the study-door, flew lightly over the carpeted hall, and found myself, in another moment, secure within the small enclosed vestibule into which the door of entrance gave. My worst misgivings had never compassed the terrific truth. At this early hour of the evening, not only was the front door locked, but the key had been withdrawn. This was despair.

My knees gave way beneath me, and I sank like a flaccid heap in the corner, against one of the leaves of the small folding-door that divided the arched vestibule from the long entry, and which was secured to the floor by a bolt, while the other one was thrown back. Crouched in the shadow, powerless to move or think, I heard, with inexpressible terror, the door of the study open, and the voice and step of Bainrothe in the hall, approaching me.

Had he heard me? Would he come? Was I betrayed?

I felt my hair rise on my head as these questions rang like a tocsin through my brain, and I think, at that moment, I had a foretaste of the chief agony of death.

They were answered by Bainrothe himself, as he paused midway between the study-door and my place of refuge; and again I breathed—I lived.

"I was mistaken, 'Stasia, it is not he! the wind, probably; and that marble looks so cold—so uninviting—shall not explore it. He has a key, you know, and can come when he likes; for my part, I shall go in to supper while the oysters are hot. Do as you like, though."

"Had we not better wait? You know he is sure to come to-night, bad as the weather is, on account of that affair. It was late when Wentworth notified him."

This was the rejoinder made from within the study, in which I recognized the voice of Mrs. Raymond, clear and shrill.

"Well, have it as you please. If you prefer courtesy to comfort, you shall be gratified; but what's the use of ceremony with Gregory? He will be here in twenty minutes, Mr. Bainrothe; but don't wait. I shall have time to sup with him before I go up-stairs, you know. I believe I will stay where I am until he comes, and finish taking in the poor thing's wedding-gown. Well, any thing is better than removal to the belfry"—and I thought I heard a sigh.

"A matter of mere temporary necessity, you know, only she might have frozen in the interval," said Bainrothe, jauntily, as he walked up the hall to the door of the dining-room, which I heard him open and let fall against its sill again. It closed with a spring, and in the next moment the study-door was also softly shut, and all was still.

My resolution was promptly taken. The folding leaves of the inner door—that which divided the marble-paved vestibule from the carpeted entry—against one of which I had been, leaning, I well knew worked to and fro on pulleys which obeyed the drawing of a cord and tassel hanging at one side, and thus they could readily be closed with a touch by any one standing in the vestibule as they opened out into the hall on which side was the latch and bolt. I recalled this quaint arrangement with a quickness born of emergency, as one that might serve me now, and speadily possessed myself of the tassel at the extremity of the controlling cord. Thus armed, and praying inwardly for strength and courage, and wherewith to carry out my scheme successfully, I took my stand in one of the two niches (just large enough for the purpose) in the door-frame, preferring, of course, that next to the lock, prepared to darken the vestibule at the first approach of the expected guest (I was afraid to do it before, lest attention might be called to it from within the house), and make my escape by rushing past him ere he could recover himself as he entered in the gloom.

The hazard was extreme, the result uncertain, the effort almost foolhardy, it may be thought; but the storm and darkness were in my favor, and I was fleet of foot, as were not all of my pursuers, as far as I could foresee who these might be.

Momently I grew cooler, more determined, more calm, more desperate, more regardless of consequences; and now the culmination of endeavor approached in the shape of the sound of stamping feet upon the icy platform of the steps which they had softly ascended, and the uncertain fitting of a dead-latch key in its dark socket, the feeling for the knob with half-frozen fingers, and finally the sudden and violent throwing forward and open of the door into the darkened vestibule, for I had drawn the cord at the first symptoms of Gregory's advent, which yet took me by surprise. I had closed the inner doors, it is true, but paralyzed with sudden terror I had taken no advantage of the darkness thus evoked, and, as the tall form of the expected and expectant bridegroom staggered in, literally blown forward by the tempest, with introverted umbrella, and wet and streaming garments (dimly discerned in the gloom) that brushed against me as he passed, I continued to stand transfixed to stone in the niche I still occupied.

The dream in which La Vigne had prophesied my failure flashed over me like lightning, and my knees trembled beneath me, yet I still clung spasmodically to the cord I held, and with such desperate force that, when Gregory pushed against the door, he believed it latched within, and so desisted from further effort.

"Dark as Erebus," he muttered, "and on such a night! Confound such hospitality! I suppose I must go back and ring;" and in pursuance of this idea he again suddenly opened the front-door, which, swinging violently back as he turned his face within, once more afforded me the golden opportunity so lately lost. Quick as thought I dropped the cord I held, and in the sudden gust the leaves of the inner door, thus released, flew open and impelled my foe irresistibly forward. With his flapping coat and hat he drifted into the lighted hall before the driving blast, and, roused to instantaneous action, I slid from the niche I filled to the icy platform without, and swift and silent as a spectre sped down the sleety steps to the outward darkness. I was free!

A moment after, I heard the door slammed heavily after me, while I crouched by the gate-post for concealment.

Rising up, I mutely blessed the friendly portal that made me an outcast in the storm-swept streets from which the very dogs shrank terrified.

One moment, one only, I paused as I passed by my father's gate-way, crowned with stone lions that glimmered in the gloom. The force of association and of contrast shook me with emotion—I could not enter there. My own roof afforded me no shelter from the biting blast; but squares away, with a comparative stranger, I must seek (if I ever gained it on that dreadful night) a refuge from the storms and sure protection from my foes.

I moved rapidly along toward the tall street-lamp that diffused a dim and murky light from its frost-crusted lantern at the corner of the square, and before I reached it I encountered the first danger of my undertaking.

Protected, fortunately, by the shadow of the high stone-wall near which I walked rapidly, I met Dinah, so nearly face to face that the whiff of the pipe she was smoking was warm upon my cheek. Wrapped in her old cloth shawl and quilted hood, she muttered as she went, and staggered too, I thought, though here the northeast wind, that swept her along before it, might have been at fault, while, blowing in my face, it retarded my progress.

I passed her unchallenged, but, glancing back just as I turned the corner, I became aware that she was retracing her steps. I fled rapidly on until I reached the shelter of a friendly nook between two houses (well remembered of old), when, turning again to gaze, I saw her standing immovable as a statue beneath the lamp-post, evidently looking in the direction I had taken. There seemed no way of escape now save in persistent flight. My place of concealment might be too readily detected by a cautious observer, a savage on the war-trail. Should Dinah herself pursue me, I knew my speed would distance her; but, that prompt pursuit of some kind was imminent, I knew from that moment.

My aim was to reach the house of Dr. Pemberton, no intermediate one presenting itself as that of an acquaintance of whom I could ask shelter, and belief in the truth of my assertions. Of this house I remembered the position with tolerable accuracy. It formed one, I knew, of a long block of buildings extending from one street to another, and was near the centre.

I had been there only on rare occasions, when his niece abode with him, for he dwelt ordinarily in widowed solitude, although, our intimacy was that of relatives rather than of patient and physician.

For this desired goal I strained every nerve, every muscle, every faculty, on that never-to-be-forgotten night of bitter, freezing cold, and driving sleet and blast, which seemed to proclaim itself, in every howling gust, "The wind Euroclydon!"



CHAPTER XIII.

At first, excitement and terror winged my feet; but even these refused, after I had gone a few squares, to do their friendly office.

Bareheaded, but for a filmy veil, soon thoroughly drenched through; barehanded and almost barefooted, for my thin silk slippers and stockings formed not, after my first few steps, the slightest impediment to wet or cold, I felt that I must perish by the wayside. The sleety storm drove sharply in my face, rendered doubly sensitive to its rigor by long absence from outward air. My insufficient clothing clung closely about me, freezing in every fold, and I glided rather than walked along the icy pavement, scarcely lifting my stiffened feet, or having power to do so.

One stern hope—it almost seemed a forlorn one—now possessed me to the exclusion of all else; one prayer trembled on my quivering lips—that I might reach my destination, if only to tell my story and drop dead a moment after.

Yet I think, in spite of this resolve—this prayer—that, had a friendly door been opened on the way, an area even emitting light and warmth, I should have instinctively turned aside and, at any risk, pleaded for shelter, both from storm and foeman.

In those days that seem far back in the march of luxury, because of the vast impetus of human momentum, stores were closed early, and the primitive family tea-table still existed which marked the assemblage of the household around the evening comet and hearth.

I remember the closed, inhospitable look of the houses past which I sped—the solid wooden shutters, then universal, which, closed from the wayfarer every evidence of internal life, and the cold sheen of the icy-white marble steps, made visible by dim lamp-light.

I gained a street-corner not very far, as it seemed to me, from my place of destination. Yet, until I glanced across the way, I was uncertain, and, but for the friendly refuge this opportunity presented, I think I must have faltered and perhaps fallen and frozen to death on the road-side.

To my bewildered and disordered brain, Aladdin's palace seemed suddenly to rise before me in that wilderness of sealed houses and uninhabited streets; for, as I have said before, the very dogs had crept away that night into secure corners, and not even a pariah chimney-sweep, with his dingy blanket drawn close around him, nodded and dozed by a watch-box or slept on a door-step.

I crept across the space that divided me from this cynosure of warmth and luxury, as a poor, draggled moth might do, to bask in the revivifying light of an astral lamp, attracted beyond my power to resist, to pause before the resplendent window, rich in green and purple and amber rotund vases, whose transparent contents were set forth and revealed by fiery jets of gas, toward which I feebly stretched my half-frozen fingers.

There was a splendid vision, also, of goldfish, in glass globes, jars of leaden rock-work, baskets of waxen fruits and flowers, crystal bottles containing rose and amber essences; but, above all, there was light—there was heat.

With one greedy, insatiate gaze my eyes swept in the details of this mimic Eden, and, in another moment, my hand turned the knob of the ground-glass door near the window, and I found myself in paradise!

Rest, shelter, heat—these must I have or perish, and, but for the timely refuge of this thrice-blessed apothecary's shop, I might have left this retrospect unwritten!

I staggered to a chair, and seated myself, unbidden, by the almost red-hot stove, and cowered above it for a time, oblivious of all else.

Then I looked timidly around me.

The master of this Eden was standing, at the moment when he first caught my eyes, holding up a bottle, scrutinizingly, between his face and the light, one of many of the same sort that a lad, in a long, white apron, was engaged in washing.

The odor of the various drugs and essences over which he presided formed an aromatic atmosphere singularly suggestive of incense, as did his costume, that of a high-priest of the temple; but, very soon discarding a gray-linen cape or talma, worn for the protection of his speckless coat, and tossing a bundle of corks rather disdainfully to his assistant, the head of the establishment came politely forward, standing on the other side of the stove, with clasped hands, expectantly.

"You will tell me your errand here when you are quite ready," he said, kindly. "Do rest and warm yourself first. The stove has a narcotic tendency when one has just come out of cold like this! The thermometer has fallen twenty degrees since noonday; but that is only half the trouble. Hem! This sleet and wind are beyond any former experience of mine at this season."

I heard the words of the speaker as if bound in a dreadful dream, but they were clearly understood, and now I made an effort at utterance, but failed, until after repeated endeavors, to enunciate one word. Yet I noted distinctly, and even with a nice discrimination of scrutiny, the red-haired and bright-eyed man, portly and somewhat pompous-looking, with his plump hands folded over his vest, who stood before me, looking pityingly down on my suffering face.

After a time I gathered up my forces sufficiently to inquire, being quite thawed and comforted by the reviving heat of the apartment, how far it might be to the house of Dr. Pemberton, who resided in the block of houses known as Kendrick's Row, on Maple Street.

"It is nearly a square and a half, miss, by street measurement just now, as, on account of changes, this is impassable," was the prompt reply. "Scarcely half a square by the alley that runs from my back-door, after a short turn, straight through to Maple Street; and, if it is only question of a message, I can send Caleb, so that you may await the coming of the doctor in comfort, in this emporium. He always uses his gig for night-visits, and will, no doubt, be happy to carry you home in his wolfskin."

"Thanks—there is no question of a medical visit. I have very important business with him. I must see him in his own house. I will go without further delay. But, perhaps"—lingering a moment—"you would be so good as to suffer Mr. Caleb to show me the short way you spoke of? I shall not mind going through the alley at all."

I rose prepared to depart, and glanced beseechingly at Caleb, who laid down his bottle uncorked, and folded his arms with an approving knightly bow, unperceived by his employer.

"We have just had a similar inquiry as to Dr. Pemberton's locality; I mean," said the master of the emporium, without replying to my request, "on the part of a very distinguished-looking personage—I might say, well got up in the fur and overcoat line—and, had you come in a few moments earlier, you might have had his escort; or perhaps you are on his track now—probably one of his party?" hesitatingly. "No! Well, it is a strange coincidence, to say the least—very strange—as the doctor is so well known hereabouts. As to going out in the storm again, I have my misgivings, miss, for you, when I look at the flimsiness of your attire and its drenched condition. I can't see, indeed, how a delicate-looking lady like yourself ever held her own against this terrific wind. Eolus seems to have lost his bags! But, perhaps you had an escort to the corner?"

"No—no—no—I came quite alone! Oh, for pity's sake, put me on my way and let me go! My business is most urgent!" I hesitated—my heart sank. Had Bainrothe been before me to spirit the doctor away by some feigned message of need, of distress, to which no inclemency of weather could close that benevolent medical ear? And did he lie in wait for me on the way?"

"Perhaps I had, after all, better go alone," I continued; "it might be too great an inconvenience"—and I moved toward the ground-glass door.

"Not if you will accept my services, miss," said Caleb, timidly, pushing away the remaining corks as he spoke, and glancing furtively at his master.

"How often must I remind you, Caleb Fink," said the owner of the emporium, "that your sphere is circumscribed to your duties? Attend to those phials, and drain them well before you bottle the citrate of magnesia. The last was spoiled by your unpardonable carelessness. I have not forgotten this!"

And again, with a deprecatory look at me, Caleb Fink subsided into a nonentity.

"Truly has the great and wise Dr. Perkins remarked that 'the women of America are suicidal from the cradle to the grave!' I will give you one of his pamphlets, miss, to take away with you, and you will be convinced that slippers are serpents in disguise in winter weather! The wooden shoes of Germany rather! Ay, or even the sabot of France! You must not stir another step in those. Be seated, pray, and I will not detain you long, while I procure a substitute or protection for such shams, worth nothing in such Siberian weather.—Caleb, a word with you;". and he whispered to his apprentice, who glided away, to return in a trice with a pair of India-rubber overshoes, into which benign boats he proceeded to thrust my unresisting feet, as I stood leaning on the counter; after which a muffler was tied about my ears, and a heavy honey-comb shawl thrown over my shoulders by the same expeditious hands.

"Could you be always as spry, Caleb! Your gloves now—I shall need my own"—and a pair of stalwart knitted mits were forthwith drawn over my passive hands, in which my fingers nestled undivided and warm.

"Now you look something like going for the doctor! My overcoat, Caleb—gloves—fur-cape—cane! All hanging near the bed. There, we are ready now for old Borealis himself, if he chooses to blow! But I forget—God bless me, you are as pale as the ghost of Pompey, at Philippi!—Caleb, the Perkins elixir—a glass!—Now, young lady, just take it down at a gulp. It is the only alcoholic preparation that Napoleon Bonaparte Burress ever suffered to pass his temperate lips. Father Matthew does not object to it at all, I am told, on emergencies. It may be had at this repository very low, either by the gross or dozen"—speaking the last words mechanically, and he tendered me a small glass of some nauseous, bittersweet, and potent beverage, that coursed through my veins like liquid fire.

"Thank you; it is very comforting," I gasped, and, setting the glass down on the counter, I covered my face with my hands and burst into tears.

The whole forlornness of my outcast and eleemosynary condition rushed over me simultaneously with the flood of warmth caused by the Perkins elixir, which nerved me the next moment for the encounter with the elements.

I saw the kindly master of the emporium turn away, either to conceal his own emotion or his observation of mine, and Caleb stood trembling and crying like a girl before me.

I had shrunk, it may be remembered, from the description Sabra gave me of McDermot, when I heard of his red hair and "chaney-blue eyes;" but to this red-haired, hazel-eyed man I yearned instinctively, for there are moral differences discernible in the temperament greater than any other, and, when a red-haired man is tender-hearted, he usually usurps the womanly prerogative, and gushes.

But Caleb's sympathy touched me even more.

"We will go now, if you please," I said, recovering myself by a strong effort, and Napoleon B. Burress mutely tendered me his stout, overcoated arm. "The short way you mentioned—let us go that way, if not disagreeable to you," I pleaded.

"Oh, no; it will be an absolute saving of time to me; but, I warn you, the alley is narrow and dark!"

"Never mind; I prefer the short cut, be it what it may. Time is every thing to me."

We passed through the shop, threaded a narrow entry, opened a back-door, which gave upon a strip of paved yard, leading in turn to a back-gate, through which we emerged into a dark and dirty-looking alley.

But first the work of unlocking a padlock, which confined a chain, had to be effected, and, while Mr. N.B. Burress was thus unfastening his back-gate preparatory to egress, I stood gazing back, Eurydice-like, in the place I had left, for the doors of the long entry stood open, revealing the shop beyond and its illuminated window.

Standing thus, I saw, as through a vista and in a perfect ecstasy of terror, the ground-glass shop-door open, and two well-known forms in succession block its portals—those of Gregory and Bainrothe! Would Caleb send them on our track, or would the better part of valor come to his aid and save me from their clutches?

A thought occurred to me. "Mr. Burress," I said (I had retained his name with its remarkable prefix), "will you not lock the gate outside? I can wait patiently until you secure your premises—and—and bring away the key."

"I had meant to leave it here until my return, but you are right," speaking indulgently. "I suppose burglars are abroad on nights like this," and he quietly relocked the alley-gate. "You are very considerate," he said, dryly, after we had gone a few yards in profound silence, "but had I not better return for a lantern?"

"Oh, not for worlds! Faster—faster, Mr. Burress, and Heaven will reward you! Never mind the stones—the snow—the mud—so that we get there first! Yes, I see where the lane turns; I see very well in the dark—never fear—only do not delay—I am so glad you locked the alley-gate. They cannot come that way."

"Of whom are you afraid, poor young lady? Nobody would harm you, I am sure; such a gentle, tender thing as you seem to be!"

"Oh, yes! Fiends are on my track! Don't let them get possession of me again, Mr. Burress. I am pursued—yes—faster—faster!"

"But what has startled you, poor thing, since we left the Repository? You seemed quite calm after the Perkins elixir—and those tears. Ah! I understand!" and he coughed several times significantly. The doctor will set all right, I suppose, when I give you into his hands. I am glad I came with you myself—courage, we shall soon be there!"

"Yes—yes—he is my only hope! I will explain all when we are safe with him. It is not as you think! I have no strength now. Don't question me further, it exhausts me to talk. Just drag me along."

And silently and valiantly did he betake himself to his task. The noisome alley was threaded, and again we emerged into the sleety, lamp-lit street, a few doors from the corner of that block, in the centre of which Dr. Pemberton resided.

As we approached the friendly threshold, the exact situation of which was familiar to my companion, he pointed it out triumphantly with his stick.

"We shall soon be there," he reiterated, "no need for hurry now." But as he spoke I saw a carriage turn the corner we were facing, and again I urged on my lagging escort to his utmost speed. I ran up the sleety steps in advance of him, and rang the bell with convulsive energy. Its summons was answered promptly, but not a second too soon, for, as the door opened to admit me, the carriage paused before the door, and two men leaped from it, one of whom, the taller, thrusting Burress aside, rushed up the steps after me with outstretched arms.

I had found refuge in the vestibule, and slammed the door in his face—closing, as it did, with a spring-lock—before he reached the platform. Then turning to his companion, he fled down to the street again, with the cry that reached my ear distinctly, of "Baffled, by God!" on his profane lips, and the twain drove off as rapidly as they had come.

A moment later a feeble ring at the door, and a voice from without, assuring the inmates that it was only N.B. Burress, and conjuring them not to be alarmed, caused him to be admitted at once by the house-maid, and shown into the same small front study into which she had conducted me to await the doctor's appearance.

"What name shall I give? The doctor is engaged," said the house-maid, lingering.

"None at all, merely let me know when he is ready to see me. I am tired and cold, and can wait patiently by this good fire."

"It may be some time, miss; would you like a cup of hot coffee, you and this gentleman? The doctor has just had his supper, and there is a pint or more left in the urn."

"Thanks—nothing could be more welcome," and the house-maid disappeared.

"That is the way of this house—patients are always entertained, if in need of refreshment," said Mr. Burress, advancing to the chimney, while he rubbed his hands in a self-gratulatory manner, then expanded them before the bright glare that filled every pore with warmth.

I was tremulous, and silent, and half exhausted, and he seemed to take this in at a friendly glance, for he made none of those inquiries that I knew were burning on his inquisitive lips; but after a few moments of further enjoyment before the grate, and having duly turned himself as on a spit, so as to absorb every ray of heat possible, he betook himself to an arm-chair and a book, near the drop-light on a corner table, the soft rustling of the turning leaves of which had a most soothing effect on my nerves.

"I shall only stay a few minutes," he said, apologetically. "I wish, however, to see you safe in Dr. Pemberton's hands before I leave you, as a sort of duty, you know, you being a charge of mine, and should you need further escort—"

"Oh, thank you, kindly; you have surely had enough trouble on my account already."

"Not a particle—only a pleasure, miss; but the push I got from your pursuer upset me on the pavement and made sparks fly out of my eyes, and, before I could gather myself up, they were back again in the carriage and off. You will have to give me the mans name, miss—you will, indeed, on my own account, when all your fatigue and fright are over. Such favors are generally returned by me with compound interest."

"Oh, be thankful you have not a compound fracture, Mr. Burress, and let the fellow go. He is beneath contempt. But I shall not be satisfied until Dr. Pemberton tells me himself that you are uninjured."

"A lump as big as a potato—that's all, miss; not worth minding, I assure you;" and he raised his hand to his occipital region. "An application, before retiring to bed, of 'Prang's Blood and Life Regenerator,' will make all right again. An astonishing remedy, miss, which no family should be without, and which may be obtained cheaply by the gross or dozen at my emporium. You have heard of Hercules Prang?"

These were the last words I heard distinctly from the lips of Napoleon B. Burress; nor were they answered, even by the brief "Never" which might have proclaimed my ignorance of the very existence of that demi-god of charlatanry, who, for the benefit of suffering mankind, had condescended to compel his genius into the shape of a "revivifying balsam."

I had, with the aid of the house-maid, divested myself of my wet overshoes and wrappings before the advent of my companion, and had already ensconced myself in a deep Spanish chair, that stood invitingly and with extended arms in one corner of the fireplace, when he advanced to place himself on the rug for a general roasting.

It was precisely twenty minutes past ten, Mr. Burress told me later, when he detected, by stealing on tiptoe to my chair, and bending above me, that I was sound asleep, and the mantel clock was on the stroke of eleven when I awoke.

In one corner of the room sat a stern statue of Silence, in the shape of N.B. Burress, watching my repose, and from the adjoining office came the murmur of voices that proved that the long interview between Dr. Pemberton and his patient was still in progress.

At this moment, one of the walnut-leaves of the small folding-door, that formed a communication between the study and office of the good physician, swung itself gently on its noiseless hinges, into the position distinguished in description as "slightly ajar," and thus remained fixed, after a fashion that spiritual mediums might have been able to account for, on supernatural principles.

The low murmur of voices then readily resolved itself into shaped words and sentences, and, but for my deep languor, and the delightful sense of security that possessed me, I should have risen and closed the obliging door, to shut out unintentional communications.

As it was, I lingered and listened, as one might do to the dash of waves, or the rustling of branches, until suddenly the tones and meaning of the principal interlocutor caused me to rise to my loftiest sitting posture, and clasp the arms of the chair I occupied, while the strained ear of attention drank in every syllable of the remainder of the narrative, evidently drawing near its close.

The low monotony of a continued discourse pervaded the voice, the manner of the speaker, the thread of whose story was no longer interrupted, as before, by the comments or questions of his companion, intent upon the vital interest of the tale.

"So I turned back at Panama," said the raconteur, probably, of a series of adventures, "and abandoned my project altogether. The man spoke with an air and tone of truth: the sketch was unmistakably hers. The whole thing was full of vraisemblance, so to speak, and bore me completely off my feet. The initials beneath the sketch of Christian Garth were identical with her own.

"He referred me to Captain Van Dome for confirmation of the saving of the few remaining passengers on the raft, and her presence in the ship Latona, together with that of the child and negress.

"I have seen Captain Van Dorne, and he admits the part he played, on the representation of Bainrothe; and, through the evidence of a newspaper advertisement, of the previous autumn, which had met his eye, to satisfy the puerile scruples of this really good but ignorant man—going no deeper than the surface in his code of morals—they were obliged to tear out the record of their names, and take refuge temporarily in the long-boat, before he would swear to Miriam, in her state-room, that Bainrothe was not on board.

"As to the habeas corpus which would have gone into effect to-day, and which the wretch managed to defeat by requiring an error to be corrected in the writ, that no guiltless man would have observed, I fear sometimes it will prove ineffectual if we wait for the morrow. My plan was to go at midnight with a party of my friends to the house of this miscreant, and take the law in my own hands; but, in this I could not stir, for the reasons I have given you. Besides that, it was risking too much—her safety and reputation.

"She cannot be secretly removed, of course, for we have a detective in the house able and strong, besides the old well-paid negress, both of whom—"

"Have played you false," I interrupted, rising impetuously, and throwing back the loose leaf of the door, "and I am here to tell you this. O friends, have you forgotten me?"

And, rushing forward, I threw an arm around each of those dear necks, weeping alternately on the shoulder of one and the other of the two men I loved best in the world, and who, for some moments, sat silent and amazed!

Then Wentworth rose mutely, and clasped me to his breast, and silence prevailed between us. It comprehended all.

I think, when we meet again in heaven, after that severance which is inevitable to those who wear a mortal shape, we may feel as we did then, but never before! The rapture—the relief—the spiritual ecstasy—surmounting, as on wings of fire, pain, fatigue, suspense, anguish of mind and body—were in themselves lessons of immortality beyond any that book or sage has issued from midnight vigil or earthly tabernacle.

Not until a new order of things is established, and we have done with tribulation, tears, and death, shall we again know such sensations; nor is it indeed quite certain that human heart and brain could twice sustain them here below!



CHAPTER XIV.

Reaction came at last! Life is full of bathos as well as pathos. An hour later, we four companions in the rejoicing over this redemption, if chiefly strangers before, were partaking cheerfully together of hot coffee and oysters. The services of Mrs. Jessup had been called in—the doctor's excellent old Quaker house-keeper—and, amid many "thous" and "thees," she had served us a capital and expeditious supper.

No one enjoyed the festive occasion more than Mr. Burress, who, on the point of stealing lightly away after witnessing from the front study the scene of recognition and meeting, had been arrested on the threshold by Dr. Pemberton himself.

Either to allow a full explanation between two long-parted lovers, or to conceal his own emotion and get back his customary calm, our dear doctor had seen fit to step into the front-study for a few minutes, and he checked Mr. Burress, with his hand on the door knob, with some very natural questions as to the mode and time of our meeting, and ended by requiring his presence at the slight collation he ordered at once.

The part the worthy apothecary had played' in my closing adventure; the certainty that to his zeal and promptness I owed my immunity from further captivity—for, had I walked around the square in the usual way, the men at watch from the carriage-windows must have espied and seized me—or, had we loitered in the alley, and arrived a moment later at the central house of Kendrick Row, there is no doubt that they would have been there to await my arrival, nor could Mr. Burress have saved me from their clutches—the whole thing seemed especially providential; but, as the efficient medium of such mercy, Napoleon B. Burress did, indeed, seem to all present crowned with a perfect nimbus of glory. Dr. Pemberton led him back to my presence with his arm encircling his shoulder; Captain Wentworth shook his hand mutely but long, with his eyes dimmed with tears, and words that found imperfect utterance, at last compelling him to strange silence.

"I thank you, I bless you," he said, at last. "I do not hope to be able to return such services, but, what I can do, command."

"And I to think that she was crazy all the time; escaped from the great asylum a mile away. Sweetest creature, too, I ever saw in my life; and Caleb thought so, too."

The speaker brushed a briny drop or two from his eyes with the back of his hand as he spoke; then, smiling archly, asked:

"Can you forgive me, miss, for belying you so, even in thought? You see, I have made a clean breast of it now; but such a pity!"

"Forgive you?" And I advanced toward him, and put both my hands in one of his large white extremities, and, before I knew what I was doing, I had stooped over and kissed it, and was bathing it with my tears.

"O miss! this is too much; it is, indeed!" said Napoleon B., blushing to the roots of his hair, and withdrawing his hand with a slightly-mortified air; "you nonplus me completely."

"You see she was too much overcome, Mr. Burress, to speak otherwise than this," said Wentworth, drawing me to his bosom. "You must honor this expression of feeling as I do."

"O sir! it is the greatest honor I ever received in my life; and she, poor thing, like Penelope, tangled up in a web so long, and free at last! Well, it is a great joy to me to think I helped a little to cut the ropes."

"Helped! Why, I owe every thing to you. Listen," and then as briefly as I could I recounted the trials in store for me that very night—the compulsory marriage, or the removal to the belfry-tower—one or the other inevitable, and either of which must have made the proposed rescue of the following day, on the part of Captain Wentworth and his friends, in one sense or the other unavailing. As the wife of Gregory, or as the prisoner of the turret, I should in one case have been morally, and in the other physically, dead or lost forever!

Mutely, and tearfully even, was my skill in setting forth the magnitude of the wrong, from which Mr. Burress had been instrumental in saving me, acknowledged by my audience, not excepting Jenny the house-maid, who, arrested on the threshold, stood wiping her eyes with her neat cotton apron in token of sympathy.

"Caleb will be wondering what has become of me, and tired out of watching if I don't go home at once," said Mr. Burress, after his emotion had subsided, and accepting gracefully the civic crown with which he had been metaphorically rewarded. Mine was in store, but how could he dream of this?

A statue of the Greek Slave, a copy made by a master-hand, soon adorned his window, and his bride wore pearls of price, the joint gift of Miriam and Wardour Wentworth, a twelvemonth later, when a mistress of the emporium was brought home, much to the solace of Caleb, who was remembered by us also, let me not forget to add.

Truly kind and benevolent as he was, Napoleon Burress had a despotic manner, which relaxed beneath the genial smile of Marian March.

"I must go, indeed, my dear sir" (to Dr. Pemberton), "but this night will be memorable in my annals. God bless you all! Farewell. Afraid of an encounter? Not I. Like Horatio Cockleshell of old, I learned to carry pistols constantly about me when I had to pass the bridge every night as a youngster. My parents lived in Hamilton village. I still keep up the custom, and therefore pay my fine yearly to the council."

"When at last we separated, the clock was on the stroke of one, and I went to a clean and quiet chamber above the little study, where a bright fire was burning, but whence the smell of lavender, which always accompanies the fresh sheets of Quakerhood, still prevailed with a summer-like fragrance. The attentive house-maid disrobed me, and bathed my chilled and frosted feet and swollen hands in water tempered with alcohol. Then arraying me in a mob-cap and snowy cotton gown, the property of good Mrs. Jessup, placed me in the soft nest prepared for sojourners beneath that homely but hospitable roof.

"I hope thee is comfortable, Miriam Monfort," said Mrs. Jessup, after I was ensconced in bed. "Why, thy face is the same, after all, that I remember when thou wert a very little girl, and used to walk out with Mrs. Austin. She is well, I hope?" settling the bed-cover.

"I cannot tell you, Mrs. Jessup. I must rather ask such questions of you. When did you see her last? and Mabel—do you know my little sister?"

"Oh, yes, I know her perfectly well by sight. Let me see, it was Sabbath before last that, just as I was coming out of Friends' meeting-house, I saw Mabel Monfort, a pretty maiden, truly, walking with her step-sister, I think, and a tall and stately gentleman. But Mrs. Austin I have not seen since last rose-time, and then only in passing. She seemed well, but wore a troubled face."

"Yes, yes; she was troubled, no doubt, things were so altered; and, if her heart had not turned to stone, she must have thought of me sometimes regretfully. But all bids fair now, Mrs. Jessup, both for me and her, and for Mabel. For the rest, let them go—they are fiends!"

"Thee has a very flushed and hot cheek, Miriam, now that I see thee closely and touch thy face"—doing so lightly with the back of her hand as she spoke. "A bowl of sage-tea would, no doubt, be of service to thee; shall I—"

"Oh, no, Mrs. Jessup; I never could drink that wise stuff in the world. I have just had a good supper, and am excited, that is all. Jenny will tell you what she overheard concerning my escape of to-night, and that will account for all."

"Good-night, then, Miriam; may the Lord have thee in his care this night"—and she withdrew, followed by Jenny, eager, no doubt, to commence the recital of my adventure, or to hear what more Captain Wentworth and Dr. Pemberton had to say on the subject.

It was nearly daylight when they parted, one to snatch a few hours of needful slumber before setting out on his professional tour, the other to go at once to the officers of justice, and, at the very earliest hour possible, obtain the authority to arrest the brace of arch-conspirators, still protected by the shadows of the dawn.

For Justice has its time of sleeping and waking in large cities, and will not be denied its meals, its hours of rest, and even recreation. So it was seven o'clock in the cold November morning before the proper ceremonials could be accomplished which placed it in the power of Wentworth to arraign Basil Bainrothe and Luke Gregory.

He occupied one seat in the hackney-coach, which was otherwise filled by the officers of the law; but, when he rang a sonorous peal on the portal bell of Bainrothe's residence, it was unanswered, and, though the house had been watched since daylight by an armed police force, who had no connection with McDermot, it was found, when an entrance had been effected, that the only inhabitants of the mansion were a sick woman, an old negress, and a child, apparently, from its puny size, about a twelvemonth old. The woman could not be aroused from the coma in which she seemed to have fallen, either as a crisis of her disease or a precursor of death (medical opinion was divided), until suddenly, about noon, she waked, perfectly clear in mind and comfortable in body, and called loudly for nourishment!

I had slept profoundly until that hour, and my first thought in waking was of Mrs. Clayton and her probable condition; then came the concentrated effort necessary for her release; and she, too, awoke, as I have shown, to consciousness and physical ease.

Her surprise, her indignation, at being thus deserted, surpassed even her disappointment at my escape, and her involuntary somnolency was a theme of self-reproach and marvel both. But all yielded in turn to terror when she found herself under arrest in her own chamber, in company with her fellow-conspirator Sabra.

The child was brought to me, at my earnest request, and, during the few days of my sojourn under Dr. Pemberton's roof, managed to make friends of all around him. His deformity soon became a matter of interest and medical examination, and it was decided that it was not beyond the reach of surgical skill.

The process would be very gradual, Dr. Pemberton thought, of straightening the spinal curvature; but, should the health of the child prove good after his tardy and difficult dentition, much might be hoped from the aid of Nature herself. This was joyous intelligence to me.

The noble soul of Ernie should still wear a fitting frame, and the stature of his kind be accorded to him! The "picaninny" wicked old Sabra had gloated on as a dainty morsel, on the raft, might live to put Fate itself to shame; for had I not marveled that his mother even should care to preserve a thing so frail and wretched, when we sat hand-in-hand together on the burning ship? And, later, had I not pondered over the wisdom of his preservation? Who, then, shall penetrate the mysteries of divine intention?

Claude Bainrothe had been arrested, but, after close and thorough examination, was dismissed as irresponsible for and ignorant of his father's acts and designs, a sentence afterward revoked, as far as public opinion was concerned.

Evelyn, Mabel, and Mrs. Austin, were, of course, beyond suspicion—the last two deservedly so; and if, indeed, Evelyn had been guilty of cooeperation, I knew it had been through the force of circumstances alone, too potent for her egotism and vanity. She never wished to destroy, only to govern me, and make my being and interests subordinate to her own. Mrs. Austin and Mabel received me with earnest joy, and Evelyn even manifested a decent sense of sisterly gratulation.

I never saw Claude Bainrothe nor entered my father's house until after he had left it and forever—accompanied not by his wife, who lingered behind in distress and wretched dependence, most bitter to a spirit like hers, neither loving to give or receive favors—for, gathering up all of his own and his father's valuables, and drawing from the bank every dollar he could command, this worthy son of an unprincipled sire fled to join his parent, with his minion, Ada Greene. Evelyn had been for some time sensible of his infatuation, and striven vainly to combat it by every means in her power, forbearance having been her first alternative, vivid reproach her last. But experiments had failed. The first only fostered guilt beneath her own roof—the last urged it to its consummation.

Still young and beautiful, she was deserted by the only man she had ever loved—the being for whom she had ruthlessly sacrificed the welfare of her sisters and every sentiment of honor; to whom she had given up her liberty to pander to his and his father's ignominy, and her home to their desecration.

In her great grief she retired to the solitude of her own chamber, and refused to see any face save that of Mrs. Austin, who from this period became her sole attendant, even after time had somewhat ameliorated the first agony incident to her condition.

For there came to her another phase of being which made this attendance no less a necessity than her present form of bitter and helpless grief. Hope revived, but in a form that promised no fruition, and which later will be made plainer to the reader. Just now I must continue my resume.

Old Martin was dead of paralysis, after praying vainly to be spared to see his master's child return and take possession of her own, for he had never believed in my suicide, an idea that Bainrothe had taken pains to propagate. Nor did he lend any faith to my demise; knowing what he did, he believed that I had gone to England to get assistance from my mother's relatives—and Mrs. Austin had shared his opinion; she had nursed him to the last, faithfully, and Evelyn had been tolerant of his presence. This, at least, was a consolation.

Sabra and Mrs. Clayton were not prosecuted, and I did, perhaps, the most inexorable act of my life when I refused to see either of them again, or assist them to more than a mere subsistence until health could be restored to the one and her "owners" written to in order that the other might be reclaimed to bondage, in which condition alone she, and such as she, can be restrained from wrongdoing. "For there are devils on the earth," says Swedenborg, "as well as angels, and they both wear human guise—but by this may we know them, that no mortal ties bind them, no sphere confines them. They walk abroad, the one solely to evil for its own sake, the other to universal good for the Father. Such as these die not, but are translated, the one to hell, the other to heaven."

Do we not right, then, to confine and enslave devils while they abide with us, or, if we can, to destroy them utterly? And if we discern them, shall we not adore God's angels?

These dwell not long among us, and their eyes are fixed always with a far, pure yearning for some sphere in which we have no part. We feel this in our daily intercourse with them, for angels like these dwell often in the lowliest form about us, and our common contact with them thrills and awes us, though we scarcely realize that it is from them we have these sensations, or what renders them so far, though near at hand!

Little children, submissive slaves, sad women, unresisting men, patient physicians, great patriots, persistent preachers, martyr poets—all these forms and phases in turn do our associate angels enter into and inform.

But ever the sign is there! They are not ours! Among us, but not of us—set apart, here for a season be it, longer or shorter, ready at any time to spread their wings! My sister was of these—I did not recognize this truth in the time of my great sorrow, when the parting plumes had not revealed themselves to my undiscerning eyes.

A mighty touchstone has been applied to these earthly orbs since then, and the power to discriminate has been given to my soul. As Gregory and Sabra were devils, I verily believe, so was Mabel one of Swedenborg's angels. Who shall gainsay me? Who knows more than I on this subtle subject? Not the wisest theologian that lives and breathes this earthly air! Only those who never speak to enlighten us, and who have passed into infinite light and knowledge through the portals of the grave.

When I knelt beside Wardour Wentworth in the old church of chimes a fortnight after my emancipation from the thraldom of demons, I acquired with this new allegiance of mine a more Christian and forbearing spirit than had ever before possessed me; but the pearl of great price came not yet. Into the deeps of sorrow was my soul first compelled to enter, a diver in the great ocean, whence alone all such precious pearls are borne.

Notice had been given to Claude Bainrothe to evacuate my father's premises before my return from the brief wedding-trip which comprised business as well as recreation. Captain Wentworth took me with him to Richmond and to Washington, to both of which places his affairs led him. In the last I had the pleasure of grasping Old Hickory by his honest hand. He was my husband's patron and benefactor, and as such alone entitled to my regard; but there was more. As patriot, soldier, gentleman in the truest sense of the word, I have not seen his peer.

It was a great delight to me, in spite of the shadow Evelyn's grief threw over our threshold, to stand once more as mistress in my father's house, even in the wreck of fortune, and control the education and destiny of my young sister. Little Ernie, too, had his place in the household as son by adoption, and grew daily stronger and more vigorous in our sight, the thoughtful, loving, and reticent child, heralding the man of power, affection, and principle, that he has become.

The employment of my husband lay near the city of my nativity. He was occupied in making the great railroad through Jersey that was the pioneer of engineering progress, and a mighty link between two kindred States. He was in this way, though often absent, never for any length of time, and his return was always a fresh source of joy to his household. Mabel worshiped him; Ernie silently revered; Evelyn with all of her growing peculiarities acknowledged he had merit; and Mrs. Austin regarded him with mingled awe and affection, for to her he was singularly kind and affectionate.

"To grow old in servitude," he would say, "what sadder fate can befall any being, or more entitle him or her to forbearance and respect? What life-long hardships does this condition not impose? And this is a field for universal charity, which costs not much, only a little patience and a few kind words and smiles."

Ours was a happy household; no cloud rested upon it, save for a few brief days of illness or discomfort, until the great blow fell. In her seventeenth year and on the eve of her marriage with Norman Stansbury (again our neighbor, at intervals, when he came to visit his relatives, a man of noble qualities and singularly devoted to my sister), Mabel died suddenly of some secret disease of the heart which had simulated radiant health and bloom.

I had sometimes observed with anxiety a slight shortness of breath, a gasping after unusual exercise, and called the attention of physicians to this state of things in my sister, who regarded it merely as a nervous symptom, and this was all to indicate that the fell destroyer was silently at work. She had just laid a bunch of white roses on her toilet, and crossed the chamber for water to place them in, when she called my name in a strange, excited way, that brought me speedily to her side from the adjoining room. She was lying white and speechless on her bed, beside which the crystal goblet lay in fragments.

The waters of her own existence had flowed forthwith those prepared for her flowers, and before assistance could be summoned she expired peacefully in my arms, without a struggle. She had inherited her mother's malady.

The anguish, and disappointment of the lover, and my own despair, maybe better imagined than portrayed. My baby died a few weeks later—partly, I think, from the effect of my own condition on her frail organization, and the hope of years was blighted in this fragile blossom—the first that had blessed our union.

The little Constance slumbered by Mabel's side, and a slip from that bunch of white roses, the last my sister had gathered, shadows the marbles that guard both of those now-distant, yet not neglected graves. Thus death at last entered our happy household!

A great shadow fell over me, which I vainly strove to dispel with all the effort of my reason and my will. Physicians, remembering my mother's inscrutable melancholy—a part of that mysterious malady that consumed her life—whispered their warnings in my husband's ears, and he resolved, with that energy which belongs to men of his nature, to lay the axe at once to the root of this evil in the only way that presented itself to his mind—as possible of accomplishment.

At first I resisted faintly the coincidence of his will, which he knew was sure to come sooner or later; and to the very last it was agony unspeakable to me, to think that my father's house should pass into the hands of strangers, and that the place that knew me should know me no more!

Very resolutely and calmly did Wardour endure and stem my opposition. Swift and strong as the current of my will flowed naturally, he was ever its master, as the stone dam can stay and lull the fiercest rivers. He persisted, knowing well what was at stake, and to my surprise Dr: Pemberton and Mr. Gerald Stansbury cooperated with his decision. Nor did Mr. Lodore oppose it, though losing thereby one of his most liberal parishioners.

A great struggle was going on in my heart just then—that I think would have perished in darkness, had I not found myself free and emancipated from all fetters of custom and observance by our change of residence.

From the shallow streams of conventional Christianity, moving with tardy current, and full of shoals and sandbanks, I was drifting down, slowly but surely, with that great ocean of deep and unsounded religion, to which all profound natures, that have suffered, do, I believe—if left to themselves—inevitably tend.

In this new land of promise—the golden California—lying like a bride by the side of her bridegroom—the great Pacific Ocean—and shut away by deserts and mountains, from all old conventional cliques and prejudices of our Eastern cities, my soul took wing. What poetry was in me found its outlet; what religious capacity God had endued me with, went forth from the clash of cymbals and the sound of the sackbut, that ever had reminded me, in all seasons of sorrow, or even of joyous excitement, that I was one of an ancient people, astray in foreign pastures—went forth (even as the compromise was made at first by Christ and his apostles with the magnificent but soulless worship of the Jews) to merge these sounds of ancient rite and form in the deep roll of the organ, that fills the churches where the Host is present.

I needed this abiding miracle to stay my faith—to give it a new rapture, never experienced before—to sustain me in my sorrow. In the presence of the holy Eucharist—in the sweet belief that saints communed with me, and that the Mother of God, who, like me, had wept and suffered, interceded for me at the throne of Christ, I regained the vitality that seemed gone forever.

There is no cup like this for the lips of the parched and weary wayfarer—none!



CHAPTER XV.

Let me go back a little in this retrospect, into which I am compelling into a small space much that would take time in the telling, as a necessary retrenchment for too much affluence of description in the beginning.

The mind of the narrator, like the stone descending the shaft, gathers accelerated velocity with its momentum toward the last, and so expends itself in a more brief and sententious manner than in the commencement. It should be also, but rarely is, more powerful, and more condensed as it nears its finale.

Why these things do not go more uniformly together, as according to popular opinion they invariably must, is better understood by the artist than his readers.

Details are requisite to fill up a mental picture, and impress it on the memory, and, though brevity is certainly the soul of wit, it cannot be said to be infallible in enforcing description to do its duty—that of painting a panoramic picture on the brain.

Life is full of pre-Raphaelitism, and so is fiction, if indeed it resembles life—such as we know it, or such as it might be. The art of verisimilitude is found alone in detail.

Let me go back, then, for a brief summary of some of the principal events and personages of Monfort Hall and Beauseincourt, the earlier portions of this retrospect. I will begin with the La Vignes.

George Gaston, in one of the brief pauses of his stormy political career, wooed and married Margaret La Vigne, the year before her mother espoused in second nuptials her early lover (the brother of that saintly minister who came to her rescue in the first days of her widowhood), and in this marriage she has been happy and prosperous.

They continue to reside under the same roof, and Bellevue awaits its master. It will be empty, I think, if I understand George Gaston's character, so long as Major Favraud is a wanderer on the face of the Continent of Europe, and held, for his especial benefit and return, in readiness.

Vernon and his sweet wife Marion spent the first season of their happy married life under my lintel-tree, and are now our nearest neighbors in our new land of sojourn. A slender iron fence divides our grounds from theirs. A golden cord of affection binds our lives together. Our interests, too, are the same.

Vernon is leagued with my husband in the great engineering projects which have enriched them both—the capital to enlist in which sphere of enterprise was furnished by the sale to a company of our "gold-gashed" lands in Georgia—revealed to my knowledge, as it may be remembered, by the inadvertence of Gregory.

The career of Bertie La Vigne had been a varied one, as might have been foreseen perhaps from her early manifestations and proclivities.

She came to me, while still we dwelt in the city of my birth, when she was approaching her seventeenth year, and remained a twelvemonth under my roof, engaged in the study of Shakespeare with that accomplished artiste Mr. Mortimer. She intended to pursue what gift she had of voice and histrionic talent as a means of livelihood, she told me from the first, and to get rid of the ineffable weariness and monotony of her life at Beauseincourt as well.

The two motives seemed to me to be worthy of all praise. There are, indeed, abodes that kill the soul as well as the body, and this was one of them in my estimation, yet I remembered as a seeming inconsistency that, when, in her sixteenth year, it was proposed that Bertie should come to me for the purpose of attending schools for the accomplishments, she steadily refused to do so.

Her sense of duty might have been at the root of this firm and persistent refusal to accept from my hand a gift richer far than "jewels of the mine"—the power of varied occupation—but something had secretly whispered to me that this was not all on which her apparent self-abnegation was based, and I think that I was right in my conjecture.

Have you seen a plant, scathed by frost, that has made a strong and successful effort to live, and still in its struggling existence bears the mark of the early blight on leaf and blossom?

Such was the impression made on my mind by Bertie La Vigne after three years of separation, and yet she had grown into majestic stature and into comparative beauty since we parted at Beauseincourt.

Tall, slender, straight as a young palm-tree, with exquisite extremities, and a face of aristocratic if not Grecian proportions, there still was wanting in her step, her eye, her smile, that wonderful abandon that had formed her chief charm in her earlier years.

She had been crystallized, so to speak, by some strange process of suffering, into a cold and dull propriety, never infringed on save at times when she found herself alone with me, and when the old frolic-spirit would for a little time possess her. It was not dead, but sleeping.

"And what, my dear Bertie," I said, one day, when Mr. Mortimer had departed, and she came to throw herself down on the sofa in my chamber and rest, "what has reconciled you to the old Parrot, as you used to call our sublime Shakespeare?"

"Sublime! I shall think you affected, Miriam, if you apply that word again to that old commonplace. If he were sublime, do you suppose all the world would read him or go to see his plays? Do reserve that epithet for Milton, Dante, Tasso, Schiller, and the like inaccessibilities. Yes, I do revere 'Wallenstein' more than any thing Shakespeare ever spouted"—in answer to my gently-shaking head—"I should break down over Thekla, I should, indeed."

"Do you think his bed was soft under the war-horses?"—and she waved her hand—"O God! what a tragedy; what a love!" and she covered her face with her quivering palm.

"Bertie, you are still too excitable. I am sorry to see it."

"Philosopher, cure thyself."

"Yes, I know that was always a fault of mine."

"That is why you married the man in the iron mask, you know. I could never have loved that person."

"Describe the man you think you could have loved, Bertie La Vigne."

"Could have loved? That time is past forever, child. 'Frozen, and dead forever,' as Shelley says. He was my affinity, I believe, only he died before I was born. What a pity! I would rather be his widow than the wife of any man living."

"She would like to hear that, no doubt, Bertie."

"Well, she may hear it if she chooses when I go to England to read the old Parrot in the right way, under their very noses, Kembles and all. I'll let Mrs. Shelley know I'm there," and she laughed merrily.

"And what is your idea of the way to read Shakespeare, Bertie dear?" I asked, playfully.

"As one having authority, a head and shoulders above him and all his prating, just as you would talk to your every-day next neighbor, read him without any fear of his old deer-stealing ghost? Why, Miriam, he knew himself better than we knew him. He had no more idea of being a genius than you have! He was a sort of artesian well of a man, and could not help spouting platitudes, that was all. Besides, he had eyes to see and ears to hear, and a very Yankee spirit of investigation. It is the fashion to crack him up like the Bible, both encyclopaedias, that's all! Every man can see himself in these books, and every man likes a looking-glass, and that's the whole secret of their success."

"Bertie, you are incorrigible."

"No, I am not; only genuine. I do think there is a good deal in both of the works in question, but their sublimity I dispute. They are homely, coarse, commonplace, as birth and death."

There was something that almost froze my blood in the way she said those last words, lying back upon the sofa with far-off-looking eyes and hands clasped beneath her head.

"Miriam," she said, after a while, "life is a humbug. I have thought so for some time."

"Poor child, poor child!"

"Ay, poorer than the poorest, Miriam Harz," and, laying aside my work, I went to and knelt beside her, and kissed her brow.

"I have no soul to open! I am as empty as a chrysalis-case, that the butterfly has gone out of to dwell amid sunshine and flowers. Yet I believe I had one once"—in ineffably mournful accents—"but two men killed it; and yet, neither intended the blow! O Miriam! I understand at last what Coleridge meant by his 'life in death.' There is such a thing—and that great necromancer found it out! I am the breathing impersonation of that loathly thing, I believe. Listen"—and she sat up with one raised finger and gave the poet's words with rare expression:

"'The nightmare—life in death was she, That chilled men's blood with cold.'

"Doesn't that describe me as I am, Miriam?"

"You are, indeed, much changed, Bertie; perhaps it would be well could you confide in me."

"No, it would not be well! I never could keep any thing wholly to myself, neither can I tell it wholly, even to such as you—reticent! merciful! But this believe, I have done nothing wrong, nothing to be ashamed of, to wear sackcloth and ashes for, and I am preparing to put my foot on it all. Ay, from the snake's head of first discovery to the snake's tail of the last disappointment, ranging over half a dozen years! A long serpent, truly!" laughing. "But I mean to be galvanized and get back my life. I am determined to be famous, rich, beautiful!" and she nodded to me with the old sweet sparkle in her eye, the glad smile on her lip.

"You laugh at the last threat!—laugh on! 'He who laughs best, laughs last!' says the old proverb. There is such a thing as training one's features, isn't there, as well as one's setters? Miriam, I shall develop slowly; I am still in my very downiest adolescence as to looks. You will see me when I have filled out and ripened, and when I put on my grand Marie Antoinette tenu, some day! Hair drawn back, a la Pompadour, powdered with gold-dust; a touch of rouge, perhaps, on either cheek; ruffles of rich lace at shoulders and elbows; pink brocade and emeralds, picked out with diamonds! Mr. Mortimer's teachings in every graceful movement! It will be all humbug, for I have no real beauty, not much grace; but people will think me beautiful and graceful for all that, while I wear my costumes. They are several—this is only one—all highly becoming! I have a vision of a sea-green dress and moss-roses; of a violet-satin robe, trimmed and twisted everywhere with flowers of yellow jasmine; of pale-gold and tipped marabouts in my hair; also of an azure silk with blond and pearls and a tiara on my forehead" (she laughed archly). "You don't know my capabilities, my dear, for appearing to look well—they are wonderful!"

"The very prospect transfigures you, Bertie. I am glad you are so courageous."

"Were you courageous when you clung to your ropes on the sea-tossed raft! No, Miriam! that was instinct—nothing more; and I, too, have very strong intuitions of self-preservation. Heaven grant that they may be successful! Let us pray."

And, with moving lips and down-drawn lids, from beneath which the large tears stole one by one, like crystal globes, this suffering spirit communed with its God, silently.

So best, I felt! Bertie was only a lip-deep scoffer. Her heart was open to conviction yet, and, when the time came, I believed that the seed sown in old days would germinate and bear good harvest. All was chaos now!

Shall I keep on with Bertie, now that the theme has possession of me, and go back to the others when she is finally dismissed? I think this will be wisest, especially as my space is small, and mood concentrative rather than erratic.

Let us pass over, then, five eventful years, during which the sorrows and changes I have spoken of had taken place, and Wentworth had fixed his home in the vicinity of San Francisco.

I had heard of Bertie in the interval as a successful debutante as a reader of Shakespeare, and had received her sparse and sparkling letters confirming report, truly "angel visits, few and far between."

At last one came announcing her intention of visiting California professionally, and sojourning beneath my roof while in San Francisco. It was to be a stay of several weeks.

She was accompanied and sometimes assisted by Mr. and Mrs. Mortimer, professional readers both—the last distinguished more for grace and beauty, even though now on the wane of life, than she ever had been for talent, but eminently fitted, both by education and character, for a guide and companion.

An English maid, as perfect as an automaton in her training and regularity, accompanied Bertie, to whom were confided all details of dress, all keys and jewels, with entire confidence and safety. An elaborate doll seemed the red-and-white and stupidly-staring Euphemia. Yet was she adroit, obedient, and expert, just to move in the groove of her requirements.

I have spoken only of her accessories; but now for Bertie herself.

"Is she not magnificent?" was my exclamation when alone with my husband on the night of her arrival, after our guest, with her sparkling face and conversation, her superb toilet and bearing, her graceful, nymph-like walk, had retired to her chamber, attended by the mechanical "Miss Euphemia."

The Mortimers, with their children and servants, remained at the principal hotel.

"The very word for her," he replied; "only that and nothing more."

"Wardour!"

"Well, love!"

"How little enthusiasm you possess about the beautiful! Now, if there were question of a new railroad-bridge, the vocabulary would have been exhausted."

"What would you have me say, dear? Is not that word a very comprehensive one? The lady above-stairs is indeed magnificent; but, Miriam, where is Bertie?" and he laughed.

"Ah! I understand; you find her artificial."

"She is too fine an actress for that, Miriam; only transfigured."

"Yes, I see what you mean" (sadly). "Bertie is wholly changed. Whom does she resemble, Wardour? What queen, bethink you, whose likeness you have seen? Not Mary Queen of Scots—not Elizabeth—"

"No, surely not; but she is, now that you draw my attention to it, strikingly like Marie Antoinette."

"She said she would be, and she has succeeded!" and I mused on the wonderful transition.

Four years more, and we heard of Bertie in England, as the rarely-gifted and beautiful American reader, "Lavinia La Vigne." Out of the repertoire of her family names she had fished up this alliteration, and "Bertie" was reserved for those behind the scenes.

It was declared also in the public sheets, what great and distinguished men were in her train; how wits bowed to her wit, and authors to her criticisms! But, when she wrote to me, she said nothing of all this, only telling of her visit to Mrs. Shelley, who had received her kindly, and to the tomb of Shakespeare, whose painted effigy she especially derided. "It looks indeed like a man who would cut his wife off with an old feather-bed and a teakettle," was one of her characteristic remarks, I remember; but there was a little postscript that told the whole story of her life, on a separate scrap of paper meant only for my eye I clearly saw, and committed instantly to the flames after perusal:

"Ah, Miriam, this is all a magic lantern! The people are phantoms, the realities are shadows, and I a wretched humbug, duller than all! Two men have lived and breathed for me on the face of this earth—two only. One was my much-offending and deeply-suffering father. The other—O, Miriam, to think of him is crime; but in his life, and that alone, I live. I send you Praed's last beautiful little song—'Tell him I love him yet.' It will tell you every thing. An answer I have scribbled to it as if written by a man. Keep both, and when I am dead, should you survive me, dear, lay them if you can in my coffin, close, close to my heart!"