Transcriber’s Note:

New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.

POPULAR NOVELS

By Mrs. Mary J. Holmes.

All published uniform with this volume, at $1.50, and sent free by mail on receipt of price.

I.— DARKNESS AND DAYLIGHT. II.— ’LENA RIVERS. III.— TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE. IV.— MARIAN GREY. V.— MEADOW BROOK. VI.— ENGLISH ORPHANS. VII.— DORA DEANE. VIII.— COUSIN MAUDE. IX.— HOMESTEAD ON THE HILLSIDE.

Mrs. Holmes is a peculiarly pleasant and fascinating writer. Her books are always entertaining, and she has the rare faculty of enlisting the sympathy and affections of her readers, and of holding their attention to her pages with deep and absorbing interest.

CARLETON, Publisher,

New York.

MARIAN GREY;
OR, THE
HEIRESS OF REDSTONE HALL.

BY

MRS. MARY J. HOLMES,

AUTHOR OF “’LENA RIVERS,” “TEMPEST AND SUNSHINE,” ETC., ETC.

NEW YORK:

Carleton, Publisher, 413 Broadway.

M DCCC LXV.

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1863,

By DANIEL HOLMES,

In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Northern District of New York.

TO

N. C. MILLER,

OF NEW YORK,

MY MUCH ESTEEMED FRIEND,

AND

FORMER PUBLISHER,

THIS STORY OF MARIAN GREY

IS RESPECTFULLY

DEDICATED,

BY

THE AUTHOR

MARIAN GREY.

CHAPTER I.
GUARDIAN AND WARD.

The night was dark and the clouds black and heavy which hung over Redstone Hall, whose massive walls loomed up through the darkness like some huge sentinel keeping guard over the spacious grounds by which it was surrounded. Within the house all was still, and without there was no sound to break the midnight silence save the sighing of the autumnal wind through the cedar trees, or the roar of the river, which, swollen by the recent heavy rains, went rushing on to meet its twin sister at a point well known in Kentucky, where our story opens, as “The Forks of the Elkhorn.” From one of the lower windows a single light was shining, and its dim rays fell upon the face of a white-haired man, who moaned uneasily in his sleep, as if pursued by some tormenting fear. At last, as the old fashioned clock struck off the hour of twelve, he awoke, and glancing nervously toward the corner, whence the sound proceeded, he whispered, “Have you come again, Ralph Lindsey, to tell me of my sin?”

“What is it, Mr. Raymond?” and a young girl glided to the bedside of the old man, who, taking her hand in his, the better to assure himself of her presence, said, “Marian, is there nothing in that corner yonder—nothing with silvery hair?”

“Nothing,” answered Marian, “nothing but the lamplight shining on the face of the old clock. Did you think there was some one here?”

“Yes—no. Marian, do you believe the dead can come back to us again—when we have done them a wrong—the dead who are buried in the sea, I mean?”

Marian shuddered involuntarily, and cast a timid look toward the shadowy corner, then, conquering her weakness, she answered, “No, the dead cannot come back. But why do you talk so strangely to-night?”

The old man hesitated a moment ere he replied.—“The time has come for me to speak, so that your father can rest in peace. He has been with me more than once in this very room, and to-night I fancied he was here again, asking why I had dealt so falsely with his child.”

“Falsely!” cried Marian, kissing tenderly the hand of the only parent she had ever known. “Not falsely, I am sure, for you have been most kind to me.”

“And yet, Marian,” he said, “I have done you a wrong—a wrong which has eaten into my very soul, and worn my life away. I did not intend to speak of it to-night, but something prompts me to do so, and you must listen. On that night when your father died, and when all in the ship, save ourselves and the watch, were asleep, I laid my hand on his forehead, and swore to be faithful to my trust. Do you hear, Marian—faithful to my trust. You don’t know what that meant, but I know, and I’ve broken my oath to the dying—and from that grave in the ocean he comes to me sometimes, and with the same look upon his face which it wore that Summer afternoon when we laid him in the sea, he asks why justice has not been done to you. Wait, Marian, until I have finished,” he continued, as he saw her about to speak; “I know I have not long to live, and I would make amends; but, Marian, I would rather—oh, so much rather, you should not know the truth until I’m dead. You will forgive me then more readily, won’t you, Marian? Promise me you will forgive the poor old man who has loved you so much—loved you, if possible, better than he loved his only son.”

He paused for her reply, and half bewildered, Marian answered, “I don’t know what you mean—but if, as you say, a wrong has been done, no matter how great that wrong may be, it is freely forgiven for the sake of what you’ve been to me.”

The sick man wound his arm lovingly around her, and bringing her nearer to him, he said, “Bless you, Marian—bless you for that. It makes my deathbed easier. I will leave it in writing—my confession. I cannot tell it now, for I could not bear to see upon your face that you despised me. You wrote to Frederic, and told him to come quickly?”

“Yes,” returned Marian, “I said you were very sick and wished to see him at once.”

For a moment there was silence in the room; then, removing his arm from the neck of the young girl, the old man raised himself upon his elbow and looking her steadily in the face, said, “Marian, could you love my son Frederic?”

The question was a strange one, but Marian Lindsey was accustomed to strange modes of speech in her guardian, and with a slightly heightened color she answered quietly, “I do love him as a brother—”

“Yes, but I would have you love him as something nearer,” returned her guardian. “Ever since I took you for my child it has been the cherished object of my life that you should be his wife.”

There was a nervous start and an increase of color in Marian’s face, for the idea, though not altogether disagreeable, was a new one to her, but she made no reply, and her guardian continued, “I am selfish in this wish, though not wholly so. I know you could be happy with him, and in no other way can my good name be saved from disgrace. Promise me, Marian, that you will be his wife very soon after I am dead, and before all Kentucky is talking of my sin. You are not too young. You will be sixteen in a few months, and many marry as early as that.”

“Does he wish it?” asked Marian, timidly; and her guardian replied, “He has known you but little of late, but when he sees you here at home, and learns how gentle and good you are, he cannot help loving you as you deserve.”

“Yes he can,” answered Marian with childish simplicity. “No man as handsome as Frederic ever loved a girl with an ugly face, and I heard him tell Will Gordon, when he spent a vacation here, that I was a nice little girl, but altogether too freckled, too red-headed, and scrawny, ever to make a handsome woman,” and Marian’s voice trembled slightly as she recalled a speech which had wrung from her many tears.

To this remark Col. Raymond made no reply—for he too, had cause to doubt Frederic’s willingness to marry a girl who boasted so few personal charms as did Marian Lindsey then. Rumors, too, he had heard, of a peerlessly beautiful creature, with raven hair and eyes of deepest black, who at the north kept his son a captive to her will. But this could not be; Frederick must marry Marian, for in no other way could the name of Raymond be saved from a disgrace, or the vast possessions he called his be kept in the family, and he was about to speak again when a heavy tread in the hall announced the approach of some one, and a moment after, Aunt Dinah, the housekeeper, appeared. “She had come to sit up with her marster,” she said, “and let Miss Marian go to bed, where children like her ought to be.”

At first Marian objected, for though scarcely conscious of it herself, she was well enough pleased to sit where she was and hear her guardian talk of Frederic and of what she had no hope would ever be; but when Aunt Dinah suggested to her that sitting up so much would make her look yellow and old, she yielded, for Frederic was a passionate admirer of beauty, and she well knew that she had none to lose. Kissing her guardian good night, she hurried to her chamber, but not to sleep, for the tumult of thought which her recent conversation had awakened kept her restless and wakeful. Under ordinary circumstances she would have wondered what the wrong could be at which Col. Raymond had hinted, but now she scarcely remembered it, or if it occurred to her at all, she instantly dismissed it from her mind as some trivial thing which the weak state of her guardian’s mind magnified into a serious matter.

Thirteen years before our story opens, Marian had embarked with her father on board a ship which sailed from Liverpool to New York. Of that father she remembered little save that he was very poor, and that he talked of his poverty as if it were something of which he was proud. Pleasant memories, though, she had of an American gentleman who used often to take her on his lap, and tell her of the land to which she was going; and when one day her father laid him down in his berth, with the fever as they said, she remembered how the kind man had cared for him, holding his aching head and watching by him till he died;—then, when it was all over, he had taken her upon his knee and told her she was to be his little girl now, and he bade her call him father—telling her how her own dead parent had asked him to care for her, who in all the wide world had no near relative. Something, too, she remembered about an old coarse bag, which had troubled her new father very much, and which he had finally put in the bottom of his trunk, throwing overboard a few articles of clothing to make room for it. The voyage was long and stormy, but they reached New York at last, and he took her to his home—not Redstone Hall, but an humble farm-house on the Hudson, where he had always lived. Frederic was a boy then—a dark-haired handsome boy of eleven, and even now she shuddered as she remembered how he used to tease and worry her. Still he liked her, she was sure—and the first real grief which she remembered was on that rainy day when, with an extra pull at her long curls, he bade her good-by and went off to a distant boarding school.

Col. Raymond, her guardian, was growing rich, and people said he must have entered into some fortunate speculation while abroad, for, since his return, prosperity had attended every movement; and when, six months after Frederic’s departure, he went to Kentucky and purchased Redstone Hall, then rather a dilapidated building, Mrs. Burt, his housekeeper, had wondered where all his money came from, when he used to be so poor. They had moved to Kentucky when Marian was five and a half years old—and now, after ten years’ improvement, there was not in the whole county so beautiful a spot as Redstone Hall, with its terraced grounds, its graveled walks, its plats of grass, its grand old trees, its creeping vines, its flowering shrubs and handsome park in the rear. And this was Marian’s home;—here she had lived a rather secluded life, for only when Frederic was with them did they see much company, and all the knowledge she had of the world was what she gleaned from books or learned from the negress Dinah, who, “having lived with the very first families,” frequently entertained her young mistress with stories of “the quality,” and the dinner parties at which her presence was once so indispensable. And Marian, listening to these glowing descriptions of satin dresses, diamonds and feathers, sometimes wished that she were rich, and could have a taste of fashion. To be sure, her guardian bought her always more than she needed—but it was not hers, and without any particular reason why she should do so, she felt that she was a dependent and something of an inferior, especially when Frederic came home with his aristocratic manners, his graceful mustache, and the soft scent of perfumery he usually carried with him. He was always polite and kind to Marian, but she felt that there was a gulf between them. He was handsome; she was plain—he was rich; she was poor—he was educated, and she—alas, for Marian’s education—she read a great deal, but never yet had she given herself up to a systematic course of study. Governesses she had in plenty, but she usually coaxed them off into the woods, or down by the river, where she left them to do what they pleased, while she learned many a lesson from the great book of nature spread out so beautifully before her. All this had tended to make and keep her a very child, and it was not until her fourteenth year that any thing occurred to develop the genuine womanly qualities which she possessed.

By the death of a distant relative, a little unfortunate blind girl was left to Colonel Raymond’s care, and was immediately taken to Redstone Hall, where she became the pet of Marian, who loved nothing in the whole world as dearly as the poor blind Alice. And well was that love repaid; for to Alice Marian Lindsey was the embodiment of everything beautiful, pure and good. Frederic, on the contrary, was a kind of terror to the little Alice. “He was so precise and stuck up,” she said; “and when he was at home Marian was not a bit like herself.” To Marian, however, his occasional visits to Redstone Hall were sources of great pleasure. To look at his handsome figure, to listen to his voice, to anticipate his slightest wish and minister to his wants so quietly that he scarcely knew from whom the attention came, was happiness for her, and when he smiled upon her, as he often did, calling her “a good little girl,” she felt repaid for all she had done. Occasionally, since her guardian’s illness, she had thought of the future when some fine lady might come to Redstone Hall as its mistress, but the subject was an unpleasant one, and she always dismissed it from her mind. In her estimation, there were few worthy to be the wife of Frederic—certainly not herself—and when the idea was suggested to her by his father, she regarded it as an utter impossibility. Still it kept her wakeful, and once she said softly to herself, “I could love him so much if he would let me, and I should be so proud of him, too.” Then, as she remembered the remark she had heard him make to his college friend, she covered her face with her hands and whispered, sadly, “Oh, I wish I wasn’t ugly.” Anon, however, there came stealing over her the thought that in the estimation of others she was not as plain as in that of Frederic Raymond. Every body seemed to like her, and if she were hideous looking they could not. Alice, whose darkened eyes had never looked upon the light of day, and who judged by the touch alone, declared that she was beautiful, while old Dinah said that age would improve her as it did wine, and that in time she would be the handsomest woman in all Kentucky.

Never before had Marian thought so much of her personal appearance—and now, feeling anxious to know exactly what her defects were, she arose, and lighting the lamp, placed it upon her dressing bureau—then throwing a shawl around her shoulders, she sat down and minutely inspected the face which Frederic Raymond called so homely. The features were regular enough, but the face was very thin—“scrawny,” Frederic had said, and the cheek bones were plainly perceptible. This might be the result of eating slate-stones; Dinah, who knew everything, said it was, and mentally resolving thereafter to abjure everything of the kind, Marian continued her investigations. It did not occur to her that her complexion was surpassingly fair, nor yet that her eyes were of a most beautiful blue, so intent was she upon the freckles which dotted her nose and a portion of her face. Slate-stones surely had nothing to do with these, and she knew of no way of remedying this evil—unless, indeed, poulticing should do it.—She would consult Dinah on the subject, and feeling a good deal of confidence in the negress’ judgment, she passed on to what she considered her crowning point of ugliness—her hair! It was soft, luxuriant and curly, but alas, it bore the color which, though accounted beautiful in Mary Stuart’s time, has long since been proscribed by fashion as horrid and unbecoming. Turn which way she would, or hold the lamp in any position she chose, it was still red—a dark, decided red—and the tears came to Marian’s eyes as she recalled the many times when, as a boy, Frederic taunted her with being a “red-head” or a “brick-top,” just as the humor suited him. Suddenly she remembered that among her treasures was a lock of her mother’s hair, and opening a rosewood box she took from it a shining tress which she laid upon the marble top of her bureau, and then bent down to admire its color, a beautiful auburn, such as is rarely seen—and which, when seen, is sure to be admired.

“And this was my mother’s,” she whispered, smoothing caressingly the silken hair. “I must resemble her more than my father, who my guardian says was dark. I wish I was like her in everything, for I believe she was beautiful,” and into the mind of the orphan girl there crept an image of a bright-haired, sweet-faced woman, whose eyes of lustrous blue looked lovingly into her own—and this was her mother. She had seen her thus in fancy many a time, but never so vividly as to-night, and unconsciously she breathed the petition, “Let me look like her some day, and I shall be content.”

The gray morning light was by this time stealing through the window, and overcome with weariness and watching, Marian fell asleep, and when, two hours later, old Dinah came in to wake her, she found her sitting before the glass, with the lamp still burning at her side, and her head resting on her arms, which lay upon the low bureau.

“For the dear Lord’s sake, what are you doing?” was Dinah’s exclamation, which at once roused Marian, who unhesitatingly answered,

“I got up to look in the glass, and see if I was so very homely.”

“Humbly! Nonsense, child,” returned old Dinah. “You look like a picter lyin’ thar with the sun a shinin’ on yer har, and makin’ it look like a piece of crimson satin.”

The compliment was a doubtful one, but Marian knew it was well meant, and, without a word in reply, commenced her morning toilet. That day, somewhat to her disappointment, her guardian did not resume the conversation of the previous night. He was convinced that Marian could be easily won, but he did not think it wise to encourage her until he had talked with his son, whose return he looked for anxiously. But day after day went by, and it was in vain that Alice listened, and Marian watched, for the daily stage. It never stopped at the gate; and each time that the old man heard them say it had gone by, he groaned afresh, fearing Frederic would not come until it was too late.

“I can at least tell him the truth on paper,” he said to himself at last, “and it may be he will pay more heed to words, which a dead father wrote, than to words which a living father spoke.”

Marian was accordingly bidden to bring him his little writing desk, and then to leave the room, for he would be alone when he wrote that letter of confession. It cost him many a fierce struggle—the telling to his son a secret which none save himself and God had ever known—aye, which none had ever need to know if he would have it so—but he would not. The secret had worn his life away, and he must make reparation now. So, with the perspiration dropping from every pore, he wrote; and, as he wrote, in his disordered imagination, there stood beside his pillow the white-haired Englishman, watching carefully to see that justice was done at last to Marian. Recently several letters had passed between the father and his son concerning the marriage of the latter with Marian—a marriage every way distasteful to the young man, who, in his answer, had said far harsher things of Marian than he really meant, hoping thus to put an end to his father’s plan. She was “rough, uncouth, uneducated and ugly,” he said, “and if his father did not give up that foolish fancy, he should positively hate the red-headed fright.”

All this the old man touched upon—quoting the very words his son had used, and whispering to himself, “Poor—poor Marian, it would break her heart to know that he said that, but she never will—she never will;” and then, with the energy of despair, he wrote the reason why she must be the wife of his son, pleading with him as only a dying man can plead, that he would not disregard the wishes of his father, and begging him to forget the dark-haired Isabel, who, though perhaps more beautiful, was not—could not—be as pure, as gentle and as good as Marian.

The letter was finished, and ’mid burning tears of remorse and shame the old man read it through.

“Yes, that will do,” he said. “Frederic will heed what’s written here. He’ll marry her or else make restitution;” and laying it away, he commenced the last and hardest part of all—the confessing to Marian how he had sinned against her.

Although there was no tie of blood between them, the gentle young orphan had crept down into his inmost heart, where once he treasured a little golden-haired girl, who, before Frederic was born, died on his lap, and went to the heaven made for such as she. In the first moments of his bereavement, he had thought his loss could never be repaired, but when, with her soft arms around his neck, Marian Lindsey had murmured in his ear how much she loved the only father she had ever known, he felt that the angel he had lost was restored to him tenfold in the little English girl. He knew that she believed that there was in him no evil, and his heart throbbed with agony as he nerved himself to tell her how for years he had acted a villain’s part, but it was done at last, and with a passionate appeal for her forgiveness, and a request that she would not forget him wholly, but come some time to visit his lonely grave, he finished the letter, and folding it up, wrote upon its back, “For Marian;” then, taking the one intended for Frederic, he attempted to write, “For my Son,” but the ink was gone from his pen, there was a blur before his eyes, and though he traced the words he left no impress, and the letter bore no superscription to tell to whom it belonged. Stepping upon the floor, he dragged his feeble limbs to the adjoining room, his library, and placing both letters in his private drawer, retired to his bed, where, utterly exhausted, he fell asleep.

When at last he awoke, Marian was sitting by his side, and to her he communicated what he had done, telling her where the letters were, and that if he died ere Frederic’s return, she must give the one bearing the words “For my Son” to him.

“You will not read it, of course,” he said, “or ever seek to know what its contents are.”

Had Marian Lindsey been like many girls, the caution would have insured the reading of the letter at once, but she fortunately shrank from anything dishonorable, and was blessed with but a limited share of woman’s curiosity; consequently, the letter was safe in her care, even though no one ever came to claim it. All that afternoon she sat by her guardian, and when as usual the stage thundered down the turnpike, leaving no Frederic at the door, she soothed him with the hope that he would be there to-morrow. But the morrow came and went as did other to-morrows, until Col. Raymond grew so ill that a telegram was despatched to the truant boy, bidding him hasten if he would see his father again alive.

“That will bring him,” the old man said, while the big tears rolled down his wrinkled face. “He’ll be here in a few days,” and he asked that his bed might be moved near the window, where, propped upon pillows, he watched with childish impatience for the coming of his boy.

CHAPTER II.
FATHER AND SON.

A telegram from Frederic, who was coming home at last! He would be there that very day, and the inmates of Redstone Hall were thrown into a state of unusual excitement. Old Dinah in jaunty turban and clean white apron, bustled from the kitchen to the dining room, and from the dining room back to the kitchen, jingling her huge bunch of keys with an air of great importance, and kicking from under her feet any luckless black baby which chanced to be in her way, making always an exception in favor of “Victoria Eugenia,” who bore a striking resemblance to herself, and would one day call her “gran’mam.” Dinah was in her element, for nothing pleased her better than the getting up a “tip-top dinner,” and fully believing that Frederic had been half starved in a land where they didn’t have hoe-cake and bacon three times a day, she determined to give him one full meal, such as would make his stomach ache for three full hours at least!

Mr. Raymond, too, was better than usual to-day, and at his post by the window watched eagerly the distant turn in the road where the stage would first appear. In her chamber, Marian was busy with her toilet, trying the effect of dress after dress, and at Alice’s suggestion deciding at last upon a pale blue, which harmonized well with her fair complexion.

“Frederic likes blue, I know,” she thought, as she remembered having heard him admire a dress of that color worn by a young lady who had once visited at Redstone Hall.

Dinah, when consulted as to the best method of making red hair dark, had strongly recommended “possum ile and sulphur, scented with some kind of essence;” but to this dye Marian did not take kindly. She preferred that her hair should retain its natural color, and falling as it did in soft curls around her face and neck, it was certainly not unbecoming. Her toilet was completed at last—Alice’s little hands had decided that it was perfect—the image reflected by the mirror was far from being ordinary looking, and secretly wondering if Frederic would not think her tolerably pretty, Marian sat down to await his coming. She had not been seated long when Alice’s quick ear caught the sound of the distant stage, and in a few moments Marian from behind the half-closed shutter, was watching the young man as he came slowly up the avenue, which led from the highway to the house. His step was usually bounding and rapid, but now he lingered as if unwilling to reach the door.

“’Tis because of his father,” thought Marian. “He fears he may be dead.”

But not of his father alone was Frederic thinking. It was not pleasant coming home; for aside from the fear that his father might really die, was a dread of what that father might ask him to do. For Marian as a sister, he had no dislike, for he knew she possessed many gentle, womanly virtues, but from the thoughts of making her his wife he instinctively shrank. Only one had the shadow of a claim to bear that relation to him, and of her he was thinking that September afternoon as he came up the walk. She was poor, he knew, and the daughter of his landlady, who claimed a distant relationship with his father; but she was beautiful, and a queen might covet her stately bearing, and polished, graceful manner. Into her heart he had never looked, for satisfied with the fair exterior, he failed to see the treachery lurking in her large black eyes, or yet to detect the fierce, stormy passions, which had a home within her breast.

Isabella Huntington, or “Cousin Bell,” as he called her, was beautiful, accomplished, and artful, and during the year that Frederic Raymond had been an inmate of her mother’s family, she had succeeded in so completely infatuating the young man that now there was to him but one face in the world, and that in fancy shone upon him even when it was far away. He had never said to her that he loved her, for though often tempted so to do, something had always interposed between them, bidding him wait until he knew her better. Consequently he was not bound to her by words, but he thought it very probable that she would one day be his wife, and as he drew near to Redstone Hall, he could not forbear feeling a glow of pride, fancying how she would grace that elegant mansion as its rightful mistress. Of Marian, too, he thought—harsh, bitter thoughts, mingled with softer emotions as he reflected that she possibly knew nothing of his father’s plan. He pitied her, he said, for if his father died, she would be alone in the world. After what had passed, it would hardly be pleasant for him to have her there where he could see her every day;—she might not be agreeable to Isabel either, and he should probably provide for her handsomely and have her live somewhere else—at a fashionable boarding school, perhaps!

Magnanimous Frederic! He was growing very generous, and by the time he reached the long piazza, Marian Lindsey was comfortably disposed of in the third story of some seminary far away from Redstone Hall!

The meeting between the father and son was an affecting one—the former sobbing like a child, and asking of the latter why he had tarried so long. The answer to this question was that Frederic had been absent from New Haven for three weeks, and that Isabel, who took charge of his letters, neglected to forward the one written by Marian. At the mention of Isabel, the old man’s cheek flushed, and he said, impatiently, “the neglect was an unpardonable one, for it bore on its face ‘In haste.’ Perhaps, though, she did it purposely, hoping thus to keep you from me.”

Instantly Frederic warmed up in Isabel’s defence, saying she was incapable of a mean act. He doubted whether she had observed the words “In haste” at all, and if she did she only withheld it for the sake of saving him from anxiety as long as possible.

At this moment there was the sound of little uncertain feet near the door, and Alice groped her way into the room. She was a fair, sweet-faced little child, and taking her upon his knee, Frederic kissed her affectionately, and asked her many questions as to what she had done since he was home six months before. Seldom before had he paid her so much attention, and feeling anxious that Marian should be similarly treated, the little girl, after answering his questions, said to him, coaxingly,

“Won’t you kiss Marian, too, when she comes down? She’s been ever so long dressing herself and trying to look pretty.”

Instantly the eyes of the father and son met—those of the former expressive of entreaty, while those of the latter flashed with defiance.

“Go for Marian, child, and tell her to come here,” said Mr. Raymond.

Alice obeyed, and as she left the room, Frederic said bitterly, “I see she is leagued with you. I had thought better of her than that.”

“No, she isn’t,” cried the father, fearing that his favorite project was in danger. “I merely suggested it to her once—only once.”

Frederic was about to reply, when the rustling of female garments announced the approach of Marian. To Colonel Raymond she was handsome then, as with a heightened bloom upon her cheek and a bashful light in her deep blue eyes, she entered timidly and offered her hand to Frederic. But to the jealous young man she was merely a plain, ordinary country girl, bearing no comparison to the peerless Isabel. Still he greeted her kindly, addressed to her a few trivial remarks, and then resumed his conversation with little Alice, who, feeling that matters were going wrong, rolled her eyes often and anxiously toward the spot where she knew Marian was sitting—and when at last the latter left the room, she said to Frederic, “Isn’t Marian pretty in her blue dress, with all those curls? There are twenty of them, for I heard her count them. Say she is pretty, so I can tell her and make her feel good.”

Frederic would not then have admitted that Marian was pretty, even had he thought so, and biting his lip with vexation, he replied, “I do not particularly admire blue, and I detest cork-screw curls.”

Marian was still in the lower hall, and heard both the question and the answer. Darting up the stairs, she flew to her chamber, and throwing herself upon the bed, burst into a passionate flood of tears. All in vain had she dressed herself for Frederic Raymond’s eye—curling her hair in twenty curls, even as Alice had said. He hated blue—he hated curls—cork-screw curls particularly. What could he mean? She never heard the term thus applied before. It must have some reference to their color, and clutching at her luxuriant tresses she would have torn them from her head, had not a little childish hand been laid upon hers, and Alice’s soothing voice murmured in her ear, “Don’t cry, Marian; I wouldn’t care for him. He’s just as mean as he can be, and if I owned Redstone Hall, I wouldn’t let him live here, would you?”

“Yes—no—I don’t know,” sobbed Marian. “I don’t own Redstone Hall. I don’t own anything, and I most wish I was dead.”

Alice was unaccustomed to such a burst of passion, and was trying to frame some reply, when the dinner bell rang, and lifting up her head, Marian said, “Go down, Alice, and tell Dinah I can’t come, and if she insists, tell her I won’t!”

Alice knew she was in earnest, and going below she delivered the message to Dinah in the presence of Frederic, who silently took his seat at the table.

“For the dear Lord’s sake, what’s happened her now?” said Dinah, casting a rueful glance at Marian’s empty chair.

“She’s crying,” returned Alice, “and she dislikes somebody in this room awfully; ’taint you, Dinah, nor ’taint me,” and the blind eyes flashed indignantly at Frederic, who smiled quietly as he replied, “Thank you, Miss Alice.”

Alice made no reply, and the dinner proceeded in silence. After it was over, Frederic returned to his father, who had been nerving himself for the task he had to perform, and which he determined should be done at once.

“Lock the door, Frederic,” he said, “and then sit by me while I say to you what I have so long wished to say.”

With a lowering brow Frederic complied, and seating himself near to his father, he folded his arms and said, “Go on, I am ready now to hear—but if it is of Marian you would speak, I will spare you that trouble, father,” and Frederic’s voice was milder in its tone. “I have always liked Marian very much as a sister, and if it so chances that you are taken from us, I will be the best of brothers to her. I will care for her and see that she does not want. Let this satisfy you, father, for I cannot marry her. I do not love her, for I love another; one compared to whom Marian is as the night to the day. Let me tell you of Isabel, father,” and Frederic’s voice was still softer in its tone.

The old man shook his head and answered mournfully, “No, Frederic, were she as fair as the morning I could not wish her to be your wife. I have never told you before, but I once received an anonymous letter concerning this same Isabel, saying she was treacherous and deceitful, and would lead you on to ruin.”

“The villain! It was Rudolph’s doings,” muttered Frederic; then in a louder tone he said, “I can explain that, I think. When Isabel was quite young, she was engaged conditionally to Rudolph McVicar, a worthless fellow whom she has since discarded. He is a jealous, malignant creature, and has sworn to be revenged. He wrote that letter, I am sure. It is like him.”

“It may be,” returned the father, “but I distrust this Isabel. Her mother, as you are aware, is a distant relative of mine. I know her well, and though I never saw the daughter, I am sure she is selfish, ambitious, deceitful and proud, while Marian is so good.”

“Marian is a mere child,” interrupted Frederic.

“Almost sixteen,” rejoined the father, “and before you marry her she will be older still.”

“Yes, yes, much older,” thought Frederic, continuing aloud, “Listen to reason, father. I certainly do not love Marian, neither do I suppose that she loves me. Now if you have our mutual good at heart, you cannot desire a marriage which would surely result in wretchedness to both.”

“I have thought of all that,” returned the father. “A few kind words from you would win Marian’s love at once, and when once won she would be to you a faithful, loving wife, whom you would ere long learn to prize. You cannot treat any woman badly, Frederic, much less Marian. I know you would be happy with her, and should desire the marriage even though it could not save me from dishonor in the eyes of the world.”

“Father,” said Frederic, turning slightly pale, “what do you mean? You have in your letters hinted of a wrong done to somebody. Was it to Marian? If so, do not seek to sacrifice my happiness, but make amends in some other way. Will money repair the wrong? If so, give it to her, even to half your fortune, and leave me alone.”

He had touched a tender point, and raising himself in bed, the old man gasped, “Yes, yes, boy—but you have no money to give her. Redstone Hall is not mine, not yours, but hers. Those houses in Louisville are hers—not mine, not yours. Everything you see around you is hers—all hers; and if you refuse her, Frederic—hear me—if you refuse Marian Lindsey, strict restitution must be made, and you will be a beggar as it were. Marry her, and as her husband you will keep it all and save me from disgrace.—Choose, Frederic, choose.”

Mr. Raymond was terribly excited, and the great drops of perspiration stood thickly upon his forehead, and trickled from beneath his hoary hair.

“Is he going mad!” thought Frederic, his own heart throbbing with a nervous fear of coming evil, but ere he could speak his father continued, “Hear my story, and you will know how I came by these ill-gotten gains,” and he glanced around the richly furnished room. “You know I was sent to England, or I could not have gone, for I had no means with which to meet the necessary expenses. In the streets of Liverpool I first saw Marian’s father, and I mistook him for a beggar. Again I met him on board ship, and making his acquaintance, found him to be a man of no ordinary intellect. There was something about him which pleased me, and when he became ill, I cared for him as for a friend. The night he died we were alone, and he confided to me his history. He was an only child, and, orphaned at an early age, became an inmate of one of those dens of cruelty—those schools on the Dotheboys plan. From this bondage he escaped at last, and then for more than thirty years employed his time in making and saving money. He was a miser in every sense of the word, and though counting his money by thousands—yes, by tens of thousands, he starved himself almost to death. No one suspected his wealth—not even his young wife, Mary Grey, whom he married three years before I met him, and who died when Marian was born. She, too, had been an only child and an orphan; and as in England there was none to care for him or his, he conceived the idea of emigrating to America, and there lavishing his stores of gold on Marian. She should be a lady, he said, and live in a palace fit for a queen. But death overtook him, and to me he entrusted his child with all his money—some in gold, and some in bank notes. And when he was dying, Frederic, and the perspiration was cold on his brow, he made me lay my hand there and swear to be faithful to my trust as guardian of his child. For her, and for her alone, the money must be used. But, Frederic, I broke that oath. The Raymonds are noted for their love of gain, and when the Englishman was buried in the sea, the tempter whispered that the avenue to wealth, which I so long had coveted, was open now—that no one knew or would ever know of the miser’s fortune; and I yielded. I guarded the bag where the treasure was hidden with more than a miser’s vigilance, and I chuckled with delight when I found it far more than he had said.”

“Oh, my father, my father!” groaned Frederic, covering his white face with his hands, for he knew now that he was penniless.

“Don’t curse me, boy,” hoarsely whispered the old man; “Marian will not. She’ll forgive me—for Marian is an angel; but I must hasten. You remember how I grew gradually rich, and people talked of my good luck. Very cautiously I used the money at first so as not to excite suspicion, but when I came to Kentucky, where I was not known, I was less fearful, and launched into speculations, until now they say I am the wealthiest man in Franklin county. But it’s hers—it’s Marian’s—every cent of it is hers. Your education was paid for with her money; all you have and are you owe to Marian Lindsey, who, by every law of the land, is the heiress of Redstone Hall.”

He paused a moment, and trembling with emotion, Frederic said, “Is there nothing ours, father? Our old home on the Hudson? That, surely, is not hers?”

“You are right,” returned the father; “the old shell was mine, but when I brought Marian home, it was not worth a thousand dollars, and it was all I had in the world. Her money has made it what it is. I always intended to tell her when she was old enough to understand, but as time went by I shrank from it, particularly when I saw how much you prized the luxuries which money alone can buy, and how that money kept you in the proud position you occupy.—But it has killed me, Frederic, before my time—and now at the last do you wonder that I wish restitution to be made? I would save you from poverty, and my name from disgrace, by marrying you to Marian. She must know the truth, of course, for in no other way can my conscience be satisfied—but the world would still be kept in ignorance.”

“And if I do not marry her, oh, father, must it come—poverty, disgrace, everything?”

The young man’s voice was almost heart-broken in its tone, but the old man wavered not as he answered—“Yes, Frederic, it must come. If you refuse, I must deed it all to her. The lawyer, of course, must know the cause of so strange a proceeding, and I have no faith that he would keep the secret, even if Marian should. I left it in writing in case you did not come, and I gave you my dying curse if you failed of restoring to Marian her fortune. But you are here—you have heard my story, and it remains for you to choose. You have never taken care of yourself—have never been taught to think it necessary—and how can you struggle with poverty. Would that Isabel join her destiny with one who had not where to lay his head?”

“Stop, father! in mercy stop, ere you drive me mad!” and starting to his feet Frederic paced the floor wildly, distractedly.

A dark cloud had fallen upon him, and turn which way he would it enveloped him in its dark folds. He knew his father would keep his word, and he desired that he should do so. It was right, and he shrank from any further injustice to the orphan, Marian, with whom he had suddenly changed places. He was the dependent now, and hers the hand that fed him.—Frederic Raymond was proud, and the remembrance of his father’s words, “Her money paid for your education; all you have and are, you owe to Marian Lindsey,” stung him to his inmost soul. Still he could not make her his wife. It would be a greater wrong than ever his father had done to her. And yet if he had never seen Isabel, never mingled in the society of beautiful and accomplished women, he might, perhaps, have learned to love the gentle little girl, whose presence, he knew, made the life and light of Redstone Hall. But he could not do it now, and going up to his father, he said hesitatingly, as if it cost a bitter, agonized struggle to give up all his wealth, “I cannot do it, father; neither would Marian wish it if she knew. Send for her now,” he continued, as a new idea flashed upon him, “tell her all, here in my presence, and let her choose for me; but stay,” he added, quickly, coloring crimson at the unmanly selfishness which had prompted the sending for Marian, a selfishness which whispered that the generous girl would share her fortune with him; “stay, we will not send for her. I can decide the matter alone.”

“Not now,” returned the father. “Wait until to-morrow at nine o’clock, if you do not come to me then, I shall send for Lawyer Gibson, and the writings will be drawn. I give you until that time to decide; and now leave me, for I would rest.”

He motioned toward the door, and glad to escape from an atmosphere which seemed laden with grief, Frederic went out into the open air, and Col. Raymond was again alone. His first thought was of the letter—the one intended for his son. He could destroy that now—for he would not that Marian should ever know what it contained. She might not be Frederic’s wife, but he would save her from unnecessary pain; and exerting all his strength, he tottered to his private drawer, and took the letter in his hand. It was growing very dark within the room, and holding it up to the fading light, the dim-eyed old man read, or thought he read, “For my Son.”

“Yes, this is the one,” he whispered—“the other reads ‘For Marian,’” and hastening back to his bedroom he threw upon the fire burning in the grate, the letter, but, alas, the wrong one—for in the drawer still lay the fatal missive which would one day break poor Marian’s heart, and drive her forth a wanderer from the home she loved so well.

That night Frederic did not come down to supper. He was weary with his rapid journey, he said, and would rather rest. So Marian, who had dried her tears and half forgotten their cause, sat down to her solitary tea, little dreaming of the stormy scene which the walls of Frederic’s chamber looked upon that night. All through the dreary hours he walked the floor, and when the morning light came struggling through the windows, it found him pale, haggard, and older by many years than he had been the day before. Still he was undecided. “Love in a cottage” with Isabel, looked fair enough in the distance, but where could he get the “cottage?” To be sure, he was going through the form of studying law, but he had never looked upon the profession as a means of procuring his livelihood, neither did he see any way by which he could pursue his studies, unless, indeed, he worked to defray the expense. He might, perhaps, saw wood. Ben Gardiner did in college—Ben with the threadbare coat, cowhide boots, smiling face and best lessons in the class. Ben liked it well enough, and so, perhaps, would he! He held his hands up to the light; they were soft and white as a girl’s. They would blister with the first cut. He couldn’t saw wood—he couldn’t do anything. And would Isabel love him still when she knew how poor he was. It seemed unjust to doubt her, but he did, and he remembered sundry rumors he had heard touching her ambitious, selfish nature. Anon, too, there crept into his heart pleasant memories of a little, quiet girl, who had always sought to do him good, and ministered to his comfort in a thousand unobtrusive ways. And this was Marian, the one his father would have him marry; and why didn’t he? When the marrying her would insure him all the elegances of life to which he had been accustomed, and which he prized so highly. She was a child yet; he could mold her to his will and make her what he pleased. She might be handsome some time. There was certainly room for improvement. But no, she would never be aught save the plain, unpolished Marian, wholly unlike the beautiful picture he had formed of Redstone Hall’s proud mistress. He could not marry her, he would not marry her, and then he went back to the question, “What shall I do, if I don’t?”

As his father had said, the Raymonds were lovers of wealth, and this weakness Frederic possessed to a great degree. Indeed, it was the foundation of all his other faults, making him selfish and sometimes overbearing. As yet he was not worthy to be the husband of one as gentle and good as Marian, but he was passing through the fire, and the flames which burned so fiercely would purify and make him better. He heard the clock strike eight, and a moment after breakfast was announced.

“I am not ready yet; tell Marian not to wait,” was the message he gave the servant; and so another hour passed by, and heard the clock strike nine.

His hour was up, but he could not yet decide. He walked to the window and looked down on his home, which never seemed so beautiful before as on that September morning. He could stay there if he chose, for he felt sure he could win Marian’s love if he tried. And then he wondered if his life would not be made happier with the knowledge that he had obeyed his father’s request, and saved his name from dishonor. There was the sound of horses’ feet upon the graveled road. It was the negro Jake, and he was going for Lawyer Gibson.

Rapidly another hour went by, and then he heard the sound of horses’ hoofs again, but this time there were two who rode, Jake and the lawyer. In a moment the latter was at the door, and the sound of his feet, as he strode through the lower hall, went to the heart of the listening young man like bolts of ice. He heard a servant call Marian and say that his father wanted her; some new idea had entered the sick man’s head. He had probably decided to tell her all before he died, but it was not too late to prevent it, the young man thought; he could not be a beggar, and with a face as white as ashes, and limbs which trembled in every joint, he hurried down the stairs, meeting in the hall both Marian and the lawyer.

“Go back,” he whispered to the former, laying his hand upon her shoulder; “I would see my father first alone.”

Wonderingly Marian looked into his pale, worn face and bloodshot eyes; then motioning the lawyer into another room, she, too, followed him thither, while Frederic sought his father’s bedside, and bending low whispered in the ear of the bewildered and half-crazed man that he would marry the Heiress of Redstone Hall!

CHAPTER III.
DEATH AT REDSTONE HALL.

For two days after the morning of which we have written, Colonel Raymond lay in a kind of stupor from which he would rouse at intervals, and pressing the hand of his son who watched beside him, he would whisper faintly, “God bless you for making your old father so happy. God bless you, my darling boy.”

And Frederic, as often as he heard these words, would lay his aching head upon the pillow and try to force back the thoughts which continually whispered to him that a bad promise was better broken than kept, and that at the last he would tell Marian all, and throw himself upon her generosity. Since the morning when he made the fatal promise he had said but little to her, though she had been often in the room, ministering to his father’s comfort—and once in the evening when he looked more than usually pale and weary, she had insisted upon taking his place, or sharing at least in his vigils. But he had declined her offer, and two hours later a slender little figure had glided noiselessly into the room and placed upon the table behind him a waiter, filled with delicacies which her own hand had prepared, and which she knew from experience would be needed ere the long night was over. He did not turn his head when she came in, but he knew whose step it was; and in his heart he thanked her for her thoughtfulness, and compelled himself to eat what she had brought because he knew how disappointed she would be if in the morning she found it all untouched.

And still he was as far from loving her now as he had ever been; and on the second night, as he sat by his sleeping father, he resolved, come what might, he would retract the promise made under such excitement. “When father wakes, I’ll tell him I cannot,” he said, and anxiously he watched the clock, which pointed at last to midnight. The twelve long strokes rang through the silent room, and with a short, quick gasp his father woke.

“Frederic,” he said, and in his voice there was a tone never heard there before. “Frederic, has the light gone out, or why is it so dark? Where are you, my son? I cannot see.”

“Here, father—here I am,” and Frederic took in his the shriveled hand which was cold with approaching death.

“Frederic, it has come at last, and I am going from you; but before I go, lay your hand upon my brow, where the death sweat is standing, and say again what you said two days ago. Say you will make Marian your wife, and that until she is your wife she shall not know what I have done, for that might influence her decision. The letter I have left for her is in my private drawer, but you can keep the key.—Promise, Frederic—promise both, for I am going very fast.”

Twice Frederic essayed to speak, but the words “I cannot” died on his lips, and again the faint voice—fainter than when it spoke before, said, “Promise, my boy, and save the name of Raymond from dishonor!”

It was in vain he struggled to resist his destiny.—The pleading tones of his dying father prevailed. Isabel Huntington—Marian Lindsey—Redstone Hall—everything seemed as nought compared with that father’s wishes and falling on his knees the young man said, “Heaven helping me, father, I will do both.”

“And as you have made me happy, so may you be happy and prospered all the days of your life,” returned the father, laying his clammy hand upon the brown hair of his son. “Tell Marian that dying I blessed her with more than a father’s blessing, for she is very dear to me. And the little helpless Alice—she has money of her own, but she must still live with you and Marian. Be kind to the servants, Frederic. Don’t part with a single one—and—and—can you hear me, boy? Keep your promise as you hope for heaven hereafter.”

They were the last words the old man ever spoke—and when at last Frederic raised his head he knew by the white face lying motionless upon the pillow, that he was with the dead. The household was aroused, and crowding round the door the negroes came, their noisy outcries grating harshly on the ear of the young man, who felt unequal to the task of stopping them. But when Marian came, a few low spoken words from her quieted the tumult, and those whose services were not needed dispersed to the kitchen, where, forgetful of their recent demonstrations of grief, they speculated upon the probable result of their “old marster’s death,” and wondered if with the new one they should lead as easy a life as they had done heretofore.

The next morning the news spread rapidly, not only that Colonel Raymond was dead, but also that he had died without a will—this last piece of information being given by Lawyer Gibson, who, a little disappointed in the result of his late visit to Redstone Hall, had several times in public expressed his opinion that it was all the work of Frederic, who wanted everything himself, and feared his father would leave something to Marian Lindsey. This seemed very probable; and in the same breath, with which they deplored the loss of Colonel Raymond, the neighbors denounced his son as selfish and avaricious. Still he was now the richest man in the county, and it would not be politic to treat him with disrespect—so they came about him with words of sympathy and offers of assistance, all of which he listened to abstractedly, and when they asked for some directions as to the arrangements for the burial, he answered, “I do not know—I am not myself to-day—but go to Marian. I will abide by her decision.”

So to Marian they went; and hushing her own great grief—for she mourned for the departed as for a well loved father—Marian told them what she thought her guardian would wish that they should do. It is not customary in Kentucky to keep the dead as long as at the North, and ere the sun of the first day was low in the west a grave was made within an enclosure near the river side, where the cedar and the fir were growing, and when the sun was setting, a long procession wound slowly down the terraced walk, bearing with them one who when they returned came not with them, but was resting quietly where the light from the windows of his former home could fall upon his peaceful grave.

CHAPTER IV.
KEEPING THE PROMISE.

Four weeks had passed away since Colonel Raymond was laid to rest. The negroes, having finished their mourning at the grave and at church on the Sabbath succeeding the funeral, had gone back to their old lighthearted way of living, and outwardly there were no particular signs of grief at Redstone Hall. But two there were who suffered keenly, and suffered all the more that neither could speak to the other a word of sympathy. With Alice Marian wept bitterly, feeling that she was indeed homeless and friendless in the wide world. From Dinah she had heard the story of the Will, and remembering the events of that morning when Lawyer Gibson, as she supposed, had come to draw it, she thought it very probable. Still this did not trouble her one half so much as the studied reserve which Frederic manifested toward her. At the funeral he had offered her his arm, walking with her to the grave and back; but since that night he had kept aloof, seeing her only at the table, or when he wished to ask some question which she alone could answer.

In the first days of her sorrow she had forgotten the letter which her guardian had left for her, and when she did remember it and go to the private drawer where he said it was, she found the drawer locked.—Frederic had the key, of course, and thinking that if a wrong had indeed been done to her, he knew it, too, she waited in hopes that he would speak of it, and perhaps bring her the letter. But Frederic Raymond had sworn to keep that letter from her yet awhile, and he dared not break his vow. On the night after the burial he, too, had gone to the private drawer, and, taking the undirected missive in his hand, had felt strongly tempted to break its seal and read. But he had no right to do that, he said; all that was required of him was to keep it from Marian until such time as he was at liberty to let her read it. So, with a benumbed sensation at his heart, he locked the drawer and left the room, feeling that his own destiny was fixed, and that it was worse than useless to struggle against it. He could not write to Isabel yet, but he wrote to her mother, telling her of his father’s death, and saying he did not know how long it would be ere they saw him again at New Haven. This done, he sat down in a kind of torpor, and waited for circumstances to shape themselves.—Marian would seek for her letter, he thought, and missing the key, would come to him, and then—oh, how he hoped it would be weeks and months before she came, for when she did he knew he must tell her why it was withheld.

Meantime, Marian waited day after day vainly wishing that he would speak to her upon the subject; but he did not, and at last, four weeks after her guardian’s death, she sought the library again, but found the drawer locked as usual.

“It is unjust to treat me so,” she said. “The letter is mine, and I have a right to read it.”

Then, as she recalled the conversation which had passed between herself and Colonel Raymond on that night when he first hinted of a wrong, she wondered if he had said aught to Frederic of her. Most earnestly she hoped not—and yet she was almost certain that he had, and this was why Frederic treated her so strangely. “He hates me,” she said bitterly, “because he thinks I want him—but he needn’t, for I wouldn’t have him now, even if he knelt at my feet, and begged of me to be his wife; I’ll tell him so, too, the first chance I get,” and sinking into the large arm chair Marian laid her head upon the writing desk and wept.

The day had been rainy and dark, and as she sat there in the gathering night and listened to the low moan of the October wind, she thought with gloomy forebodings of the future, and what it would bring to her.

“Oh, it is dreadful to be so homeless—so friendless, so poor,” she cried, and in that cry there was a note of desolation which touched a chord of pity in the heart of him who stood on the threshold of the door, silently watching the young girl as she battled with her stormy grief.

He did not know why he had come to that room, and he surely would not have come had he expected to find her there. But it could not now be helped; he was there with her; he had witnessed her sorrow, and involuntarily advancing toward her he laid his hand lightly upon her shoulder and said, “Poor child, don’t cry so hard.”

She seemed to him a little girl, and as such he had addressed her; but to the startled Marian it mattered not what he said—there was kindness in his voice, and lifting up her face, which even in the darkness looked white and worn, she sobbed, “Oh, Frederic, you don’t hate me, then?”

“Hate you, Marian,” he answered, “of course not. What put that idea into your head?”

“Because—because you act so cold and strange, and don’t come near me when my heart is aching so hard for him—your father.”

Frederic made no reply, and resolving to make a clean breast of it, Marian continued, “There’s nobody to care for me now, and I wish you to be my brother, just as you used to be, and if your father said any thing else of me to you he didn’t mean it, I am sure; I don’t at any rate, and I want you to forget it and not hate me for it. I’ll go away from Redstone Hall if you say so, but you mustn’t hate me for what I could not help. Will you, Frederic?” and Marian’s voice was again choked with tears.

She had stumbled upon the very subject uppermost in Frederic’s mind, and drawing a chair near to her, he said, “I will not profess to be ignorant of what you mean, Marian. My father had some strange fancies at the last, but for these you are not to blame. Did he say nothing to you of a letter?”

“Yes, yes,” answered Marian quickly, “and I’ve been for it so many times. Will you give it to me now, Frederic? It’s mine, you know,” and Marian looked at him wistfully.

Frederic hesitated a moment, and misapprehending the motive of his hesitancy, Marian continued,

“Do not fear what I may think. He said a wrong had been done to me, but if it has not affected me heretofore, it surely will not now—and I loved him well enough to forgive anything. Let me have the letter, won’t you?”

“Marian,” and Frederic trembled with strong emotion, “the night my father died, I laid my hand upon his head and promised that you should not see that letter until you were a bride.”

“A bride!” Marian exclaimed passionately, “I shall never be a bride—never—certainly not yours!” and the little hands worked nervously together, while she continued. “I asked you to forget that whim of your father’s. He did not mean it—he would not have it so, and neither would I,” and Frederic Raymond could almost see the angry flash of the blue eyes turned so defiantly toward him.

Man-like he began to feel some interest now that there was opposition, and to her exclamation “neither would I,” he replied softly, “Not if I wish it, Marian?”

The tone rather than the words affected the young girl, thrilling her with a new-born delight; and laying her hand again upon the desk, she sobbed afresh, not impetuously, this time, but steadily, as if the crying did her good. Greatly she longed for him to speak again, but he did not. He was waiting for her, and drying her tears, she lifted up her face, and in a voice which seemed to demand the truth, she said: “Frederic, do you wish it? Here, almost in the room where your father died, can you say to me truly that you wish me to be your wife?”

It was a perplexing question, and Frederic Raymond felt that he was dealing falsely with her, but he made to her the only answer he could—“Men seldom ask a woman to marry them unless they wish it.”

“I know,” returned Marian, “but—do—would you have thought of it if your father had not first suggested it?”

“Marian,” said Frederic, “I am much older than yourself, and I might never have thought of marrying you. He, however, gave me good reasons why I should wish to have it so—in all sincerity I ask you to be my wife. Will you, Marian? It seems soon to talk of these things, but he so desired it.”

In her bewilderment Marian fancied he had said, “I do wish to have it so,” but she would know another thing, and not daring to put the question to him direct, she said, “Do men ever wish to marry one whom they do not love?”

Frederic understood her at once, and for a moment felt strongly tempted to tell her the truth, for in that case he was sure she would refuse to listen to his suit and he would then be free, but his father’s presence seemed over and around him, while Redstone Hall was too fair to be exchanged for poverty; and so he answered, “I have always loved you as a sister, and in time I will love you as you deserve. I will be kind to you, Marian, and I think I can make you happy.”

He spoke with earnestness, for he knew he was deceiving the young girl, and in his inmost soul he determined to repair the wrong by learning to love her, as she said:

“And suppose I refuse you, what then?”

Marian spoke decidedly, and something in her manner startled Frederic, who now that he had gone thus far, did not care to be thwarted.

“You will not refuse me, I am sure,” he said.—“We cannot live together here just as we have done, for people would talk.”

“I can go away,” said Marian, mournfully, while Frederic replied,

“No, Marian, if you will not be my wife, I must go away; Redstone Hall cannot be the home of us both, and if you refuse I shall go—soon, very soon.”

“Won’t you ever come back?” asked Marian, with childish simplicity; but ere Frederic could answer, the door suddenly opened and old Dinah appeared, exclaiming as her eye fell upon them, “For the dear Lord’s sake, if you two ain’t settin’ together in the dark, when I’ve done hunted everywhar for you,” and Dinah’s face wore a very knowing look, as setting down the candle she departed, muttering, something about “when me and Philip was young.”

The spell was broken for Marian, and starting up, she said, “I cannot talk any more to-night. I’ll answer you some other time,” and she hurried into the hall, where she stumbled upon Dinah, who greeted her with “Ain’t you two kinder hankerin’ arter each other, ’case if you be, it’s the sensiblest thing you ever done. Marster Frederic is the likeliest, trimmest chap in Kentuck, and you’ve got an uncommon heap of sense.”

Marian made no reply but darted up the stairs to her room, where she could be alone to think. It seemed to her a dream, and yet she knew it was a reality. Frederic had asked her to be his wife, and though she had said to herself that she would not marry him even if he knelt at her feet, she felt vastly like revoking that decision! If she were only sure he loved her, or would love her; and then she recalled every word he had said, wishing she could have looked into his face and seen what its expression was. She did not think of the letter in her excitement.—She only thought of Frederic’s question, and she longed for some one in whom she could confide. Alice, who always retired early, was already asleep, and as her soft breathing fell on Marian’s ear, she said, “Alice is much wiser than children usually are at six and a half. I mean to tell her,” and, stealing to the bedside, she whispered, “Alice, Alice, wake up a moment, will you?”

Alice turned on her pillow, and when sure she was awake, Marian said impetuously, “If you were me, would you marry Frederic Raymond?”

The blind eyes opened wide, as if they doubted the sanity of the speaker; then quietly replying, “No, indeed, I wouldn’t,” Alice turned a second time upon her pillow and slept again, while Marian, a good deal piqued at the answer, tormented herself with wondering what the child could mean, and why she disliked Frederic so much. The next morning it was Alice who awoke Marian and said, “Was it a dream, or did you say something to me last night about marrying Frederic?”

For a moment Marian forgot that the sightless eyes turned so inquiringly toward her could not see, and she covered her face with her hands to hide the blushes she knew were burning there.

“Say,” persisted Alice, “what was it?” and half willingly, half reluctantly, Marian told of the strange request which Frederic had made, saying nothing, however, of the letter, for if Colonel Raymond had done her a wrong, she felt it a duty she owed his memory to keep it to herself.

The darkened world in which Alice lived, had matured her other faculties far beyond her age, and though not yet seven years old, she was in many things scarcely less a child than Marian, whose story puzzled her, for she could hardly understand how one who had seemed so much her companion could think of being a married woman. Marian soon convinced her, however, that there was a vast difference between almost seven and almost sixteen, and still she was not reconciled.

“Frederic is well enough,” she said, “and I once heard Agnes Gibson say he was the best match in the county, but somehow he don’t seem to like you. Ain’t he stuck up, and don’t he know a heap more than you?”

“Yes, but I can learn,” answered Marian, sadly, thinking with regret of the many hours she had played in the woods when she might have been practising upon the piano, or reading the books which Frederic liked best. “I can in time make a lady perhaps—and then you know if I don’t have him, one of us must go away, for he said so.”

“Oh,” exclaimed Alice, catching her breath and drawing nearer to Marian, “wouldn’t it be nice for you and me to live here all alone with Dinah, and do just as we’re a mind to. Tell him you won’t, and let him go back where he came from.”

“No,” returned Marian, “if either goes away, it will be me, for I’ve no right here, and Frederic has.”

“You go away,” repeated Alice. “What could you do without Dinah?”

“I don’t know,” returned Marian mournfully, a dim foreboding as it were of her dark future rising up before her. “I can’t sew—I don’t know enough to teach, and I couldn’t do anything but die!”

This settled the point with Alice. She would rather Marian should marry Frederic than go away and die, and so she said, “I’d have him, I reckon,” adding quickly, “You’ll carry the keys, then, won’t you, and give me all the preserves and cake I want?”

Thus was the affair amicably adjusted between the two, and when at the breakfast table she met with Frederic, she was ready to answer his question; but she chose to let him broach the subject, and this he did do that evening when he found her alone in his father’s room. He had decided that it was useless to struggle with his fate, and he resolved to make the best of it. How far Redstone Hall, bank notes, stock and real estate influenced this decision we cannot say, but he was sincere in his intention of treating Marian well, and when he found her by accident in his father’s room, he said to her kindly, “Can you answer me now?”

Marian was not yet enough accustomed to the world to conceal whatever she felt, and with the light of a new happiness shining on her childish face, she went up to him, and laying her hand confidingly upon his, she said, “I will marry you, Frederic, if you wish me to.”

A strange enigma is human nature. When the previous night she had hesitated to answer, Frederic was conscious of a vague fear that she might say no—and now that she had said yes, he felt less pleasure than pain, for the die he knew was cast. A more observing eye than Marian’s would have seen the dark shadow which flitted over his face, and the sudden paling of his lips, but she did not; she only saw how he shook off her hand without even so much as touching it, and all the novels she had ever read would surely have sanctioned so modest a proceeding as that! But novels, she reflected, were not true, and as she was an actor in real life, she must accept whatever that life might bring. Still she was not quite satisfied, and when Frederic, fancying he should feel better if the matter were well over, said to her, “There is no reason why we should delay—my father would wish the marriage to take place immediately, and I will speak to Dinah at once,” she felt that with him it was a mere form, and bursting into tears she said passionately, “You are not obliged to marry me. I certainly did not ask you to.”

For a moment Frederic stood irresolute, and then he replied, “Don’t be foolish, Marian, but take a common sense view of the matter. I am not accustomed to love-making, and the character would not suit me now when my heart is so full of sorrow for my father. Many a one would gladly take your place, but”—here he paused, uncertain how to proceed and still keep truth upon his side—then, as a bright thought struck him, he added, “but I prefer you to all the girls in Kentucky. Be satisfied with this, and wait patiently for the time when I can show you that I love you.”

His manner both frightened and fascinated Marian, and she answered through her tears, “I will be satisfied, and wait.”

Frederic knew well that Marian was too much of a child to manage the affair, and after his interview with her, he sought out Dinah, to whom he announced his intentions.

“There is no need of delay,” he said, “and two weeks from to-day is the time appointed. There will be no show—no parade—simply a quiet wedding in the presence of a few friends, who will dine with us, of course. The dinner, you must see to, and I will attend to the rest.”

Amid ejaculations of surprise and delight, old Dinah heard what he had to say—and then, boiling over with the news, hastened to the kitchen, where she was soon surrounded by an astonished and listening audience, the various members of which were affected differently, just according to their different ideas of what “marster Frederic’s” wife ought to be. Among the negroes at Redstone Hall were two distinct parties, one of which having belonged to Mr. Higgins, the former owner of the place, looked rather contemptuously upon the other clique, who had been purchased of Mr. Smithers, a neighboring planter, and were not supposed to have as high blood in their veins as was claimed by their darker rivals. Hence between the democratic Smitherses and the aristocratic Higginses was waged many a fierce battle, which was usually decided by old Dinah, who, having belonged to another family still, “thanked the Lord that she was neither a Higginses nor a Smitherses, but was a peg or so above such low-lived truck as them.”

On this occasion the announcement of Master Frederic’s expected marriage was received by the Smitherses with loud shouts of joy and hurrahs for Miss Marian. The Higginses, on the contrary, though friendly to Marian, declared she was not high bred enough to keep up the glory of the house, and Aunt Hetty, who led the clan and was a kind of rival to old Dinah, launched forth into a wonderful stream of eloquence.

“Miss Marian would do in her place,” she said, “but ’twas a burnin’ shame to set such an onery thing over them as had been oncet used to the quality. ’Twas different with the Smitherses, whose old Miss was bed rid with a spine in her back, and hadn’t but one store carpet in the house. But the Higginses, she’d let ’em know, had been ’customed to sunthin’ better. Oh,” said she, “you or’to seen Miss Beatrice the fust day Marster brought her home. She looked jest like a queen, with that great long switchin’ tail to her dress, a wipin’ up the walk so clean that I, who was a gal then, didn’t have to sweep it for mor’n a week—and them ars she put on when she curchied inter the room and walkin’ backards sot down on the rim of the cheer—so”—and holding out her short linsey-woolsey to its widest extent, the old negress proceeded to illustrate.

But alas for Aunt Hetty—her intention was anticipated by stuttering Josh, the most mischievous spirit of all the Smithers clan. Quick as thought the active boy removed the chair where she expected to land, pushing into its place an overflowing slop-pail, and into this the discomfited old lady plunged amid the execrations of her partisans and the jeers of her opponents.

“You Josh—you villain—the Lord spare me long enough to break yer sassy neck!” she screamed, as with difficulty she extricated herself from her position and wrung her dripping garments.

“Sarved you right,” said Dinah, shaking her fat sides with delight. “Sarved you right, and the fust one that raises thar voice agin Miss Marian ’ll catch sunthin’ a heap wus than dirty dishwater.”

But Dinah’s threat was unnecessary, for with Hetty’s downfall the star of the Higginses set, leaving that of the Smitherses still in the ascendant!

Meantime Marian was confiding to Alice the story of her engagement, and wondering if Frederic intended taking a bridal tour. She hoped he did, for she so much wished to see a little of the world, particularly New York, of which she had heard such glowing accounts. But nothing could be less in accordance with Frederic’s feelings than a bridal tour—and when once Marian ventured to broach the subject, he said that under the circumstances it would hardly be right to go off and enjoy themselves, so they had better stay quietly at home. And this settled the point, for Marian never thought of questioning his decision. If they made no journey, she would not need any additions to her wardrobe, and she was thus saved from the trouble which usually falls to the lot of brides.—Still it was not at all in accordance with her ideas—this marrying without a single article of finery, and once she resolved to indulge in a new dress at least. She had ample means of her own, for her guardian had been lavish of his money, always giving her far more than she could use, and during the last year she had been saving a fund for the purpose of surprising Alice and the blacks with handsome Christmas presents.—The former was to have a little gold watch, which she had long desired, because she liked to hear it tick—but the watch and the dress could not both be bought, and when she considered this, Marian generously gave up the latter for the sake of pleasing the blind girl. Among her dresses was a neat, white muslin given her by Colonel Raymond only the Summer previous, and this she decided should be the wedding robe, for black was gloomy, she said, and would almost seem ominous of evil.

And so the childish bride elect made her simple arrangements, unassisted by any one save Dinah and the little Alice, the latter of whom was really of the most service, for old Dinah spent the greater portion of her time in grumbling because “Marster Frederic didn’t act more lover-like to his wife that was to be.”

Marian, too, felt this keenly, but she would not admit it, and she said to Dinah, “You can’t expect him to be like himself when he’s mourning for his father.”

“Mournin’ for his father,” returned Dinah,—“and what if he is? Can’t a fellow kiss a gal and mourn a plenty too? Taint no way to do to mope from mornin’ till night like you was gwine to the gallus. Me and Phil didn’t act that way when he was settin’ to me—but I ’spect they’ve done got some new fangled way of courtin’ jest as they hev for everything else—but I’m satisfied with the old fashion, and I wish them fetch-ed Yankees would mind their own business and let well ’nough alone.”

Dinah felt considerably relieved after this long speech, particularly as she had that very morning made it in substance to Frederic—and when that evening she saw the young couple seated upon the same sofa, and tolerably near to each other, she was sure she had done some good by “ginnen ’em a piece of her mind.”

Among the neighbors there was a great deal of talk, and occasionally a few of them called at Redstone Hall, but these only came to go away again, and comment on Frederic’s strange taste in marrying one so young, and so wholly unlike himself. It could not be, they said, that he had really cared about the Will, else why had he so soon taken Marian to share his fortune with him? But Frederic kept his own counsel, and once when questioned on the subject of his marriage and asked if it were not a sudden thing, he answered haughtily, “Of course not—it was decided years ago, when Marian first came to live with us.”

And so amid the speculations of friends, the gossip of Dinah, the joyous anticipations of Marian, and the harrowing doubts of Frederic, the two weeks passed away, bringing at last the eventful day when Redstone Hall was to have once more a mistress.

CHAPTER V.
THE BRIDAL DAY.

“It was the veriest farce in all the world, the marriage of Frederic Raymond with a child of fifteen;” at least so said Agnes Gibson of twenty-five, and so said sundry other guests who at the appointed hour assembled in the parlor of Redstone Hall, to witness the sacrifice—not of Frederic as they vainly imagined, but of the unsuspecting Marian.

He knew what he did, and why he did it, while she, blindfolded as it were, was about to leap into the uncertain future. No such gloomy thoughts as these, however, intruded themselves upon her mind as she stood before her mirror and with trembling fingers made her simple bridal toilet. When first the idea of marrying Frederic was suggested to her nearly as much pride as love had mingled in her thoughts, for Marian was not without her ambition, and the honor of being the mistress of Redstone Hall had influenced her decision. But during the two weeks since her engagement, her heart had gone out toward him with a deep absorbing love, and had he now been the poorest man in all the world and she a royal princess, she would have spurned the wealth that kept her from him, or gladly have laid it at his feet for the sake of staying with him and knowing that he wished it. And this was the girl whom Frederic Raymond was about to wrong by making her his wife when he knew he did not love her. But she should never know it, he said—should never suspect that nothing but his hand and name went with the words he was so soon to utter, and he determined to be true to her and faithful to his marriage vow.

Some doubt he had as to the effect his father’s letter might have upon her, and once he resolved that she should never see it; but this was an idle thought, not to be harbored for a moment. He had told her when she asked him for it the last time that she should have it on her bridal day; for so his father willed it, and he would keep his word. He had written to Isabel at the very last, for though he was not bound to her by a promise he knew an explanation of his conduct was due to her, and he forced himself to write it. Not a word did he say against Marian, but he gave her to understand that but for his father the match would never have been made—that circumstances over which he had no control compelled him to do what he was doing. He should never forget the pleasant hours spent in her society, he said, and he closed by asking her to visit the future Mrs. Raymond at Redstone Hall. It cost him a bitter struggle to write thus indifferently to one he loved so well, but it was right, he said, and when the letter was finished he felt that the last tie which bound him to Isabel was sundered, and there was nothing for him now but to make the best of Marian. So when on their bridal morning she came to him and asked his wishes concerning her dress, he answered her very kindly, “As you are in mourning you had better make no change, besides I think black very becoming to your fair complexion.”

This was the first compliment he had ever paid her, and her heart thrilled with delight, but when, as she was leaving the room he called her back and said, still gently, kindly, “Would you as soon wear your hair plain? I do not quite fancy ringlets,” her eyes filled with tears, for she remembered the cork-screw curls, and glancing in the mirror at her wavy hair, she wished it were possible to remedy the defect.

“I will do the best I can,” she said, and returning to her room, she commenced her operations, but it was a long, tedious process, the combing out of those curls, for her hair was tenacious of its rights, and even when she thought it subdued and let go of the end, it rolled up about her forehead in tight round rings, as if spurning alike both water and brush.

“I’d like to see the man what could make me yank out my wool like that,” muttered Dinah, who was watching the straightening process with a lowering brow, inasmuch as it reflected dishonor upon her own crisped locks. “If the Lord made yer har to curl, war it so, and not mind every freak of his’n. Fust you know, he’ll be a-wantin’ you to war yer face on t’other side of yer head, but ’taint no way to do. You must begin as you can hold out. In a few hours you’ll have as much right here as he has, and I’d show it, too, by pitchin’ inter us niggers and jawin’ to kill. I shall know you don’t mean nothin’ and shan’t keer. Come to think on’t, though, I reckon you’d better let me and the Smitherses be and begin with them Higginses. I’d give it to old Hetty good—she ’sarves to be took down a button hole lower, if ever a nigger did, for she said a heap o’ stuff about you.”

Marian smiled a kind of quiet happy smile and went on with her task, which was finished at last, and her luxuriant hair was bound at the back of her head in a large flat knot. The effect was not becoming and she knew it, but if Frederic liked it she was satisfied, even if Dinah did demur, telling her she looked like “a cat whose ears had been boxed.” Frederic did not like it, but after the pains she had taken he would not tell her so, and when she said to him, “I am ready,” he offered her his arm and went silently down the stairs to the parlor, where guests and clergymen were waiting.

The day was bright and beautiful, for the light of the glorious Indian Summer sun was resting on the Kentucky hills, and through the open window the murmuring ripple of the Elkhorn came, while the balmy breath of the south wind swept over the white face of the bride, and lifted from her neck the few stray locks which, escaping from their confinement, curled naturally in their accustomed place. But to the assembled guests there seemed in all a note of sadness, a warning voice which said the time for this bridal was not yet; and years after, when the beautiful mistress of Redstone Hall rode by in her handsome carriage, Agnes Gibson told to her little sister how on that November day the cheeks of both bride and bridegroom paled as if with mortal fear when the words were spoken which made them one.

Whether it were the newness of her position, or a presentiment of coming evil Marian could not tell, but into her heart there crept a chill as she glanced timidly at the man who stood so silently beside her, and thought, “He is my husband.” It was, indeed, a sombre wedding—“more like a funeral,” the guests declared, as immediately after dinner they took their leave and commented upon the affair as people always will. Oh, how Frederic longed yet dreaded to have them go. He could not endure their congratulations, which to him were meaningless, and he had no wish to be alone. He was recovering from his apathy, and could yesterday have been his again, he believed he would have broken his promise. But yesterday had gone and to-morrow had come—it was to-day, now, with him, and Marian was his wife. Turn which way he would, the reality was the same, and with an intense loathing of himself and a deep pity for her, he feigned some trivial excuse and went away to his room, where, with the gathering darkness and his own wretched thoughts, he would be alone.

With strange unrest Marian wandered from room to room, wondering if Frederic had so soon grown weary of her presence, and sometimes half wishing that she were Marian Lindsey again, and that the new name by which they called her belonged to some one else. At last, when it was really dark—when the lamps were lighted in the parlor and Alice had wept a bitter, passionate good night in her arms and gone to sleep, she bethought her of the letter. She could read it now. She had complied with all the stipulations, and there was no longer a reason why it should be withheld. She went to Frederic’s door; but he was not there, and a servant passing in the hall said he had returned to the parlor while she was busy with Alice. So to the parlor Marian went, finding him sitting unemployed and wrapped in gloomy thought. He heard her step upon the carpet, but standing in the shadow as she did, she could not see the look of pain which flitted over his face at her approach.

“Frederic,” she said, “I may read the letter now—will you give me the key?”

Mechanically he did as she desired, and then with a slightly uneasy feeling as to the effect the letter might have upon her, he went back to his reflections, while she started to leave the room. When she reached the door she paused a moment and looked back. In giving her the key he had changed his position, and she could see the suffering expression of his white face. Quickly returning to his side, she said anxiously, “Are you sick?”

“Nothing but a headache. You know I am accustomed to that,” he replied.

Marian hesitated a moment—then parting the damp brown hair from off his forehead she kissed him timidly and left the room. Involuntarily Frederic raised his hand to wipe the spot away, but something stayed the act and whispered to him that a wife’s first kiss was a holy thing and could never be repeated!

Through the hall the nimble feet of Marian sped until she stood within her late guardian’s room, and there she stopped, for the atmosphere seemed oppressive and laden with terror.

“’Tis because it’s so dark,” she said, and going out into the hall, she took a lamp from the table and then returned.

But the olden feeling was with her still—a feeling as if she were treading some fearful gulf, and she was half tempted to turn back even now, and ask Frederic to come with her while she read the letter.

“I will not be so foolish, though,” she said, and opening the library door she walked boldly in; but the same Marian who entered there never came out again!

CHAPTER VI.
READING THE LETTER.

Oh, how still it was in that room, and the click of the key as it turned the slender bolt echoed through the silent apartment, causing Marian to start as if a living presence had been near. The drawer was opened, and she held the letter in her hand, while unseen voices seemed whispering to her, “Oh, Marian, Marian—leave the letter still untouched. Do not seek to know the secret it contains, but go back to the man who is your husband, and by those gentle acts which seldom fail in their effect, win his love. It will be far more precious to you than all the wealth of which you are the unsuspecting heiress.”

But Marian did not understand—nor know why it was she trembled so. She only knew she had the letter in her hand—her letter—the one left by her guardian. It bore no superscription, but it was for her, of course, and fixing herself in a comfortable position, she broke the seal and read:

“My Dear Child:”

There was nothing in those three words suggestive of a mistake—and Marian read on till, with a quick, nervous start, she glanced forward, then backward—and then read on and on, until at last not even the fear of death itself could have stopped her from that reading. That letter was never intended for her eye—she knew that now, but had the cold hand of her guardian been interposed to wrest it from her, she would have held it fast until she learned the whole. Like coals of living fire, the words burned into her soul, scorching, blistering as they burned—and when the letter was finished she fell upon her face with a cry so full of agony and horror that Frederic in the parlor heard the wail of human anguish, and started to his feet, wondering whence it came.

With the setting of the sun the November wind had risen, and as the young man listened it swept moaning past the window, seeming not unlike the sound he had first heard. “It was the wind,” he said, and he resumed his seat, while, in that little room, not very far away, poor Marian came back to consciousness, and crouching on the floor, prayed that she might die. She understood it now—how she had been deceived, betrayed, and cruelly wronged. She knew, too, that she was the heiress of untold wealth, and for a single moment her heart beat with a gratified pride, but the surprise was too great to be realized at once, and the feeling was soon absorbed in the reason why Frederic Raymond had made her his wife. It was not herself he had married, but her fortune—her money—Redstone Hall. She was merely a necessary incumbrance, which he would rather should have been omitted in the bargain. The thought was maddening, and, stretching out her arms, she asked again that she might die.

“Oh, why didn’t he come to me?” she cried, “and tell me? I would gladly have given him half my fortune—yes, all—all—rather than be the wretched thing I am, and he would have been free to love and marry this—”

She could not at first speak the name of her rival—but she said it at last, and the sound of it wrung her heart with a new and torturing pain. She had never heard of Isabel Huntington before, and as she thought how beautiful and grand she was, she whispered to herself, “Why didn’t he go back to her, and leave me, the red-headed fright, alone? Yes, that was what he wrote to his father. Let me look at it again,” and the tone of her voice was bitter and the expression of her face hard and stony, as taking up the letter she read for the second time that “she was uncouth, uneducated and ugly,” and if his father did not give up that foolish fancy, Frederic would positively “hate the red-headed fright.” Her guardian had not given up the foolish fancy, consequently there was but one inference to be drawn.

In her excitement she did not consider that Frederic had probably written of her harsher things than he really meant. She only thought, “He loathes me—he despises me—he wishes I was dead—and I dared to kiss him too,” she added. “How he hated me for that, but ’twas the first, and it shall be the last, for I will go away forever and leave him Redstone Hall, the bride he married a few hours ago,” and laying her face upon the chair Marian thought long and earnestly of the future. She had come into that room a happy, simple-hearted, confiding child, but she had lived years since, and she sat there now a crushed but self-reliant woman, ready to go out and contend with the world alone. Gradually her thoughts and purposes took a definite form. She was ignorant of the knotty points of law, and she did not know but Frederic could get her a divorce, but from this publicity she shrank. She could not be pointed at as a discarded wife. She would rather go away where Frederic would never see nor hear of her again, and she fancied that by so doing he would after a time at least be free to marry Isabel. She had not wept before, for her tears seemed scorched with pain, but at the thought of another coming there to take the place she had hoped to fill, they rained in torrents over her white face, and clasping her little hands convulsively together, she cried—“How can I give him up when I love him so much—so much?”

Gradually there stole over her the noble, unselfish thought, that because she loved him so much, she would willingly sacrifice herself and all she had for the sake of making him happy—and then she grew calm again and began to decide where she would go. Instinctively her mind turned toward New York city as the great hiding place from the world. Mrs. Burt, the woman who had lived with them in Yonkers, and who had always been so kind to her, was in New York she knew, for she had written to Colonel Raymond not long before his death, asking if there was anything in Kentucky for her son Ben to do. This letter her guardian had answered and then destroyed with many others, which he said were of no consequence, and only lumbered up his drawer. Consequently there was no possibility that this letter would suggest Mrs. Burt to Frederic, who had never seen her, she having come and gone while he was away at school, and thus far the project was a safe one. But her name—she might some time be recognized by that, and remembering that her mother’s maiden name was Mary Grey, and that Frederic, even if he had ever known it, which was doubtful, had probably forgotten it, she resolved upon being henceforth Marian Grey, and she repeated it aloud, feeling the while that the change was well—for she was no longer the same girl she used to know as Marian Lindsey. Once she said softly to herself, “Marian Raymond,” but the sound grated harshly, for she felt that she had no right to bear that name.

This settled, she turned her thoughts upon the means by which New York was to be reached, and she was glad that she had not bought the dress, for now she had ample funds with which to meet the expense, and she would go that very night, before her resolution failed her. Redstone Hall was only two miles from the station, and as the evening train passed at half-past nine, there would be time to reach it, and write a farewell letter, too, to Frederic, for she must tell him how, though it broke her heart to do it, she willingly gave him everything, and hoped he would be happy when she was gone forever. Marian was beautiful then in her desolation, and so Frederic Raymond would have said, could he have seen her with the light of her noble sacrifice of self shining in her eyes, and the new-born, womanly expression on her face. The first fearful burst was over, and calmly she sat down to her task—but the storm rose high again as she essayed to write that good-by, which would seem to him who read it a cry of despair wrung from a fainting heart.

“Frederic—dear Frederic,” she began, “can I—may I say my husband once—just once—and I’ll never insult you with that name again?

“I am going away forever, Frederic, and when you are reading this I shall not be at Redstone Hall, nor anywhere around it. Do not try to find me. It is better you should not. Your father’s letter, which was intended for you, and by mistake has come to me, will tell you why I go. I forgive your father, Frederic—fully, freely forgive him—but you—oh, Frederic, if I loved you less I should blame you for deceiving me so cruelly. If you had told me all I would gladly have shared my fortune with you. I would have given you more than half, and when you brought that beautiful Isabel home I would have loved her as a sister.

“Why didn’t you, Frederic? What made you treat me so? What made you break my heart when you could have helped it? It aches so hard now as I write, and the hardest pain of all is the loss of faith in you. I thought you so noble, so good, and I may confess to you here on paper, I loved you so much—how much you will never know, for I shall never come back to tell you.

“And I kissed you, too. Forgive me for that, Frederic. I didn’t know then how you hated me.—Wash the stain from your forehead, can’t you?—and don’t lay it up against me. If I thought I could make you love me, I would stay. I would endure torture for years if I knew the light was shining beyond, but it cannot be. The sight of me would make you hate me more. So I give everything I have to you and Isabel. You’ll marry her at a suitable time, and when you see how well she becomes your home, you will be glad I went away. If you must tell her of me, and I suppose you must, speak kindly of me, won’t you?—You needn’t talk of me often, but sometimes, when you are all alone, and you are sure she will not know, think of poor little Marian, who gave her life away, that one she loved the best in all the world might have wealth and happiness.

“Farewell, Frederic, farewell. Death itself cannot be harder than bidding you good-by, and knowing it is for ever.”

And well might Marian say this, for it seemed to her that she dipped her pen in her very heart’s blood, when she wrote that last adieu. She folded up the letter and directed it to Frederic—then taking another sheet she wrote to the blind girl:

“Dearest Alice—Precious little Alice. If my heart was not already broken, it would break at leaving you. Don’t mourn for me much, darling. Tell Dinah and Hetty, and the other blacks, not to cry—and if I’ve ever been cross to them, they must forget it now that I am gone. God bless you all. Good by—good by.”

The letters finished, she left them upon the desk, where they could not help being seen by the first one who should enter—then stealing up the stairs to the closet at the extremity of the hall, she put on her bonnet, vail and shawl, and started for her purse, which was in the chamber where Alice slept. Careful, very careful were her footsteps now, lest she should waken the child, who, having cried herself to sleep, was resting quietly. The purse was obtained, as was also a daguerreotype of her guardian which lay in the same drawer—and then for a moment she stood gazing at the little blind girl, and longing to give her one more kiss; but she dared not, and glancing hurriedly around the room which had been hers so long, she hastened down the stairs and out upon the piazza. She could see the light from the parlor window streaming out into the darkness, and drawing near she looked through blinding tears upon the solitary man, who, sitting there alone, little dreamed of the whispered blessings breathed for him but a few yards away. It seemed to Marian in that moment of agony that her very life was going out, and she leaned against a pillar to keep herself from falling.

“Oh, can I leave him?” she thought. “Can I go away forever, and never see his face again or listen to his voice?” and looking up into the sky she prayed that if in heaven they should meet again, he might know and love her there for what she suffered here.

On the withered grass and leaves near by there was a rustling sound as if some one was coming, and Marian drew back for fear of being seen, but it was only Bruno, the large watch dog. He had just been released from his kennel, and he came tearing up the walk, and with a low savage growl sprang toward the spot where Marian was hiding.

“Bruno, good Bruno,” she whispered, and in an instant the fierce mastiff crouched at her feet and licked her hand with a whining sound, as if he suspected something wrong.

One more yearning glance at Frederic—one more tearful look at her old home, and Marian walked rapidly down the avenue, followed by Bruno, who could neither be coaxed nor driven back. It was all in vain that Marian stamped her little foot, wound her arms round his shaggy neck, bidding him return; he only answered with a faint whine quite as expressive of obstinacy as words could have been. He knew Marian had no business to be abroad at that hour of the night, and, with the faithfulness of his race, was determined to follow. At length, as she was beginning to despair of getting rid of him, she remembered how pertinaciously he would guard any article which he knew belonged to the family—and on the bridge which crossed the Elkhorn, she purposely dropped her glove and handkerchief, the latter of which bore her name in full. The ruse was successful, for after vainly attempting to make her know that she had lost something, the dog turned back, and, with a loud, mournful howl, which Marian accepted as his farewell, he laid himself down by the handkerchief and glove, turning his head occasionally in the direction Marian had gone, and uttering low plaintive howls when he saw she did not return.

Meantime Marian kept on her way, striking out into the fields so as not to be observed—and at last, just as the cars sounded in the distance, she came up to a clump of trees growing a little to the left, and on the opposite side of the road from that on which the depot stood. By getting in here no one would see her at the station, and when the train stopped she came out from her concealment, and bounding lightly upon the platform of the rear car, entered unobserved. As the passengers were sitting with their backs toward her, but one or two noticed her when she came in, and these scarce gave her a thought, as she sank into the seat nearest to the door, and drawing her vail over her face trembled violently lest she should be recognized, or at least noted and remembered. But her fears were vain, for no one there had ever seen or heard of her—and in a moment more the train was moving on, and she, heart-broken and alone, was taking her bridal tour!

CHAPTER VII.
THE ALARM.

In her solitary bed little Alice slumbered on, moaning occasionally in her sleep, and at last when the clock struck nine, starting up and calling “Marian, Marian, where are you?” Then, remembering that Marian could not come to her that night, she puzzled her little brain with the great mystery, and wept herself to sleep for the second time.

In the kitchen old Dinah was busy with various household matters. With Frederic she had heard in the distance the bitter moan which Marian made when first she learned how she had been deceived, and like him she had wondered what the sound could be—then as a baby’s cry came from a cabin near by, she had said to herself, “some of them Higgins brats, I’ll warrant. They’re allus a squallin’,” and, satisfied with this conclusion, she had resumed her work. Once or twice after that she was in the house, feeling a good deal disturbed at seeing Frederic sitting alone without his bride, who, she rightly supposed, “was somewhar. But ’taint no way,” she muttered; “Phil and me didn’t do like that;” then reflecting that “white folks wasn’t like niggers,” she returned to the kitchen just as Bruno set up his first loud howl. With Dinah the howl of a dog was a sure sign of death, and dropping her tallow candle in her fright, she exclaimed—“for the Lord’s sake who’s gwine to die now? I hope to goodness ’taint me, nor Phil, nor Lid, nor Victory Eugeny,” and turning to Aunt Hetty, who was troubled with vertigo, she asked if “she’d felt any signs of an afterplax fit lately?”

“The Lord,” exclaimed old Hetty, “I hain’t had a drap o’ blood in me this six month, and if Bruno’s howlin’ for me, he may as well save his breath;” but in spite of this self-assurance, the old negress, when no one saw her, dipped her head in a bucket of water by way of warding off the danger.

Thus the evening wore away until at last Dinah, standing in the doorway, heard the whistle of the train as it passed the Big Spring station.

“Who s’posed ’twas half-past nine,” she exclaimed. “I’ll go this minit and see if Miss Marian wants me.”

Just then another loud piercing howl from Bruno, who was growing impatient, fell upon her ear and arrested her movements.

“What can ail the critter,” she said—“and he’s down on the bridge, too, I believe.”

The other negroes also heard the cry, which was succeeded by another and another, and became at last one prolonged yell, which echoed down the river and over the hills, starting Frederic from his deep reverie and bringing him to the piazza, where the blacks had assembled in a body.

“’Spects mebbe Bruno’s done cotched somethin’ or somebody down thar,” suggested Philip, the most courageous of the group.

“Suppose you go and see,” said Frederic, and lighting his old lantern Philip sallied out, followed ere long by all his comrades, who, by accusing each other of being “skeered to death,” managed to keep up their own courage.

The bridge was reached, and in a tremor of delight Bruno bounded upon Phil, upsetting the old man and extinguishing the light, so that they were in total darkness. The white handkerchief, however, caught Dinah’s eye, and in picking it up she also felt the glove, which was lying near it. But this did not explain the mystery—and after searching in vain for man, beast or hobgoblin, the party returned to the house, where their master awaited them.

“Thar warn’t nothin’ thar ’cept this yer rag and glove,” said Dinah, passing the articles to him.

He took them, and going to the light saw the name upon the handkerchief, “Marian Lindsey.” The glove too, he recognised as belonging to her, and with a vague fear of impending evil, he asked where they found them.

“On the bridge,” answered Dinah; “somebody must have drapped ’em. That handkercher looks mighty like Miss Marian’s hem-stitched one.”

“It is hers,” returned Frederic—“do you know where she is?”

“You is the one who orto know that, I reckon,” answered Dinah, adding that she “hadn’t seen her sense jest after dark, when she went up stars with Alice.”

Frederic was interested now. In his abstraction he had not heeded the lapse of time, though he wondered where Marian was, and once feeling anxious to know what she would say to the letter, he was tempted to go in quest of her. But he did not—and now, with a presentiment that all was not right, he went to Alice’s chamber, but found no Marian there. Neither was she in any of the chambers, nor in the hall, nor in the dining room, nor in his father’s room, and he stood at last in the library door. The writing desk was open, and on it lay three letters—one for Alice, one for him, the other undirected. With a beating heart he took the one intended for himself, and tearing it open, read it through. When Marian wrote that “she gave her life away,” she had no thought of deceiving him, for her giving him up was giving her very life. But he did not so understand it, and sinking into a chair he gasped, “Marian is dead!” while his face grew livid and his heart sick with the horrid fear.

“Dead, Marster Frederic,” shrieked old Dinah—“who dars tell me my chile is dead!” and bounding forward like a tiger, she grasped the arm of the wretched man, exclaiming, “whar is she the dead? and what is she dead for? and what’s that she’s writ that makes yer face as white as a piece of paper?—Read, and let us hear.”

“I can’t, I can’t,” moaned the stricken man. “Oh, has it come to this? Marian, Marian—won’t somebody bring her back?”

“If marster’ll tell me whar to look, I’ll find her, so help me, Lord,” said uncle Phil, the tears rolling down his dusky cheeks.

“You found her handkerchief upon the bridge,” returned Frederic, “and Bruno has been howling there—don’t you see? She’s in the river!—She’s drowned! Oh, Marian—poor Marian, I’ve killed her—but God knows I did not mean to;” and in the very spot where not long before poor Marian had fallen on her face, the desolate man how lay on his, and suffered in part what she had suffered there.

It was a striking group assembled there. The bowed man, convulsed with strong emotion, and clutching with one hand the letter which had done the fearful work. The blacks gathered round, some weeping bitterly and all petrified with terror, while into their midst when the storm was at its hight the little Alice groped her way—her soft hair falling over her white night dress, her blind eyes rolling round the room, and her quick ear turned to catch any sound which might explain the strange proceedings. She had been roused from sleep by the confusion, and hearing the uproar in the hall and library, had felt her way to the latter spot, where in the doorway she stood asking for Marian.

“Bless you, honey, Miss Marian’s dead—drownded,” said Dinah, and Alice’s shriek mingled with the general din.

“Where’s Frederic?” asked the little girl, feeling intuitively that he was the one who needed the most sympathy.

At the sound of his name Frederic lifted up his head, and taking the child in his arms, kissed her tenderly, as if he would thus make amends for his coldness to the lost Marian.

“‘Tain’t no way to stay here like rocks,” said Uncle Phil at last. “If Miss Marian’s in the river, we’d better be a fishin’ her out,” and the practical negro proceeded to make the necessary arrangements.

Before he left the room, however, he would know if he were working for a certainty, and turning to his master, said, “Have you jest cause for thinkin’ she’s done drownded herself—’case if you hain’t, ’taint no use huntin’ this dark night, and it’s gwine to rain, too. The clouds is gettin’ black as pitch.”

Thus appealed to, Frederic answered, “She says in the letter that she’s going away forever, that she shall not come back again, and she spoke of giving her life away. You found her handkerchief and glove upon the bridge, with Bruno watching near, and she is gone. Do you need more proof?”

Uncle Phil did not, though “he’d jest like to know,” he said, “why a gal should up and dround herself on the very fust night arter she’d married the richest and han’somest chap in the county—but thar was no tellin’ what gals would do. Gener’ly, though, you could calkerlate on thar doin’ jest con-tra-ry to what you’d ’spect they would, and if Miss Marian preferred the river to that twenty-five pound feather-bed that Dinah spent mor’n an hour in makin’ up, ’twas her nater, and ’twan’t for him to say agin it. All he’d got to do was to work!”

And the old man did work, assisted by the other negroes and those of the neighbors who lived near to Redstone Hall. Frederic, too, joined, or rather led the search. Bareheaded, and utterly regardless of the rain which, as Uncle Phil had prophesied, began to fall in torrents, he gave the necessary directions, and when the morning broke, few would have recognized the elegant bridegroom of the previous day in the white-faced, weary man, who, with soiled garments and dripping hair, stood upon the narrow bridge, and in the grey November morning looked mournfully down the river as it went rushing on, telling no secret, if secret, indeed, there were to tell, of the wild despair which must have filled poor Marian’s heart and maddened her brain ere she sought that watery grave.

Before coming out he had hurriedly read his father’s letter, and he could well understand how its contents broke the heart of the wretched girl, and drove her to the desperate act which he believed she had committed.

“Poor Marian,” he whispered to himself, “I alone am the cause of your sad death;” and most gladly would he then have become a beggar and earned his bread by the sweat of his brow, could she have come back again, full of life, of health and hope, just as she was the day before.

But this could not be, for she was dead, he said, dead beyond a doubt; and all that remained for him to do was to find her body and lay it beside his father. So during that day the search went on, and crowds of people were gathered on each side of the river, but no trace of the lost one could be found, and when a second time the night fell dark and heavy round Redstone Hall, it found a mournful group assembled there.

To Alice Frederic had read the letter left for her, and treasuring up each word the child groped her way into the kitchen, where, holding the note before her sightless eyes as if she could really see, she repeated it to the assembled blacks,

“Lor’ bless the child,” sobbed Dinah from behind her woolen apron, “I knowed she would remember me.”

“And me,” joined in Hetty. “Don’t you mind how I is spoke of, too? She was a lady, every inch of her, Miss Marian was, an’ if I said any badness of her, I want you to forgive me, Dinah. Here’s my hand,” and these two old ladies took each other’s hand in token that they were joined together now in one common sorrow.

Indeed, for once, the Higginses and Smitherses forgot their ancient feud and united in extolling the virtues of the lost one. After reading the letter as many as three times—for when their grief had somewhat subsided, the blacks would ask to hear it again, so as to have fresh cause for tears—Alice returned to the parlor, where she knew Frederic was sitting. Her own heart was throbbing with anguish, but she felt that his was a sorrow different from her own, and feeling her way to where he sat she wound her little arms around his neck, and whispered tenderly: “We must love each other more now that Marian is gone.”

He made no answer except to take her on his lap and lay her head upon his bosom; but Alice was satisfied with this, and after a moment she said, “Frederic, do you know why Marian killed herself?”

“Oh, Alice, Alice,” he groaned. “Don’t say those dreadful words. I cannot endure the thought.”

“But,” persisted the child, “she couldn’t have known what she was doing, and God forgave her.—Don’t you think He did? She asked him to, I am sure, when she was sinking in the deep water.”

The child’s mind had gone further after the lost one than Frederic’s had, and her question inflicted a keener pang than any he had felt before. He had ruined Marian, body and soul, and Alice felt his hot tears dropping on her face as he made her no reply. Her faith was stronger than his, and putting up her waxen hand, she wiped his tears away, saying to him, “We shall meet Marian again, I know, and then if you did anything naughty which made her go away, you can tell her you are sorry, and she’ll forgive you, for she loved you very much.”

Alice’s words were like arrows to the heart of the young man, and still he felt in the first hours of his desolation that she was his comforting angel, and he could not live without her. More than once she asked him if he knew why Marian went away, and at last he made her answer, “Yes, Alice, I do know, but I cannot tell you now. You would not understand it.”

“I think I should,” persisted the child, “and I should feel so much better if I knew there was a reason.”

Thus importuned, Frederic replied, “I can only tell you that she thought I did not love her.”

“And did you, Frederic. Did you love her as Marian ought to be loved?”

The large brown blind eyes looked earnestly into his face, and with that gaze upon him Frederic Raymond could not tell a lie, so he was silent, and Alice, feeling that she was answered, continued, “But you would love her now if she’d come back.”

He couldn’t say yes to that, either, for he knew he did not love her even then, though he thought of her as a noble, generous hearted creature, worthy of a far different fate than had befallen her—and had she come back to him, he would have striven hard to make the love which alone could atone for what she had endured. But she did not come—and day after day went by, during which the search was continued at intervals, and always with the same result—until when a week was gone and there was still no trace of her found, people began to suggest that she was not in the river at all, but had gone off in another direction.—Frederic, however, was incredulous—she had no money that he or any one else knew of, or at least but very little. She had never been away from home alone, and if she had done so now, somebody would have seen her ere this, and suspected who it was—for the papers far and near teemed with the strange event, each editor commenting upon its cause according to his own ideas, and all uniting in censuring the husband, who at last was described as a cruel, unfeeling wretch, capable of driving any woman from his house, particularly one as beautiful and accomplished as the unfortunate bride! It was in vain that Frederic winced under the annoyance—he could not help it—and the story went the rounds, improving with each repetition, until at last an Oregon weekly outdid all the rest by publishing the tale under the heading of “Supposed Horrible Murder.” So much for newspaper paragraphs.

Meantime Frederic, too, inserted in the papers advertisements for the lost one, without any expectation, however, that they would bring her back. To him she was dead, even though her body could not be found. There might be deep, unfathomable sink-holes in the river, he said, and into one of these she had fallen—and so, with a crushing weight upon his spirits, and an intense loathing of himself and the wealth which was his now beyond a question, he gave her up as lost and waited for what would come to him next.

Occasionally he found himself thinking of Isabel, and wondering what she would say to his letter.—When he last saw her, she was talking of visiting her mother’s half-brother, who lived at Dayton, Ohio, and he had said to her at parting, “If you come as far as that, you must surely visit Redstone Hall.”

But he had little faith in her coming—and now he earnestly hoped she would not, for if he wronged the living he would be faithful to the dead; and so day after day he sat there in his desolate home, brooding over the past, trying to forget the present, and shrinking from the future, which looked so hopeless now. Thoughts of Marian haunted him continually, and in his dreams he often heard again the wailing sound, which he knew must have been her cry when she learned how she had been deceived. Gradually, too, he began to miss her presence—to listen for her girlish voice, her bounding step and merry laugh, which he had once thought rude. Her careful forethought for his comfort, too, he missed—confessing in his secret heart at least that Redstone Hall was nothing without Marian.

And now, with these influences at work to make him what he ought to be, we leave him awhile in his sorrow, and follow the fugitive bride.

CHAPTER VIII.
MARIAN.

Onward and onward—faster and faster flew the night Express, and the wishes of nearly all the passengers kept pace with the speed. One there was, however, a pale faced, blue-eyed girl, who dreaded the time when the cars would reach their destination, and she be in New York! How she had come thus far safely she scarce could tell. She only knew that every body had been kind to her, and asked her where she wished to go; until now the last dreadful change was made—the blue Hudson was crossed—Albany was far behind, and she was fast nearing New York. Night and day she had traveled, always with the same dull, dreary sense of pain—the same idea that to her the world would never be pleasant, the sunshine bright, or the flowers sweet again. Nervously she shrank from observation—and once, when a lady behind her, who saw that she was weeping, touched her shoulder and said, “What is the matter, little girl?” she started with fear, but did not answer until the question was repeated—then she replied, “Oh, I’m so tired and sick, and the cars make such a noise!”

“Have you come far?” the lady asked, and Marian answered, “Yes, very, very far,” adding, as she remembered with a shudder the din and confusion of the larger cities, “Is New York a heap noisier than Albany or Buffalo?”

“Why, yes,” returned the lady, smiling at the strange question. “Have you never been there?”

“Once, when a child,” said Marian, and the lady continued, “You seem a mere child now. Have you friends in the city?”

“Yes, all I have in the world, and that is only one,” sobbed Marian, her tears falling fast at words of sympathy.

The lady was greatly interested in the child, as she thought her, and had she been going to New York would have still befriended her, but she left at Newburgh, and Marian was again alone. She had heard much of New York, but she had no conception of it—and when at last she was there, and followed a group through the depot up to Broadway, her head grew dizzy and her brain whirled with the deafening roar. Cincinnati, Louisville, Buffalo and Albany combined were nothing to this, and in her confusion she would have fallen upon the pavement had not the crowd forced her along. Once, as a richly dressed young lady brushed past her, she raised her eyes meekly and asked where “Mrs. Daniel Burt lived?”

The question was too preposterous to be heeded, even if it were heard, and the lady moved on, leaving Marian as ignorant as ever of Mrs. Burt’s whereabouts. To two or three other ladies the same question was put, but Mrs. Daniel Burt was evidently not generally known in New York, for no one paid the slightest attention—except indeed to hold tighter their purse-strings, as if there were danger to be apprehended from the slender little figure which extended its ungloved hand so imploringly. After a time, a woman from the country, who had not yet been through the hardening process, listened to the question—and finding that Mrs. Daniel Burt was no way connected with the Burts of Yates county, nor the Blodgetts of Monroe, replied that she was a stranger in the city, and knew no such person—but pretty likely Marian would find it in the Directory—and as a regiment of soldiers just then attracted her attention, she turned aside, while Marian, discouraged and sick at heart, kept on her weary way, knowing nothing where she was going, and, if possible, caring less. When she came opposite to Trinity Church, she sank down upon the step, and drawing her vail over her face, half wished that she might die and be buried there in the enclosure where she saw the November sunshine falling on the graves. And then she wondered if the roar of the great city didn’t even penetrate to the ears of the sleeping dead, and, shudderingly, she said, “Oh, I would so much rather be buried by the river at home in dear old Kentucky. It’s all so still and quiet there.”

Gradually, as her weariness began to abate, she grew interested in watching the passers-by, wondering what every body was going down that street for, and why they came back so quick! Then she tried to count the omnibuses, thinking to herself, “Somebody’s dead up town, and this is the procession.” The deceased must have been a person of distinction, she fancied, for the funeral train seemed likely never to end. And, what was stranger than all, another was moving up while this was coming down! Poor Marian! she knew but little of the great Babylon to which she had so recently come, and she thought it made up of carts, hacks, omnibuses and people—all hurrying in every direction as fast as they could go. It made her feel dizzy and cross-eyed to look at them, and leaning back against the iron railing, she fell into a kind of conscious sleep, in which she never forgot for an instant the roar which troubled her so much, or lost the gnawing pain at her heart. In this way she sat for a long time, while hundreds and hundreds of people went by, some glancing sideways at her, and thinking she did not look like an ordinary beggar, while others did not notice her at all.

At last, as the confusion increased, she roused up, staring about her with a wild, startled gaze. People were going home, and she watched them as they struggled fiercely and ineffectually to stop some loaded omnibus, and then rushed higher up to a more favorable locality.

“The funeral was over,” she said. The omnibuses were most all returning, and though she had no idea of the lapse of time, she fancied that it might be coming night, and the dreadful thought stole over her—“What shall I do then? Maybe I’ll go in the church, though,” she added. “Nobody, I am sure, will hurt me there,” and she glanced confidingly at the massive walls which were to shield her from danger and darkness.

And while she sat there thus, the night shadows began to fall—the people walked faster and faster—the omnibus drivers swore louder and longer—the crowd became greater and greater—and over Marian there stole a horrid dread of the hour when the uproar would cease—when Wall street would be empty, the folks all gone, and she be there alone with the blear-eyed old woman who had seated herself near by, and seemed to be watching her.

“I will ask once more,” she thought. “Maybe some of these people know where she lives.” And, throwing back her vail, she half rose to her feet, when a tall, disagreeable looking fellow bent over her and said—“What can I do for you, my pretty lass?”

For an instant Marian’s heart stood still, for there was something in the rowdy’s appearance exceedingly repulsive, but when he repeated his question, she answered timidly, “I want to find Mrs. Daniel Burt.”

“Oh, yes, Mrs Daniel Burt. I know the old lady well—lives just round the corner. Come with me and I’ll show you the way,” and the great red, rough hand was about to touch the little slender white one resting on Marian’s lap, when a blow from a brawny fist sent the rascal reeling upon the pavement, while a round, good-humored face looked into Marian’s, and a kindly voice said, “Did the villain insult you, little girl?”

“Yes—I reckon not—I don’t know,” answered Marian, trembling with fright, while her companion continued, “’Tis the first time he ever spoke civil to a woman then. I know the scamp well—but what are you sittin’ here alone for, when everybody else is goin’ hum?”

Marian felt intuitively that he could be trusted, and she sobbed aloud, “I havn’t any home, nor friends, nor anything.”

“Great Moses!” said the young man, scanning her closely, “you ain’t a beggar—that’s as sure as my name is Ben Burt—and what be you sittin’ here for, any way?”

Marian did not heed his question, so eagerly did she catch at the name Ben Burt.

“Oh, sir,” she exclaimed, grasping his arm, “are you any way related to Mrs. Daniel Burt, who once lived with Colonel Raymond at Yonkers?”

“Wall, ra-ally now,” returned the honest-hearted Yankee, “if this don’t beat all. I wouldn’t wonder if I was some connected to Mrs. Daniel Burt, bein’ she brung me up from a little shaver, and has licked me mor’n a hundred times. She’s my mother, and if it’s her you’re looking for we may as well be travelin’, for she lives all of three miles from here.”

“Three miles!” repeated Marian, “that other man said just around the corner. What made him tell such a lie?”

“You tell,” answered Ben, with a knowing wink, which however failed to enlighten Marian, who was too glad with having found a protector to ask many questions, and unhesitatingly taking Ben’s offered arm she went with him up the street, until she found the car he wished to take.

When they were comfortably seated and she had leisure to examine him more closely, she found him to be a tall, athletic, good-natured looking young man, betraying but little refinement either in personal appearance or manner, but manifesting in all he did a kind, noble heart, which won her good opinion at once. Greatly he wondered who she was and whence she came, but he refrained asking her any questions, thinking he should know the whole if he waited. It seemed to Marian a long, long ride, and she was beginning to wonder if it would never end, when Ben touched her arm and signified that they were to alight.

“Come right down this street a rod or so and we’re there,” said he, and following whither he led, Marian was soon climbing a long, narrow stairway to the third story of what seemed to her a not very pleasant block of buildings.

But if it were dreary without, the sight of a cheerful blazing fire, which was disclosed to view as Ben opened a narrow door, raised her spirits at once, and taking in at a glance the rag carpet, the stuffed rocking chairs, the chintz-covered lounge, the neat-looking supper table spread for two, and the neater looking woman who was making the toast, she felt the pain at her heart give way a little, just a little, and bounding toward the woman, she cried, “You don’t know me, I suppose. I am Marian Lindsey, Colonel Raymond’s ward.”

Mrs. Burt, for it was she, came near dropping her plate of buttered toast in her surprise, and setting it down upon the hearth, she exclaimed, “The last person upon earth I expected to see. Where did you come from, and how happened you to run afoul of Ben?”

“I ran afoul of her,” answered Ben. “I found her a cryin’ on the pavement in front of Old Trinity, with that rascal of a Joe Black, makin’ b’lieve he was well acquainted with you, and that you lived jest round the corner.”

“Mercy me,” ejaculated Mrs. Burt, “but do tell a body what you’re here for—not but I’m glad to see you, but it seems so queer. How is the old Colonel, and that son I never see—Ferdinand, ain’t it—no Frederic, that’s what they call him?”

At the mention of Frederic, Marian gave a choking sob and replied: “Colonel Raymond is dead, and Frederic—oh, Mrs. Burt, please don’t ask me about him now, or I shall surely die.”

“There’s some bedivilment of some kind, I’ll warrant,” muttered Ben, who was a champion of all woman kind. “There’s been the old Harry to pay, or she wouldn’t be runnin’ off here, the villain,” and in fancy he dealt the unknown Frederic a far heavier blow than he had given the scapegrace Joe.

“Well, never mind now,” said Mrs. Burt, soothingly. “Take off your things and have some supper; you must be hungry, I’m sure. How long is it since you ate?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” answered Marian, a deathlike paleness overspreading her face; “not since yesterday, I reckon. Where am I? Everything is so confused!” and overcome with hunger, exhaustion and her late fright, Marian fainted in her chair.

Taking her in his arms as if she had been an infant, Ben carried her to the spare room, which, in accordance with her New England habits, Mrs. Burt always kept for company, and there on the softest of all soft beds he laid her down; then, while his mother removed her bonnet and shawl, he ran for water and camphor, chafing with his own rough fingers her little clammy hands, and bathing her forehead until Marian came back to consciousness.

“There, swaller some cracker and tea, and you’ll feel better directly,” said Mrs. Burt; and, like a very child, Marian obeyed, feeling that there was something delicious in being thus cared for after the dreadful days she had passed. “You needn’t talk to us to-night. There will be time enough to-morrow,” continued Mrs. Burt, as she saw her about to speak; and fixing her comfortably in bed, she went back to Ben, to whom she told all that she knew concerning Marian and the family with whom she had lived.

“There’s something that ain’t just right, depend on’t,” said Ben, sitting down at the table. “That Frederic has served her some mean caper, and so she’s run away. But she hit the nail on the head when she came here.”

By the time supper was over, Marian’s soft, regular breathing told that she was asleep, and taking the lamp in his hand, the curious Ben stole to see her. Her face was white as marble, and even in her sleep the tears dropped from her long eye-lashes, affecting Ben so strangely that his coat sleeve was more than once called in requisition to perform the office of a handkerchief.

“Poor little baby! You’ve been misused the wust kind,” he whispered, as with his great hand he brushed her tears away, and then went noiselessly out, leaving her to her slumbers.

It was a deep, dreamless sleep which came to Marian that night, for her strength was utterly exhausted, and in the atmosphere of kindness surrounding her, there was something soothing to her irritated nerves. But when the morning broke and the roar of the waking city fell again upon her ear, she started up, and gazing about the room, thought, “where am I, and what is it that makes my heart ache so?”

Full soon she remembered what it was, and burying her face in the pillows, she wept again bitterly, wondering what they were doing far away at Redstone Hall, and if anybody but Alice was sorry she had gone. A moment after Mrs. Burt’s kind voice was heard asking how she was, and bidding her be still and rest. But this it was impossible for Marian to do. She could not lie there in that little room and listen to the din which began to produce upon her the same dizzy, bewildering effect it had done the previous day, when she sat on the pavement and saw the omnibuses go by. She must be up and tell the kind people her story, and then, if they said so, she would go away—go back to those graves she had seen yesterday, and lying down in some hollow, where that horrid man and blear-eyed woman could not find her she would die, and Frederic would surely never know what had become of her. She knew she could trust both Mrs. Burt and Ben, and when breakfast was over, she unhesitatingly told them everything, interrupted occasionally by Ben’s characteristic exclamations of surprise and his mother’s ejaculations of wonder.

Mrs. Burt’s first impulse was, that if she were Marian she would claim her property, though of course she would not live with Frederic. But Ben said No—“he’d work his fingernails off before she should go back.” His mother wanted some one with her when he was gone, and Marian was sent to them by Providence. “Any way,” said he, “she shall live with us a while, and we’ll see what turns up. Maybe this Fred’ll begin to like her now she’s gone. It’s nater to do so, and some day he’ll walk in here and claim her.”

This picture was not a displeasing one to Marian, who through her tears smiled gratefully upon Ben, mentally resolving that should she ever be mistress of Redstone Hall she should remember him. And thus it was arranged that Marian Grey, as she chose to be called, should remain where she was, for a time at least, and if no husband came for her, she should stay there always as the daughter of Mrs. Burt, whose motherly heart already yearned toward the unfortunate orphan. Both Mrs. Burt and Ben were noble types of diamonds in the rough. Neither of them could boast of much education or refinement, but in all the great city there were few with warmer hearts or kindlier feelings than the widow and her son. Particularly was this true of Ben, who in his treatment of Marian only acted out the impulse of nature; if she had been aggrieved, he was the one to defend her, and if she bade him keep her secret, it was as safe with him as if it had never been breathed into his ear. Nearly all of Ben’s life had been passed in factories, and though now home on a visit, he was still connected with one in Ware, Mass. Very carefully he saved his weekly earnings, and once in three months carried or sent them to his mother, who, having spent many years in New York city, preferred it to the country. Here she lived very comfortably on her own earnings and those of Ben, whose occasional visits made the variety of her rather monotonous life. The other occupants of the block were not people with whom she cared to associate, and she passed many lonely hours. But with Marian for company it would be different, and she welcomed her as warmly as Ben himself had done.

“You shall be my little girl,” she said, laying her hand caressingly on the head of Marian, who began to think the world was not as cheerless as she had thought it was. Still the old dreary pain was in her heart—a desolate, homesick feeling, which kept her thoughts ever in one place and on one single object—the place, Redstone Hall, and the object, Frederic Raymond. And as the days went by, the feeling grew into an intense, longing desire to see her old home once more—to look into Frederic’s face—to listen to his voice, and know if he were sorry that she was gone. This feeling Mrs. Burt did not seek to discourage, for though she was learning fast to love the friendless girl, she knew it would be better for her to be reconciled to Mr. Raymond, and when one day, nearly four weeks after Marian’s arrival, the latter said to her, “I mean to write to Frederic and ask him to take me back,” she did not oppose the plan, for she saw how the great grief was wearing the young girl’s life away, making her haggard and pale, and writing lines of care upon her childish face.

That night there came to Marian a paper from Ben, who, having far outstayed his time, had returned the week before to Ware. Listlessly she tore open the wrapper, and glancing at the first page, was about throwing it aside, when a marked paragraph arrested her attention, and, with burning cheeks and fast-beating heart, she read that “Frederic Raymond would gladly receive any information of a young girl who had disappeared mysteriously from Redstone Hall.”

“Oh!” she exclaimed, springing to her feet, “I am going home—back to Frederic. He’s sent for me—see!” and she pointed out to Mrs. Burt the advertisement. “Can I go to-night?” she continued. “Is there a train? Oh, I am so glad.”

Mrs. Burt, however, was more moderate in her feelings. Mr. Raymond could scarcely do less than advertise, she thought, and to her this did not mean that he wished the fugitive to return for any love he bore her. Still, she would not dash Marian’s hopes at once, though she would save her from the cold reception she felt sure she would meet, should she return to Redstone Hall, unannounced. So, when the first excitement of Marian’s joy had abated, she said: “I should write to Mr. Raymond, just as I first thought of doing. Then he’ll know where you are, and he will come for you, if he wants you, of course.”

That “if he wants you” grated harshly on Marian’s ear; but, after her past experience, she did not care to thrust herself upon him, unless sure that he wished it, and concluded to follow Mrs. Burt’s advice. So she sat down and wrote to him a second letter, telling him where she was, and how she came there, and asking him in her childlike way, to let her come back again.

“Oh, I want to come home so much,” she wrote; “if you’ll only let me, you needn’t ever call me your wife, nor make believe I am—at least, not until you love me, and I get to be a lady. I’ll try so hard to learn. I’ll go away to school, and maybe, after a good many years are gone, you won’t be ashamed of me, though I shall never be as beautiful as Isabel. If you don’t want me back, Frederic, you must tell me so. I can’t feel any worse than I did that day when I sat here in the street and wished I could die. I didn’t die then, maybe I shouldn’t now, and if you do hate me, I’ll stay away and never write again—never let you know whether I am alive, or not; and after seven years, Ben Burt says, you will be free to marry Isabel. She’ll wait for you, I know. She won’t be too old then, will she? I shall be almost twenty-three, but that is young, and the years will seem so long to me if you do not let me return. May I, Frederic? Write, and tell me Yes; but direct to Mrs. Daniel Burt, as I shall then be more sure to get it. I dare not hope you’ll come for me, but if you only would, and quick, too, for my heart aches so, and my head is tired and sick with the dreadful noise. Do say I may come home. God will bless you if you do, I am sure; and if you don’t, I’ll ask Him to bless you just the same.”

The letter closed with another assurance that she gave to him cheerfully all her fortune—that she neither blamed his father, nor himself, nor Isabel, nor anybody. All she asked was to come back!

Poor little Marian! The pain in her heart was not so intense, and the noise in the street easier to bear after sending that letter, for hope softened them both, and whispered to her, “he’ll let me come,” and in a thousand different ways she pictured the meeting between herself and Frederic. Occasionally the thought intruded itself upon her, “what if he bids me keep away,” and then she said, “I’ll do it if he does, and before seven years are gone, maybe I’ll be dead. I hope I shall, for I do not want to think of Isabel’s living there with him!”

She had great faith in the seven years, for Ben had said so, and Ben, who was very susceptible to female charms, believed it, too, and the thought of it was like a ray of sunshine in the dingy, noisome room where all day he worked, sometimes reckoning up how many months there were in seven years—then how many weeks—then how many days, and finally calling himself a fool for caring a thing about it. When the newspaper article came under his eye, the sunshine left the dirty room, and after he had sent the paper to Marian he cared but little how many months or weeks or days there were in seven years, and he felt angry at himself for having sweat so hard in making the computation!

And so, while Marian in the city waits and watches for the message which will, perhaps, bid her come back, and Ben, in the noisy factory, waits also for a message which shall say she has gone, and his mother is again alone, the letter travels on, and one pleasant afternoon, when the clerk at Cincinnati makes up the mail for Frankfort, he puts that important missive with the rest and sends it on its way.

CHAPTER IX.
ISABEL HUNTINGTON.

All day and all night it rained with a steady, unrelenting pour, and when the steamboat which plies between Cincinnati and Frankfort stopped at the latter place, two ladies from the lower deck looked drearily over the city, one frowning impatiently at the mud and the rain, while the other wished in her heart that she was safely back in her old home, and had never consented to this foolish trip. This wish, however, she dared not express to her companion, who, though calling her mother, was in reality the mistress—the one whose word was law, and to whose wishes everything else must bend.

“This is delightful,” the younger lady exclaimed, as holding up her fashionable traveling dress, and glancing ruefully at her thin kid gaiters, she prepared to walk the plank. “This is charming. I wonder if they always have such weather in Kentucky.”

“No, Miss, very seldom, ’cept on strordinary ’casions,” said the polite African, who was holding an umbrella over her head, and who felt bound to defend his native State.

The lady tossed her little bonnet proudly, and turning to her mother, continued: “Have you any idea how we are to get to Redstone Hall?”

At this question an old gray-haired negro, who, with several other idlers, was standing near, came forward and said, “If it’s Redstone Hall whar Miss wants to go, I’s here with Marster Frederic’s carriage. I come to fotch a man who’s been out thar tryin’ to buy a house of marster in Louisville.”

At this announcement the face of both ladies brightened perceptibly, and pointing out their baggage to the negro, who was none other than our old friend Uncle Phil, they went to a public house to wait until the carriage came round for them.

“What do you suppose Frederic will think when he sees us?” the mother asked; and the daughter replied, “He won’t think anything, of course. It is perfectly proper that we should visit our relations, particularly when we are as near to them as Dayton, and they are in affliction, too. He would have been displeased if we had returned without giving him a call.”

From these remarks the reader will readily imagine that the ladies in question were Mrs. Huntington and her daughter Isabella. They had decided at last to visit Dayton, and had started for that city a few days after the receipt of Frederic’s letter announcing his father’s death: consequently they knew nothing of the marriage, and the fact that Colonel Raymond was dead only increased Isabel’s desire to visit Redstone Hall, for she rightly guessed that Frederic was now so absorbed in business that it would be long ere he came to New Haven again; so she insisted upon coming, and as she found her Ohio aunt not altogether agreeable, she had shortened her visit there, and now with her mother sat waiting at the Mansion House for the appearance of Phil and the carriage. That Isabel was beautiful was conceded by every one, and that she was as treacherous as beautiful was conceded by those who knew her best. Early in life she had been engaged to Rudolph McVicar, a man of strong passions, an iron will and indomitable perseverance. But when young Raymond came, and she fancied she could win him, she unhesitatingly broke her engagement with Rudolph, who, stung to madness by her cold, unfeeling conduct, swore to be revenged. This threat, however, was little heeded by the proud beauty. If she secured Frederic Raymond, she would be above all danger, and she bent every energy to the accomplishment of her plan. She knew that the Kentuckians were proverbial for their hospitality, and feeling sure that no one would think it at all improper for her mother and herself to visit their cousin, as she called Frederic, she determined, if possible, to prolong that visit until asked to stay with him always. He had never directly talked to her of love, consequently she felt less delicacy in going to his house and claiming relationship with him; so when Phil came around with the carriage, she said to him, quite as a matter of course, “How is Cousin Frederic since his father’s death?”

“Jest tolable, thankee,” returned the negro, at the same time saying, “Be you marster’s kin?”

“Certainly,” answered Isabel, while the negro bowed low, for any one related to his master was a person of distinction to him.

Isabel had heard Frederic speak of Marian, and when they were half way home, she put her head from the window and said to Phil, “Where is the young girl who used to live with Colonel Raymond—Marian was her name, I think?”

“Bless you,” returned the negro, cracking his whip nervously, “haint you hearn how she done got married to marster mighty nigh three weeks ago?”

“Married! Frederic Raymond married!” screamed Isabel; “it is not true. How dare you tell me such a falsehood?”

“Strue as preachin’, and a heap truer than some on’t, for I seen ’em joined with these very eyes,” said Phil, and, glancing backward at the white face leaning from the window, he muttered, “’spects mebby she calkerlated on catchin’ him herself. Ki, wouldn’t she and Dinah pull har though. Thar’s a heap of Ole Sam in them black eyes of hern,” and, chirruping to his horses, Philip drove rapidly on, thinking he wouldn’t tell her that the bride had ran away—he would let Frederic do that.

Meantime, Isabel, inside, was choking—gasping—crying—wringing her hands and insisting that her mother should ask the negro again if what he had told them were so.

“Man—sir”—said Mrs. Huntington, putting her bonnet out into the rain, “is Mr. Frederic Raymond really married to that girl Marian?”

“Yes, as true as I am sittin’ here. Thursday’ll be three weeks since the weddin’,” was the reply, and with another hysterical sob, Isabel laid her head in her mother’s lap.

Nothing could exceed her rage, mortification and disappointment, except, indeed, her pride, and this was stronger than all her other emotions and that which finally roused her to action. She would not turn back now, she said. She would brave the villain and show him that she did not care. She would put herself by the side of his wife and let him see the contrast. She had surely heard from him that Marian was plain, and in fancy, she saw how she would overshadow her rival and make Frederic feel keenly the difference between them, and then she thought of the discarded Rudolph. If everything else should fail, she could win him back—he had some money, and she would rather be his wife than nobody’s!

By this time they had left the highway, for Redstone Hall was more than a mile from the turnpike, and Isabel found ample opportunity for venting her ill-nature. Such a road as that she never saw before, and she’d like to know if folks in Kentucky lived out in the lots. “No wonder they were such heathen! you nigger,” she exclaimed, as Phil drove through a brook; “are you going to tip us over, or what?”

“Wonder if she ’spects a body is gwine round the brook,” muttered Phil, and as the carriage wheels were now safe from the water, he stopped and said to the indignant lady, “mebby Miss would rather walk the rest of the way. Thar’s a heap wus places in the cornfield, whar we’ll be pretty likely to get oversot.”

“Go on,” snapped Isabel, who knew she could not walk quite as well as the mischievous driver.

Accordingly they went on, and ere long came in sight of the house which even in that drenching rain looked beautiful to Isabel, and all the more beautiful because she felt that she had lost it. On the piazza little Alice stood, her fair hair blowing over her face, and her ear turned to catch the first sound which should tell her if what she hoped were true. Old Dinah, who saw the carriage in the distance, had said there was some one in it, and instantly Alice thought of Marian, and going out upon the piazza, she waited impatiently until Phil drove up to the door.

“There are four feet,” she said, as the strangers came up the steps; “four feet, but none are Marian’s,” and she was turning sadly away, when she accidentally trod upon the long skirt of Isabel, who, snatching it away, said angrily, “child, what are you doing—stepping on my dress?”

“I didn’t mean to; I’m blind,” answered Alice, her lip quivering and her eyes filling with tears.

“Never you mind that she dragon,” whispered Uncle Phil, thrusting into the child’s hand a paper of candy, which had the effect of consoling her somewhat, both for her disappointment and her late reproof.

“Who is that ar?” asked Dinah, appearing upon the piazza just as Isabel passed into the hall. “Some of marster’s kin!” she repeated after Uncle Phil. “For the Lord’s sake, what fotched ’em here this rainy day, when we’s gwine to have an ornery dinner—no briled hen, nor turkey, nor nothin’. Be they quality, think?”

“’Spects the young one wants to be, if she ain’t,” returned Phil, with a very expressive wink, which had the effect of enlightening Dinah with regard to his opinion.

“Some low flung truck, I’ll warrant,” said she, as she followed them into the parlor, where Isabel’s stately bearing and glittering black eyes awed her into a low courtesy, as she said: “You’re very welcome to Redstone Hall, I’m sure. Who shall I tell marster wants to see him?”

“Two ladies, simply,” was Isabel’s haughty answer, and old Dinah departed, whispering to herself, “Two ladies simple! She must think I know nothin’ ’bout grarmar to talk in that kind of way, but she’s mistakened. I hain’t lived in the fust families for nothin’,” and knocking at Frederic’s door, she told him that “two simple ladies was down in the parlor and wanted him.”

“Who?” he asked, in some surprise, and Dinah replied:

“Any way, that’s what she said—the tall one, with great black eyes jest like coals of fire. Phil picked ’em up in Frankford, whar they got off the boat. They’s some o’ yer kin they say.”

Frederic did not wish to hear any more, for he suspected who they were. It was about this time they had talked of visiting Dayton, and motioning Dinah from the room, he pressed his hands to his forehead, and thought, “Must I suffer this, too? Oh, why did she come to look at me in my misery?” Then, forcing an unnatural calmness, he started for the parlor, where, as he had feared, he stood face to face with Isabel Huntington.

She was very pale, and in her black eyes there was a hard, dangerous expression, from which he gladly turned away, addressing first her mother, who, rising to meet him, said:

“We have accepted your invitation, you see.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied, and he was trying to stammer out a welcome, when Isabel, who all the time had been aching to pounce upon him, chimed,

“Where is Mrs. Raymond? I am dying to see my new cousin” and in the eyes of black there was a reddish gleam, as if they might ere long emit sparks of living fire.

“Mrs. Raymond!” repeated Frederic, the name dropping slowly from his lips. “Mrs. Raymond! Oh! Isabel, don’t you know? Havn’t you heard?”

“Certainly I have,” returned the young lady, watching him as a fierce cat watches his helpless prey. “Of course I have heard of your marriage, and have come to congratulate you. Is your wife well?”

Frederic raised his hand to stop the flippant speech, and when it finished he rejoined: “But havn’t you heard the rest—the saddest part of all? Marian is dead!—drowned—at least we think she must be, for she went away on our wedding night, and no trace of her can be found.”

The fiery gleam was gone from the black eyes—the color came back to the cheeks—the finger nails ceased their painful pressure upon the tender flesh—the shadow of a smile dimpled the corner of the mouth, and Isabel was herself again.

“Dead! Drowned!” she exclaimed. “How did it happen? What was the reason? Dreadful, isn’t it?” and going over to where Mr. Raymond stood, she looked him in the face, with an expression she meant should say, “I am sorry for you,” but which really did say something quite the contrary.

“I cannot tell you why she went away,” Frederic answered, “but there was a reason for it, and it has cast a shadow over my whole life.”

“Marian was a mere child, I had always supposed,” suggested Isabel, anxious to get at the reason why he had so soon forgotten herself.

“Did you get my last letter—the one written to you?” asked Frederic, and upon Isabel’s replying that she did not, he briefly stated a few facts concerning his marriage, saying it was his father’s dying request, and he could not well avoid doing as he had done, even if he disliked Marian. “But I didn’t dislike her,” he continued, and the hot blood rushed into his face. “She was a gentle, generous hearted girl, and had she lived, I would have made her happy.”

If by this speech Frederic Raymond thought to deceive Isabel Huntington, he was mistaken, for, looking into his eyes she read a portion of the truth and knew there was something back of all—a something between himself and his father which had driven him to the marriage. What it was she did not care then to know. She was satisfied that the bride was gone—and when Frederic narrated more minutely the particulars of her going, the artful girl said to herself, “She is dead beyond a doubt, and when I leave Redstone Hall, I shall know it, and mother, too!”

It was strange how rapidly Isabel changed from a hard, defiant woman, to a soft, sparkling, beautiful creature, and when, in her plaid silk dress of crimson and brown, with her magnificent hair bound in heavy braids about her head, she came down to dinner, Aunt Dinah involuntarily dropped another courtesy, and whispered under her teeth, “The Lord, if she ain’t quality after all.” Old Hetty, too, who from a side door looked curiously in at their guests, received a like impression, pronouncing her more like Miss Beatrice than any body she had ever seen. To Alice, Isabel was all gentleness, for she readily saw that the child was a pet; so she called her darling and dearest, smoothing her fair hair and kissing her once when Frederic was looking on. All this, however, did not deceive the little blind girl, or erase from her mind the angry words which had been spoken to her, and that evening, when she went to Frederic to bid him good night, she climbed into his lap and said: “Is that Miss Isabel going to stay here always?”

“Why, no,” he answered. “Did you think she was?”

“I did not know,” returned Alice, “but I hoped not, for I don’t like her at all. She’s very grand and beautiful, Dinah says, but I think she must look like a snake, and I want her to go away, don’t you?”

Frederic would not say yes to this question, and he remained silent. Had he been consulted, he would rather that she had never come to Redstone Hall, but now that she was there, he did not wish her away. It would be inhospitable, he said, and when next morning she came down to breakfast, bright, fresh and elegant in her tasteful wrapper, he felt a pang, as he thought, “had I done right, she might have been the mistress of Redstone Hall,” but it could not be now, he said, even if Marian were dead, and all that day he struggled manfully between his duty and his inclination, while Isabel dealt out her highest card, ingrafting herself into the good graces of the Smitherses by speaking to them pleasant, familiar words, exalting herself in the estimation of the Higginses by her lofty, graceful bearing, and winning Dinah’s friendship by praising Victoria Eugenia, and asking if that fine looking man who drove the carriage was her husband. Then, in the evening, when the lamps were lighted in the parlor, she opened the piano and filled the house with the rich melody of her cultivated voice, singing a sad, plaintive strain, which reminded Alice of poor, lost Marian, and carried Frederic back to other days, when, with a feeling of pride, he had watched her snowy fingers as they gracefully swept the keys. He could not look at them now—he dared not look at her, in her ripe glowing beauty, and he left the room, going out upon the piazza, where he wiped great drops of sweat from his face, and almost cursed the fate which had made it a sin for him to love the dark-haired Isabel. She knew that he was gone, and rightly divining the cause, she dashed off into a stirring dancing tune, which brought the negroes to the door, where they stood admiring her playing and praising her queenly form.

“That’s somethin’ like it,” whispered Hetty, beating time to the lively strain. “That sounds like Miss Beatrice did when she done played the pianner. I ’clare for’t, I eenamost wish Marster Frederic had done chose her. ’Case you know t’other one done drowned herself the fust night,” she added quickly, as she met Dinah’s rebuking glance.

Dinah admired Isabel, but she could not forget Marian; though like her sex, whether black or brown, she speculated upon the future, when “Marster Frederic would be done mournin’,” and she wondered if “old miss,” meaning Mrs. Huntington, would think it necessary to stay there, too. Thus several days went by, and so pleasant was it to Frederic to have some one in the house who could divert him from his gloomy thoughts, that he began to dread the time when he would be alone again. But could he have looked into the heart of the fair lady, he would have seen no immediate cause of alarm. Isabel did not intend to leave her present quarters immediately, and to this end her plans were laid. From what she had heard she believed Marian Lindsey was dead, and if so, she would not again trust Frederic away from her influence. Redstone Hall needed a head—a housekeeper—and as her mother was an old lady, and also a relative of Frederic, she was just the one to fill that post. Their house in New Haven was only rented until March, and by writing to some friends they could easily dispose of their furniture until such time as they might want it. Alice needed a governess, for she heard Frederic say so; and though the little pest (this was what she called her, to herself) did not seem to like her, she could teach her as well as any one. It would be just as proper for her to be Alice’s governess as for any one else, and a little more so, for her mother would be with her.

And this arrangement she brought about with the most consummate skill, first asking Frederic if he knew of any situation in Kentucky which she could procure as a teacher. That was one object of her visit, she said. She must do something for a living, and as she would rather teach either in a school, or in a private family, she would be greatly obliged to him if he would assist her a little. Hardly knowing what he was doing, Frederic said something about Alice’s having needed a governess for a long time; and quickly catching at it, Isabel rejoined, “Oh! but you know I couldn’t possibly remain here, unless mother staid with me. Now, if you’ll keep her as a kind of overseer-in-general of the house, I’ll gladly undertake the charge of dear little Alice’s education. She does not fancy me, I think, but I’m sure I can win her love. I can that of almost any one—children I mean, of course;” and the beautiful, fascinating eyes looked out of the window quite indifferently, as if their owner were utterly oblivious of the fierce struggle in Frederic’s bosom.

He wished her to stay with him—oh, so much! But was it right? and would he not get to loving her? No, he would not, he said. He would only think of her as his cousin—his sister, whose presence would cheer his solitary home. So he bade her stay, and she bade her mother stay, urging so many reasons why she should, and must, that the latter consented at last, and a letter was dispatched to New Haven, with directions for having their furniture packed away, and their house given up to its owner. This arrangement at first caused some gossip among the neighbors, who began to predict what the end would be, and, also, to assert more loudly than ever their belief that Marian was not dead. Still, there was no reason why Isabel should not be Alice’s governess, particularly as her mother was with her; and when Agnes Gibson pronounced her beautiful, accomplished, and just the thing, the rest followed in the train, and the health of the “northern beauty” was drunk by more than one fast young man.

In the kitchen at Redstone Hall there was also a discussion, in which the Higginses rather had the preference, inasmuch as the lady in question was after their manner of thinking. Old Dinah wisely kept silent, saying to herself, “a new broom sweeps clean, and I’ll wait to see what ’tis when it gets a little wore. One thing is sartin, though, if she goes to put on ars, and sasses us colored folks, I’ll gin her a piece of my mind. I’ll ask her whar she come from, and how many niggers she owned afore she come from thar.”

It was several days before Alice was told of the arrangement, and then she rebelled at once. Bursting into tears, she hid her face in Dinah’s lap, and sobbed, “I can’t learn of her. I don’t like her. What shall I do?”

“I wish to goodness I had larning,” answered Dinah, “and I’d hear you say that foolishness ’bout the world’s turnin’ round and makin’ us stan’ on our heads half the time, but I hain’t, and if I’s you I’d make the best on’t. I’ll keep my eye on her, and if she makes you do the fust thing you don’t want to, I’ll gin her a piece of my mind. I ain’t afraid on her. Why, Gibson’s niggers say how they hearn Miss Agnes say she used to make her own bed whar she came from, and wash dishes, too! Think o’ that!”

Thus comforted, Alice dried her tears, and hunting up the books from which she had once recited to Marian, she declared herself ready for her lessons at any time.

“Let it be to-morrow, then,” said Isabel, who knew that Frederic was going to Lexington, and that she could not see him even if she were not occupied with Alice.

So, the next morning, after Frederic was gone, Alice went to the school-room, and drawing her little chair to Isabel’s side, laid her books upon the lady’s lap, and waited for her to begin.

“You must read to me,” she said, “until I know what ’tis, and then I’ll recite it to you.”

But Isabel was never intended for a teacher, and she found it very tedious reading the same thing over and over, particularly as Alice seemed inattentive and not at all inclined to remember. At last she said, impatiently, “For the pity’s sake how many more times must I read it. Can’t you learn anything?”

“Don’t—don’t speak so,” sobbed Alice. “I’m thinking of Marian, and how she used to be with me. It’s just six weeks to-day since she went away. Oh, I wish she’d come back. Do you believe she’s dead?”

Isabel was interested in anything concerning Marian, and closing the book, she began to question the child, asking her among other things, “if Marian did not leave a letter for Mr. Raymond, and if she knew what was in it.”

“No one knows,” returned the child; “he never told—but here’s mine,” and drawing from her bosom the soiled note, she passed it to Isabel, who scrutinized it closely, particularly the handwriting.

“Of course she’s dead, or she would have been heard from ere this,” said she, passing the note back to Alice, who, not feeling particularly comforted, made but little progress in her studies that morning, and both teacher and pupil were glad when the lessons of the day were over.

Before starting for Lexington, Frederic had sent Josh on some errand to Frankfort, and just after dinner the negro returned. Isabel was still alone upon the piazza when he came up, and as she was expecting news from New Haven, she asked if he stopped at the post-office.

“Ye-e-us’m,” began the stuttering negro, “an’ I d-d-d-one got a h-h-eap on ’em, too,” and Josh gave her six letters—one for herself and five for Frederic.

Hastily breaking the seal of her own letter, she read that their matters at home were satisfactorily arranged—a tenant had already been found for their house, and their furniture would be safely stowed away. Hearing her mother in the hall, she handed the letter to her and then went to the library to dispose of Frederic’s. As she was laying them down she glanced at the superscriptions, carelessly, indifferently, until she came to the last, the one bearing the New York post-mark; then, with a nervous start she caught it up again and examined it more closely, while a sickening, horrid fear crept through her flesh—her heart gave one fearful throb and then lay like some heavy, pulseless weight within her bosom. Could it be that she had seen that handwriting before? Had the dead wife returned to life, and was she coming back to Redstone Hall? The thought was overwhelming, and for a moment Isabel Huntington was tempted to break that seal and read. But she dared not, for her suspicion might be false; she would see Alice’s note again, and seeking out the child she asked permission to take the letter which Marian had written. Alice complied with her request, and darting away to the library Isabel compared the two. They were the same. There could be no mistake, and in the intensity of her excitement, she felt her black hair loosening at its roots.

“It is from her, but he shall never see it, never!” she exclaimed aloud, and her voice was so unnatural that she started at the sound, and turning saw Alice standing in the door with an inquiring look upon her face, as if asking the meaning of what she had heard.

Isabel quailed beneath the glance of that sightless child, and then sat perfectly still, while Alice said, “Miss Huntington, are you here? Was it you who spoke?”

Isabel made no answer, but trembling in every limb, shrank farther and farther back in her chair as the little, groping, outstretched arms came nearer and nearer to her. Presently, when she saw no escape, she forced a loud laugh, and said, “Fie, Alice. I tried to frighten you by feigning a strange voice. You want your letter, don’t you? Here it is. I only wished to see if in reading it a second time I could get any clue to the mystery,” and she gave the bit of paper back to Alice, who, somewhat puzzled to understand what it all meant, left the room, and Isabel was again alone. Three times she caught up the letter with the intention of breaking its seal, and as often threw it down, for, unprincipled as she was, she shrank from that act, and still, if she did not know the truth, she should go mad, she said, and pressing her hands to her forehead, she thought what the result to herself would be were Marian really alive.

“But she isn’t,” she exclaimed. “I won’t have it so. She’s dead—she’s buried in the river.” But who was there in New York that wrote so much like her? She wished she knew, and she might know, too, by opening the letter. If it was from a stranger, she could destroy it, and he, thinking it had been lost, would write again. She should die if she didn’t know, and maybe she should die if she did.

At all events, reality was more endurable than suspense, and glancing furtively around to make sure that no blind eyes were near, she snatched the letter from the table and broke the seal! Even then she dared not read it, until she reflected that she could not give it to Frederic in this condition—she might as well see what it contained; and wiping the cold moisture from her face she opened it and read, while her flesh seemed turning to stone, and she could feel the horror creeping through her veins, freezing her blood and petrifying her very brain. Marian Lindsey lived! She was coming back again—back to her husband, and back to the home which was hers. There was enough in the letter for her to guess the truth, and she knew why another had been preferred to herself. For a moment even her lip curled with scorn at what she felt was an unmanly act, but this feeling was soon lost in the terrible thought that Marian might return.

“Can it be? Must it be?” she whispered, as her hard, black eyes fastened themselves again upon the page, blotted with Marian’s tears. “Seven years—seven years,” she continued, “I’ve heard of that before,” and into the wild tumult of her thoughts there stole a ray of hope. If she withheld the letter from Frederic, and she must withhold it now, he would never know what she knew. Possibly, too, Marian might die, and though she would have repelled the accusation, Isabel Huntington was guilty of murder in her heart, as she sat there alone and planned what she would do. She was almost on the borders of insanity, for the disappointment to her now would be greater and more humiliating than before. She had no home to go to—her arrangements for remaining in Kentucky were all made, and Redstone Hall seemed so fair that she would willingly wait twice seven years, if, at the expiration of that time, she were sure of being its mistress. It was worth trying for, and though she had but little hope of success, the beautiful demon bent her queenly head and tried to devise some means of effectually silencing Marian, so that if there really were anything in the seven years the benefit would accrue to her.

“She’s a little,” she said, “and this Mrs. Daniel Burt she talked about is just as silly as herself. They’ll both believe what is told to them. I may never marry Frederic, it is true, but I’ll be revenged on Marian. What business had she to cross my path, the little red-headed jade!”

Isabel was growing excited, and as she dared do anything when angry, she resolved to send the letter back.

“I can imitate his handwriting,” she thought; “I can do anything as I feel now,” and going to her room, she found the letter he had written to her mother.

This she studied and imitated for half an hour, and at the end of that time wrote on the blank page of Marian’s letter, “Isabel Huntington is now the mistress of Redstone Hall.”

“That will keep her still, I reckon,” she said, and taking a fresh envelope, she directed it to “Mrs. Daniel Burt,” as Marian had bidden Frederic do. “’Twas a fortunate circumstance, her telling him that, for ‘Marian Lindsey’ would have been observed at once,” she thought; and then, lest her resolution should fail her, she found Josh and bade him take the letter to the post-office at the Forks of Elkhorn not very far away.

Nothing could suit Josh better than to ride, and stuttering out something which nobody could understand, he mounted his rather sorry-looking horse and was soon galloping out of sight. In the kitchen Mrs. Huntington heard of Josh’s destination, and when next she met her daughter, she asked to whom she had been writing.

“To some one, of course,” answered Isabel, at the same time intimating that she hoped she could have a correspondent without her mother troubling herself.

The rudeness of this speech was forgotten by Mrs. Huntington in her alarm at Isabel’s pale face, and she asked anxiously what was the matter?

“Nothing but a wretched headache—teaching don’t agree with me,” was Isabel’s reply, and turning away, she ran up the stairs to her room, where, throwing herself upon the bed, she tried to fancy it all a dream.

But it was not a dream, and Marian’s anguish was scarcely greater than her own at that moment, when she began to realize that Frederic and Redstone Hall were lost to her forever. There might be something in the seven years, but it was a long, dreary time to wait, with the ever-haunting fear that Marian might return, and she half wished she had not opened the letter. But her regrets were unavailing now, and resolving to guard her secret carefully and deny what she had done, if ever accused of it, she began to consider how she should hereafter demean herself toward Frederic. It would be terrible to have him making love to her, she thought, for she would be compelled to tell him no, and if another should become her rival, she could not stand quietly by and witness the unlawful deed.

“Oh, if I or Marian had never been born, this hour would not have come to me,” she cried, burying her face in the pillows to shut out the fast increasing darkness which was so hateful to her.

Already was she reaping the fruit of the transgression, and when an hour later she heard the voice of Frederic in the hall, she stopped her ears, and, burying her face still closer in the pillows, wished again that either Marian or herself had never seen the light of day.

CHAPTER X.
FREDERIC AND ALICE.

All the day long Frederic had thought of Marian—thought of the little blue-eyed girl, who just six weeks before went away from him to die. To die. Many, many times he said that to himself, and as often as he said it, he thought, “perhaps she is not dead,” until the belief grew strong in him that somewhere he should find her, that very day it might be. He wished he could, and take her back to Redstone Hall, where she would be a barrier between himself and the beautiful temptation which it was so hard for him to resist. Manfully had he struggled against it, going always from its presence when the eyes of lustrous black looked softly into his own, and when he heard, as he often did, the full rich-toned voice singing merry songs, he stopped his ears lest the sweet music should touch a chord which he said was hushed forever.

“It might have been,” he thought sometimes to himself, but the time was past, and even if Marian were dead, he must not take another to share the wealth so generously given up. And Marian was dead, he had always believed until to-day, when she seemed to be so near, that on his return at night to Redstone Hall he had a half presentiment that he might find her there, or at least some tidings of her.

All about the house was dark, but on the piazza a little figure was standing, and as its dim outline was revealed to him, he said, involuntarily: “That may be Marian, and I am glad, or at least I will be glad,” and he was hurrying on, when a light from the hall streamed out upon the figure, and he saw that it was Alice waiting for him. Still the impression was so strong that after kissing her, he asked if no one had been at the Hall that day.

“No one,” she answered, and with a vague feeling of disappointment, he led her into the house.

Alice’s heart was full that night, for accidentally she had heard old Hetty and Lyd discussing the probable result of Isabel’s sojourn among them, and the very idea shocked her, as if they had trampled on Marian’s grave.

“I’ll tell Frederic,” said she to herself, “and ask him is he going to marry her,” and when after his supper he went into the library to read the letters which Mrs. Huntington told him were there, she followed him thither.

It was not Frederic’s nature to pet or notice children much, but in his sorrow he had learned to love the little helpless girl dearly, and when he saw her standing beside him with a wistful look upon her face, he smoothed her soft brown hair and said: “What does my blind bird want?”

“Take me in your lap,” said Alice, “so I can feel your heart beat and know if you tell me true.”

He complied with her request, and laying her head against his bosom, she began, “be we much related?”

“Second cousins, that’s all.”

“But you love me, don’t you?”

“Yes, very much.”

“And I love you a heap,” returned the little girl. “I didn’t use to, though—till Marian went away. Frederic, Marian isn’t dead!” and, lifting up her head, Alice looked at him with a truthful, earnest look, which seemed to say that she believed what she asserted.

Frederic gasped a short, quick breath, and Alice continued, “wouldn’t it be very wicked for you to love anybody else. I don’t mean me—because I’m a little blind girl—but to love somebody and marry them with Marian alive?”

“Certainly it would be wicked,” he replied; and Alice continued, “Aunt Hetty said you were going to marry Isabel, and it almost broke my heart. I never thought before that Marian wasn’t dead, but I knew it then. I felt her right there with us, and I’ve felt her ever since. Dinah, too, said it seemed to her just like Marian was alive, and that she hoped you wouldn’t make—perhaps I ought not to tell you, but you don’t care for Dinah—she hoped you wouldn’t make a fool of yourself. Frederic, do you love Isabel Huntington?”

“Yes,” dropped involuntarily from the young man’s lips, for there was something about that old little child which wrung the truth from him.

“Did you love her before you married Marian?”

“Yes,” he said again, for he could not help himself. There was silence a moment, and then Alice, who had been thinking of what he told her once before, said, interrogatively, “Marian found it out, and that was why she thought you didn’t love her and went away?”

“That was one reason, but not the principal one.”

“Do you think Isabel as good as Marian?”

“No, not as good—not as good,” and Frederic was glad that he could pay this tribute to the lost one.

After a moment Alice spoke again:

“Frederic, do you believe Marian is dead?”

“I have always thought so,” he answered, and Alice replied: “But you don’t know for certain; and I want you to promise that until you do you won’t make love to Isabel, nor marry her, nor anybody else, will you, Frederic?” and putting both her little hands upon his forehead, she pushed back his hair and waited for an answer.

Many times the young man had made that resolution, but the idea of thus promising to another was unpleasant, and he hesitated for a time; then he said:

“Suppose we never can know for certain—would you have me live all my life alone?”

“No,” said Alice, “and you needn’t, either; but I’d wait ever so long, ten years, anyway, and before that time she’ll come, I’m sure. Dinah says maybe she will, and that perhaps we shan’t know her, she’ll be so changed—so handsome,” and as if the power of prophecy were on her, Alice pictured a beautiful woman who might come to them sometime as their lost Marian, and Frederic, listening to her, felt more willing to promise than he had been before.

A glow of hope was kindled within his own bosom, and when she finished he said to her:

“I will wait, Alice—wait ten years for Marian.”

Blessed Alice! When the mother, whose grave was grass-grown now and sunken, first knew her only child was blind, she murmured against the dealings of Providence, and in the bitterness of her heart asked:

“Why was my baby born? and what good can it ever do?”

She who had questioned thus was dead, while the good the little girl was to do was becoming, each day, more and more apparent. Helpless and blind though she was, she would keep the strong man from falling, and when his heart grew faint with hope deferred, her gentle, earnest words would cheer him on to wait a little longer. Marian was not dead to her, and so sure of it did she seem that when the interview was ended, and Frederic was left alone, he bowed his head reverently and said:

“If Marian be, indeed, alive, will the good Father send me some tidings of her, and so keep me from sin?”

Oh! could the writing desk before him have told how only that afternoon there had lain upon its velvet cover a message from the lost one—a sweet, childlike petition for him to take her back, even though he could not love her—he would have gone for her then, and, bringing her to the home which was not his, but hers, he would have placed her between himself and the temptation, yielding to her all honor and respect until his heart should say it loved her. But the time was not yet, and he must suffer longer—must pass through deeper waters; while Marian, too, must be molded and changed into a bride who, far better than the queenly Isabel, could do the honors of Redstone Hall.

CHAPTER XI.
THE LETTER RECEIVED.

It was baking-day at Mrs. Burt’s, and the good lady bustled in and out—her cap strings pinned over her head, her sleeves tucked up above her shoulders, and her face, hands and apron covered with flour. Occasionally as she rolled out the short pie crust, or sliced the juicy apple, she glanced at the rain-drops pattering against the window, and said encouragingly, “I don’t care for the rain, for I’ve get a big umbrella and the best kind of overshoes;” and as often as she related the cheering words, they brought a smile to the thin, white face of the young girl who sat in the large, stuffed easy chair, and did not offer to share the labors of her aunt, as she called her.

Marian was sick. Strong excitement had worn her strength away, and since she had sent the letter to Frederic, her restless anxiety for the answer had made her so weak that she kept her bed nearly all the time, counting the days which must elapse ere she could possibly hope to hear, and then, when the full time was out, bidding Mrs. Burt wait one more day before she went to the office, so as to be sure and get it. She had made due allowance for delays, and now she was certain that it had come. She would sit up that day, she said, for she felt almost well; and if Frederic told her to come home, she should start to-morrow and get there Saturday night, and she fancied how people would stare at her, and be glad to see her, too, on Sunday, when she first went into church, for she “should go, any way.” Alice, too, would be delighted, and kiss her so many times; and then she wondered if Frederic wouldn’t kiss her, too—she thought he might just once, she’d been so long away, and she said to herself that “she would draw back a little, and let him know she wasn’t so very anxious.”

Poor Marian, how little was she prepared for the cruel blow awaiting her! The pies were made at last, as was the gingerbread and crispy snaps; the apple dumplings, Marian’s favorite dessert, were steaming on the stove; the litter was cleared away, the carpet swept, the oil-cloth washed, the chairs set back; and then exchanging her work dress for a more respectable delaine, Mrs. Burt put over the kettle to boil, “for after her wet walk, she should want a cup of tea,” she said, and, leaving Marian to watch the pie baking in the oven, she started on her errand.

“I mean to have the table ready when she gets back,” said Marian—“for if I don’t make her think I’m well, she won’t let me start so soon;” and, exerting all strength, she set the table for dinner in the neatest possible manner, even venturing upon the extravagance of bringing out the best white dishes, which Mrs. Burt only used on great occasions. “When I get some, I’ll send her a new set with gilt bands,” the little girl said, as she arranged the cups, and then stepped back to witness the effect. “Oh! I wish she’d come,” she continued, glancing at the clock; but it was not time yet, and, resuming her rocking-chair, she tried to wait patiently.

But it seemed very long and very tiresome, sitting there alone, listening to the rain and the ticking of the clock. It is strange how the most trivial circumstance will sometimes stamp itself indelibly upon the memory. The steam from the dumplings, which Marian thought she should enjoy so much, filled the room with a sweet, sickly odor, and for many, many years she remembered how faint it made her feel. But ’twas a pleasant faintness now; everything was pleasant, for wasn’t she going home, back to Redstone Hall—back to Frederic, who, if he didn’t love her now, would learn to love her, for Mrs. Burt said so; Mrs. Burt, who knew almost as much as Dinah, and who, even while she thought of her, was coming up the narrow stairs. Marian heard her put her dripping umbrella beside the door, but for her life she could not move. If she should be disappointed after all, she said, and she tried to see how many she could count before she knew for certain.

“A letter—oh, have you a letter for me?” she attempted to say, when Mrs. Burt came in, but she could not articulate a word, and the good lady, wishing to tease her a little, leisurely took off her overshoes, hung up her shawl, wiped her damp bonnet with a handkerchief, and looked at the dumplings and then said, as indifferently as if the happiness of a young life was not to be crushed by what she had in her pocket, “it rains awfully down street!”

“I know—but the letter—was there a letter?” and Marian’s blue eyes looked dark with excitement. “Yes, child, there was, but where it was mailed I don’t know. ’Tis directed to me, and is from Kentucky, but I can’t make out the post-mark mor’n the dead. It’s some kind of Forks, but the postmaster will never set the Hudson on fire with his writing.”

“Forks of Elkhorn,” cried Marian, snatching at the letter. “It’s Frederic’s superscription, too, and dated ever so many days ago. Dear Frederic, he didn’t wait a minute before he wrote,” and she pressed to her lips the handwriting of Isabel Huntington!

The envelope was torn open—the enclosed sheet was withdrawn, but about it there was a strangely familiar look. Was there a film before Marian’s eyes? Was she growing blind, or did she recognize her own letter—the one she had sent to Redstone Hall? It was the same—for it said “Dear Frederic” at the top, and “Marian” at the bottom! And he had returned it to her unanswered—not a word—not a line—nothing but silence, as cold, as hard and as terrible as the feeling settling down on Marian’s heart. But yes—there was one line—only one, and it read—oh, horror, could it be that he would mock her thus—that he would tear out her bleeding heart and trample it beneath his feet, by offering her this cruel insult.

“Isabel Huntington is now the mistress of Redstone Hall.”

This was the drop in the brimming bucket, and if she had suffered death when the great sorrow came upon her once before, she suffered more now a hundred fold. In her ignorance she fancied they were married, for how else could Isabel be mistress there, and she comprehended at once the shame—the disgrace such a proceeding would bring to Frederic, and the wrong, the dishonor, the insult it brought to her. There was a look of anguish in her eye and a painful contraction of the muscles about her mouth. There were purple spots upon her flesh, which seemed wasting away while she sat there, and a note of agony, rarely heard by human ear, was in her voice, as she cried, “No, no, no—it is too soon—too soon—anything but that,” and the little Marian who, half an hour before, had heard the ticking of the clock and listened to the rain, lay in the arms of Mrs. Burt, a white, motionless thing, unconscious of pain, unconscious of everything. She had suffered all she could suffer, and henceforth no sorrow which could come to her would eat into her heart’s core as this last one had done.

Mrs. Burt thought she was dead, as did those who came at her loud call, but the old physician said there was life, adding, as he looked at the blue pinched lips and shrunken face: “The more’s the pity, for she has had some awful blow, and if she lives she’ll probably be a raving maniac.”

Poor Marian! As time passed on the physician’s words seemed likely to be verified. For days she lay in the same deathlike stupor, and when at last she roused from it, ’twas only to tear her hair and rave in wild delirium. At first, Mrs. Burt, who had examined the letter, thought of writing to Frederic and telling him the result of his cruel message, the truth of which she did not believe; but she seldom acted without advice, so she wrote first to Ben, who came quickly, crying like a very child, and wringing his great rough hands when he saw the swaying, tossing form upon the bed and knew that it was Marian.

“No, mother,” he said, “we won’t write. It’s a lie the villain told her, but we will let him be till she’s dead. God will find him fast enough, the rascal!” and Ben struck his fist upon the bureau as if he would like to take the management of Frederic into his own hands.

It was a long and terrible sickness which came to Marian, and when the delirium was on, the very elements of her nature seemed changed. For her hair she conceived an intense loathing; and clutching at her long tresses, she would tear them from her head and shake them from her fingers, whispering scornfully:

“Go, you vile red things! He hates you, and so do I.”

“Better shave the hull concern and not let her yank it out like that,” said Ben; and when she became more and more ungovernable, he passed his arms around her and held fast her little hands, while her head was shorn of the locks once so displeasing to Frederic Raymond.

Ben’s taste, however, was different, and putting them reverently together, he dropped great tears upon them, and then laid them carefully away, thinking: “’Twill be something to look at when she’s gone. Poor little picked bird,” he would say as he watched by her side and listened to her moaning cries for home, “you’ll be out of your misery afore long, and go to a’nough sight better hum than Red stun Hall; but I hev my doubts ’bout meetin’ him there. Poor little girl if you hadn’t been born a lady and I hadn’t been born a fool, and we’d been brung up together, mabby you wouldn’t be a lyin’ here a biting your tongue and wringin’ your hands, with your head shaved slick and clean,” and the sweat dropped from Ben’s face, as he thought of what under widely different circumstances might have been. “But it can’t be now,” he said, “for even if she wan’t jined to this villain she loves so much, she’s as far above Ben Burt as the stars in Heaven.”

This, however, did not lessen Ben’s attentions in the least, or stay his tears when he thought that she would die. “She should be buried in Greenwood,” he said; “he’d got more’n two hundred dollars in the bank at Ware, all arnt honest, with hard work; and if there was such a thing as a stun forty feet high she should have it, and he’d get som o’ them that scribbled for a living to write a piece; there should be a big funeral, too—he could hire carriages as well as the best of ’em—and he’d have a procession so long that folks would stop and stare, and Frederic Raymond wouldn’t be ashamed on’t either, the scalliwag—he hoped when he and Isabel came to die they’d be pitched into the canal where the water was considerable kind o’ dirty, too!”

This long speech relieved Ben somewhat, and fully determined to carry out his promise, he staid patiently by Marian, nor experienced one feeling of regret when he heard that, owing to his prolonged absence, his place in Ware had been given to another.

“Nobody cares,” he said, “I can find something to do if it’s nothin’ but sawin’ wood.”

So he remained at home through all the winter days, and watched by the sick girl, who talked piteously of her home, of Alice, and that man who hated her so. She never spoke his name, but she sometimes begged of him to come and take her away where it didn’t thunder all the time. The roar of the city disturbed her, and she frequently besought Ben to go and stop it so that she could sleep and be better in the morning; and Ben, had it been in his power, would have stayed the busy life around them, and let the weary, worn-out sufferer sleep. But this could not be, and so, day after day the heavy, incessant roar came through the curtained window into the darkened room, where Marian lay moaning in her pain. Once in her unconsciousness she folded meekly her thin hands and prayed, “Will God stop that noise and let me sleep just once?” then with an expression of childish trust upon her face, she said to those around her, “He will stop it to-morrow, I reckon.”

And when the winter snows all were fallen, and the early March sun shone upon the kitchen walls, the to-morrow so much longed for came, and Marian woke at last to consciousness. She was out of danger, the physician said, though it might be long ere her health was fully restored. To Marian, this announcement brought but little joy. “She had hoped to die,” she said, “and thus be out of the way,” and then she spoke of Redstone Hall, asking if any tidings had come from there since the dreadful message she had received. There was none, for Isabel Huntington guarded her secret well, and Frederic Raymond knew nothing of the white, emaciated wreck which prayed each day that he might be happy with the companion he had chosen.

“If he had only waited,” she said to Mrs. Burt and Ben, one day when she was able to be bolstered up in bed, “if he had waited and not taken her so soon, I shouldn’t care so much, but it’s awful to think of his living with her after I wrote that letter.”

“Marian,” said Ben, a little impatiently, “I’m naturally a fool, so every body says, but I’ve sense enough to know that Mr. Raymond never went and married that woman so quick after you came away; ’taint reasonable at all. Why, they’d mob him—tar and feather him—for you ain’t dead, and he’s no business with two wives.”

Marian’s, face was whiter than ever when Ben finished speaking, and a bright red spot burned on her cheek as she gasped, “You didn’t,—you can’t believe she’s there and not his wife. That would be worse than everything else.”

“Of course I don’t,” returned Ben. “My ’pinion is that she ain’t there at all, and he only writ that to make a clean finish of you, or ’tany rate, so’t you wouldn’t be coming back to bother him. He calkerlates to have her bimeby. I presume—say in seven years.”

“Oh, I wish I knew,” said Marian, and Ben replied, “Would you rest any easier nights if you did?”

“Yes, a heap,” was the answer, and the great, blue eyes looked wistfully at Ben, as if anxious that he should clear up the mystery.

“You might write,” suggested Mrs. Burt; but Marian shook her head, saying, “I wrote once, and you know my success.”

“You certainly wouldn’t go back,” continued Mrs. Burt; and Marian answered indignantly, “Never! I am sure he hates me now, and I shall not trouble him again. Perhaps he thinks me mean because I read the letter intended for him, and so found it all out. But I thought it was mine until I read a ways, and then I could not stop. My eyes wouldn’t leave the paper. Was it wrong in me, do you think?”

“It is what anybody would have done,” answered Mrs. Burt, and, changing the subject entirely, Marian rejoined, “Oh, I do wish I knew about this Isabel.”

For a time Ben sat thinking; then striking his hands together, he exclaimed, “I’ve got it, and it’s jest the thing, too. I don’t want no better fun than that. I’ve lost my place to Ware, and though I might get another, I’ve a notion to turn peddler. I allus thought I should like travellin’ and seein’ the world. I’ll buy up a lot of jimcracks and take a bee line for Redstun Hall, and learn just how the matter stands. I can put on a little more of the Down East Yankee, if you think I hain’t got enough, and I’ll pull the wool over their eyes. What do you say, wee one?”

“Oh, I wish you would,” said Marian, adding in the same breath, “what will you do, if you find him the husband of Isabel?”

“Do!” he repeated. “String ’em both up by the neck on one string. What do you ’spect I’d do? Honest, though,” he continued, as he saw her look of alarm; “if she is his wife, which ain’t at all likely, ’tis because he s’posed you’re dead, but he knows better now, and I shall tell the neighbors that you’re alive and breathin’, and they can do with him what they choose—and if they ain’t married, nor ain’t nothin’, I’ll just do what you say.”

“Come back, and don’t tell Frederic you ever saw or heard of me,” said Marian. “I shall not live a great while, and even if I do, I’d rather not trouble him. It would only make him hate me worse, and that I couldn’t bear. He knows now where I am, and if he ever wants me, he will come. Don’t tell him, nor any one, a word of me, Ben, but do go, for I long to hear from home.”

To Mrs. Burt this project seemed a wild and foolish one, but she rarely opposed her son, and when she saw that he was determined, she said nothing, but helped him all she could.

“You’ll be wantin’ to send some jimcrack to that, blind gal, I guess,” he said to Marian one day, and she replied, “I wish I could, but I havn’t anything, and besides you mustn’t tell her of me.”

“Don’t you worry,” answered Ben. “I’ve passed my word, and I never broke it yet. I can manage to give her somethin’ and make it seem natural. What do you say to makin’ her a bracelet out o’ them curls of yourn that we shaved off?”

“That red hair! Frederic would know it at once,” and Marian shook her head ruefully, but Ben persisted. “’Twould look real pretty, just like gingerbread when ’twas braided tight,” and bringing out the curls, he selected the longest one, and hurried off.

The result proved his words correct, for when a few days after he brought home the little bracelet, which was fastened with a neat golden clasp, Marian exclaimed with delight at the soft beauty of her hair:

“Darling Alice,” she cried, kissing the tiny ornament, “I wish she could know that my lips have touched it—that it once grew on my head—but it wouldn’t be best. She couldn’t keep the secret, and you mustn’t tell.”

“Don’t worry, I say,” returned Ben. “I’ve got an idee in my brains for a wonder, and I’m jest as ’fraid of tellin’ as you be. So cheer up a bit and grow fat, while I’m gone, for I want you to be well when I come back, so as to go to school and get to be a great scholar, that Mr. Raymond won’t be ashamed on when the right time comes,” and Ben spoke as cheerfully as if within his heart there was no grave where during the weary nights when he watched with Marian he buried his love for her, and vowed to think of her only as a cherished sister.

Marian smiled pleasantly upon him, watching him with interest as he made up his pack, consisting of laces, ribbons, muslin, handkerchiefs, combs and jewelry, a little real, and a good deal brass, “for the niggers,” he said. Many were the charges she gave him concerning the blacks, telling him which ones to notice particularly, so as to report to her.

“Jehoshaphat!” he exclaimed at last, “how many is there? I shall never remember in the world,” and taking out a piece of paper, he wrote upon it, “Dinah, Hetty, Lid, Victory, Uncle Phil, Josh, and the big dog. There!” said he, reading over the list, “if I don’t bring you news of every one, my name ain’t Ben Burt. I’ll wiggle myself inter their good feelin’s and get ’em to talkin’ of you, see if I don’t.”

Marian had the utmost confidence in Ben’s success, and though she knew she should be lonely when he was gone, she was glad when, at last, the morning came for him to leave them. Ben, too, was equally delighted, for the novelty lent a double charm to the project; and, bidding his mother and Marian good-by, he gathered up his large boxes, and whistling a lively tune, by way of keeping up his spirits, started for Kentucky.

CHAPTER XII.
THE YANKEE PEDDLER.

The warm, balmy April day was drawing to a close, and the rays of the setting sun shone like burnished gold on the western windows of Redstone Hall. It was very pleasant there now, for the early spring flowers were all in blossom, the grass was growing fresh and green upon the lawn, and the creeping vines were clinging lovingly to the time-worn pillars, or climbing up the massive walls of dark red stone, which gave the place its name. The old negroes had returned from their labors, and were lounging about their cabins, while the younger portion looked wistfully in at the kitchen door, where Dinah and Hetty were busy in preparing supper. On the back piazza several dogs were lying, and as their quick ears caught the sound of a gate in the distance, the whole pack started up and went tearing down the avenue, followed by the furious yell of Bruno, who tried in vain to escape from his confinement.

“Thar’s somebody comin’,” said Dinah, shading her eyes with her hand, and looking toward the highway; “somebody with somethin’ on his back. You, Josh, go after them dogs, afore they skeer him to death.”

Stuttering out some unintelligible speech, Josh started in the direction the dogs had gone, and soon came up to a tall six-footer, who, with short pantaloons, a swallow-tailed coat, stove-pipe hat, sharp-pointed collar, red necktie, and two huge boxes on his back, presented a rather ludicrous appearance to the boy, and a rather displeasing one to the dogs, who growled angrily, as if they would pounce upon him at once. The club, however, with which he had armed himself kept them at bay, until Josh succeeded in quieting them down.

“Ra-ally, now,” began our friend Ben, who vainly imagined it necessary to put on a little, by way of proving himself a genuine Yankee—“ra-ally, now boot-black, what’s the use of keepin’ sich a ’tarnal lot o’ dogs to worry a decent chap like me.”

It was Josh’s misfortune to stammer much more when at all excited, and to this interrogatory he began, “Caw-caw-caw-cause ma-ma-mars wa-wa-want——”

“Great Heaven!” interrupted the Yankee, setting down his pack and eyeing the stuttering negro as if he had been the last curiosity from Barnum’s—“will you tell a fellow what kind of language you speak.”

“Spe-pe-pe-pects sa-sa-same ye-e-e you do,” returned the negro, failing wholly to enlighten Ben, who rejoined indignantly, “You go to grass with your lingo;” and, gathering up his boxes, he started for the house, accompanied by Josh and the dogs, the first of which made several ineffectual attempts at conversation.

“Some nateral born fool,” muttered Ben, thinking to himself that he would like to examine the boy’s mouth and see what ailed it.

After a few minutes they entered the yard, and came up to the other blacks, who were curiously watching the new comer. Seating himself upon the steps and crossing one leg over the other, Ben swung his cowhide boot forward and back, and greeted them with, “wall, uncles, and ants, and cousins, how do you dew, and how do you find yourselves this afternoon?”

“Jest tolerable, thanky,” answered uncle Phil, and Ben continued, “wall, health is a great blessing to them that hain’t got it. Do you calkerlate that I could stay here to-night? I’ve got lots o’ gewgaws,” pointing to his boxes—“hankerchers, pins, ear-rings and a red and yeller gownd that’ll jest suit you, old gall,” nodding to Dinah, who muttered gruffly, “if he calls me old what’ll he say to Hetty?”

Ben saw he had made a mistake, for black women no more care to be old than their fairer sisters, and he tried to make amends by complimenting the indignant lady until she was somewhat mollified, when he asked again if he could stay all night?

“You, Josh,” said Uncle Phil, “go and tell yer master to come here.”

“Whew-ew,” whistled Ben, “if you’re goin’ to send that stutterin’ critter, I may as well be joggin’, for no human can make out his rigmarole.”

But Ben was mistaken. Josh’s dialect was well understood by Frederic, who came as requested, and, standing in the door, gazed inquisitively at the singular looking object seated upon his steps, and apparently oblivious to everything save the sliver he was trying to extract from his thumb with a large pin, ejaculating occasionally, “gaul darn the pesky thing.”

Nothing, however, escaped the keen grey eyes which from time to time peered out from beneath the stove-pipe hat. Already Ben had seen that Redstone Hall was a most beautiful spot, and he did not blame Frederic for disliking to give it up. He had selected Dinah and Phil from the other blacks, and had said that the baby, who, with a small white dog, was disputing its right to a piece of fat bacon and a chicken bone, was Victoria Eugenia. Josh he identified by his name, and he was wondering at Marian’s taste in caring to hear from him, when Frederic appeared, and all else was forgotten in his eagerness to inspect the man “who could make a gal bite her tongue in two and yank her hair out by the roots, all for the love of him.”

Frederic seemed in no hurry to commence a conversation, and during the minute that he stood there without speaking, Ben had ample time to take him in from his brown hair and graceful mustache down to his polished boots.

“Got up in considerable kind of good style,” was Ben’s mental comment, as he watched the young man carelessly scraping his finger nail with a pen-knife.

“Did you wish to see me?” Frederic said at last, and with another thrust at the sliver, Ben stuck his pin upon his coat sleeve, and reversing the position of his legs, replied, “wall, if you’re the boss, I guess I dew; I’m Ben Butterworth from down East, and I’ve got belated, and bein’ there ain’t no taverns near I want to stay all night, and pay in money or notions. Got a lot on ’em, besides some tip-top muslin collars for your wife, Mrs., what do you call her?” and the gray eyes glistened themselves upon the face, which for a single instant was white as marble—then the hot blood came rushing back, and Frederic replied, “there is no wife here, sir, but you can stay all night if you please. Will you walk in?” and he led the way to the sitting-room, followed by Ben, who had obtained what to him was the most important information of all.

The night was chilly, and in the grate a cheerful coal fire was burning, casting its ruddy light upon the face of a little girl, who, seated upon a stool, with her hair combed back from her sweet face, her waxen hands folded together and her strange brown eyes fixed upon the coals as if she were looking at something far beyond them, seemed to Ben what he had fancied angels in heaven to be. It was not needful for Mr. Raymond to say, “Alice, here is a peddler come to stay all night,” for Ben knew it was the blind girl, and his heart gave a great throb when he saw her sitting there so beautiful, so helpless, and so lonely, too, for he almost knew that she was thinking of Marian, and he longed to take her in his arms and tell her of the lost one.

Motioning him to a chair, Frederic went out, leaving them together. For some minutes there was perfect silence, while Ben sat looking at her and trying hard to keep from crying. It seemed terrible to him that one so young should be blind, and he wanted to tell her so, but he dared not, and he sat so still that Alice began to think she was alone, and, resuming her former thoughts, whispered softly to herself, “oh, I wish she would come back.”

“Blessed baby,” Ben had almost ejaculated, but he checked himself in time, and said instead, “little gal.”

Alice started, and turning her ear, seemed waiting for him to speak again, which he did soon.

“Little gal, will you come and sit in my lap?”

His voice was gentle and kind, but Alice did not care to be thus free with a stranger, so she replied, “I reckon I won’t do that, but I’ll sit nearer to you,” and she moved her stool so close by him that her head almost rested on his lap.

“You must ’scuse me,” she said, “if I don’t act like other children do—I’m blind.”

Very tenderly he smoothed her silken hair, and as he did so, she felt something drop upon her forehead. It was a tear, and wiping it away, she said:

“Man, be you hungry and tired, or what makes you cry?”

“I’m cryin’ for you, poor, unfortunate lamb;” and the tender-hearted Ben sobbed out aloud.

“Oh, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t,” said the distressed child—“I’m used to it. I don’t mind it now.”

The ice was fairly broken, and a bond of sympathy established between the two.

“He must be a good man,” Alice thought; and when he began to question her of her home and friends, she replied to him readily.

“You haven’t no mother, nor sister, nor a’nt, nor nothin’, but Mr. Raymond and Dinah,” said Ben, after they had talked awhile. “Ain’t there no white women in the house but you?”

“Yes, Mrs. Huntington and Isabel. She’s my governess,” answered Alice; and, conscious of a pang, Ben continued:

“Mr. Raymond sent for ’em, I s’pose?”

“No,” returned Alice. “They came without sending for—came to visit, and he hired them to stay. Mrs. Huntington keeps house.”

At this point in the conversation there was a rustling of garments in the hall, and a splendid, queenly creature swept into the room, bringing with her such an air of superiority that Ben involuntarily hitched nearer to the wall, as if to get out of sight.

“Je-ru-sa-lem! ain’t she a dasher?” was his mental exclamation; and, in spite of himself, he followed her movements with an admiring glance.

Taking a chair, she drew it to the fire, and, without deigning to notice the stranger, she said, rather reprovingly,

“Alice, come here.”

The child obeyed, and Ben, determined not to be ignored entirely, said:

“Pretty well this evenin’, miss?”

“How, sir?” and the black eyes flashed haughtily upon him.

Nothing abashed, he continued: “As’t you if you’re pretty well, but no matter, I know you to be by your looks. I’ve got a lot of finery that I know you want.” And on opening his boxes, he spread out upon the carpet the collars and under-sleeves, which had been bought with a view to this very night. Very disdainfully Isabel turned away, saying she never traded with peddlers.

“I wonder if you don’t,” returned Ben, with imperturbable gravity. “Wall, now, seein’ it’s me, buy somethin’, dew. Here’s a bracelet that can’t be beat,” and he held up to view Marian’s soft hair, which, in the bright firelight, looked singularly beautiful.

Isabel did unbend a little now. There was no sham about that, she knew, and, taking it in her hand, she tried to clasp it on her round, white arm; but it would not come together. It was not made for her!

“It isn’t large enough,” said she; “it must have been intended for some child.”

“Shouldn’t wonder if you’d hit the nail right on the head,” returned Ben, and taking the bracelet he continued, “Mebby ’twas meant for this wee one—who knows?” and he fastened it on Alice’s slender wrist. “Fits to a T,” said he, “and you have it, too. Them clasps is little hearts, do you see?”

Frederic now entered the room, and holding up her arm, Alice said, “Look, is it pretty?”

“Yes, very,” he replied, bending down to examine it, while Ben watched him narrowly, wondering how he would feel if he knew from whose tresses that braid was made.

“Harnsome color, ain’t it, Square?” he said, holding Alice’s hand a little more to the light, and continuing, “Now there’s them that don’t like red hair, but I swan I’ve seen some that wan’t so bad. Now when it curls kinder—wall, like a gimblet, you know. I’ve got a gal to hum I call my sister, and her hair’s as nigh this color as two peas, or it was afore ’twas shaved. She’s been awful sick with the heart disorder, and fever, and I tell you, Square, if you’d o’ seen her pitchin’ and divin’, and rollin’ from one end of the bed to t’other, bitin’ her tongue and yankin’ out her hair by han’fuls, I rather guess you’d felt kinder streaked. It made a calf of me, though I didn’t feel so bad then as when she got weaker, and lay so still that we held a feather to her lips to see if she breathed.”

“Oh, did she die?” asked Alice, who had been an attentive listener.

“No,” answered Ben, “she didn’t, and the thankfullest prayer I ever prayed was the one I made in the buttery, behind the door, when the doctor said she would get well.”

Supper was announced, and putting up his muslins, Ben followed his host to the dining room. Alice, too, was at the table, the bracelet still upon her wrist, for she liked the feeling of it. “And she did so wish it was hers.”

“I shall have to buy it for you, I reckon,” said Frederic, and he inquired its price.

“Wall, now,” returned Ben, “if ’twas any body but the little gal, I should say five dollars, but bein’ it’s hers, I’d kinder like to give it to her.”

This, however, Frederic would not suffer. Alice would not keep it, he said, unless he paid for it, and he put a half eagle into the hand of the child, who offered it to Ben. For a moment, the latter hesitated, then thinking to himself, “Darnt it all, what’s the use. If Marian goes to school, as I mean she shall, she’ll need a lot of money, and what I get out o’ him is clear gain,” he pocketed the piece, and the bracelet belonged to Alice.

After supper, Ben sat down by the fire in the dining room, hoping the family would leave him with Alice, and this they did ere long, Isabel going to the piano, and Frederic to the library to answer letters, while Mrs. Huntington gave some directions for breakfast. These directions were merely nominal, however, for Dinah, to all intents and purposes, was mistress of the household, and she came in to see to the supper dishes, which were soon cleared away, and Ben, as he wished, was alone with Alice. The bracelet seemed to be a connecting link between them, for Alice was not in the least shy of him now, and when he asked her again to sit in his lap, she did so readily.

“That Miss Isabel is a dreadful han’some gal,” he began; “I should s’pose Mr. Raymond would fall in love with her.”

No answer from Alice, whose sightless eyes looked steadily into the fire.

“Mebby he is in love with her.”

No answer yet, and mentally chiding himself for his stupidity in not striking the right vein, Ben continued:

“I wonder he hain’t married afore this. He must be as much as twenty-five or six years old, and so han’ some too!”

“He has been married,” and the little face of the speaker did not move a muscle.

“Now you don’t say it,” returned Ben. “A widower, hey? How long sence he was married?”

“A few months,” and the long eye-lashes quivered in the firelight just a little.

“I want to know—died so soon—poor critter. Tell me about her, dew. You didn’t know her long, so I s’pose you couldn’t love her a great sight?”

The brown eyes flashed up into Ben’s face, and the blood rushed to Alice’s cheek, as she replied “Me not love Marian! Oh, I loved her so much!”

The right chord was touched at last, and in her own way Alice told the sad story—how Marian had left them on her bridal night, and though they searched for her everywhere, both in the river and through the country, no trace of her could be found, and the conviction was forced upon them that she was dead.

“Je-ru-sa-lem! I never thought of that!” was Ben’s involuntary exclamation; but it conveyed no meaning to Alice, and when he asked if they still believed her dead, she answered:

“I don’t quite believe Frederic does. I don’t, any way. I used to, though, but now it seems just like she would come back,” and turning her face more fully toward him, Alice told how she had loved the lost one, and how each day she prayed that she might come home to them again.

“I don’t know as she was pretty,” she said, “but she was so sweet, so good, and I’m so lonesome without her,” and down Alice’s cheeks the big tears rolled, while Ben’s kept company with them and fell upon her hands.

“Man, don’t you cry a heap?” she asked, shaking the round drops off and wondering why a perfect stranger should care so much for Marian.

“I’m so plaguy tender-hearted that I can’t help it,” was Ben’s apology, as he blew his nose vigorously upon his blue cotton handkerchief.

For a time longer he talked with her, treasuring up blessed words of comfort for the distant Marian, and learning also that Alice was sure Frederic would never marry again until certain of Marian’s death. He might like Isabel, she admitted, but he would not dare make her his wife till he knew for true what had become of Marian.

“And he does know it, the scented up puppy,” thought Ben. “He jest writ her that last insultin’ thing to kill her out and out; but he didn’t come it, and till he knows he did, he dassent do nothin’.”

This reasoning was very satisfactory to Ben, who, having learned from Alice all that he could, began to think it was time to cultivate the negroes, and putting the child from his knee, he said “he guessed he’d go out and see the slaves—mebby they’d like to trade a little, and he must be off in the mornin’.”

Accordingly he started for the kitchen, where his character had been pretty thoroughly dissected. A negro from a neighboring plantation had dropped in on a gossiping visit, and as was very natural, the conversation had turned upon the peddler, whose peculiar appearance had attracted much attention at the different places where he had stopped. Particularly was this the case at the house the black man Henry lived.

“He done ask a heap of questions about us colored folks,” said Henry; “how many was there of us, how old was we, and what was we worth, and when marster axed him did he want to buy,” he said “no, but way off whar he lived he allus spoke in meetin’, and them folks was mighty tickled to hear suffin’ ’bout niggers.’ Ole Miss say how’t she done b’lieve he’s an abolution come to run some on us off, case he look like one o’ them chaps down in the penitentiary.”

“Oh, Lord,” ejaculated Dinah, involuntarily hitching her chair nearer to Victoria Eugenia, who lay in her cradle.

Old Hetty, too, took alarm at once, and glancing nervously at her own grandchild Dudley, a little boy two years of age, who was stretched upon the floor, “she hoped to goodness he wouldn’t carry off Dud.”

“Jest the ones he’ll pick for. He could hide a dozen on ’em in them big boxes,” said Henry, and feeling pleased at the interest he had awakened in the two old ladies he proceeded to relate the stories he had heard “’bout them fetch-ed Yankees meddlin’ with what didn’t consarn ’em,” and he advised Dinah and Hetty both not to let the peddler get sight of the children for fear of what might happen.

At this point Ben came out of the house with his huge boxes. He was first discovered by Josh, who, delighted with the fun, pointed mysteriously toward him and stuttered, “Da-da-da ’e co-co-comes.”

“The Lord help us,” said Dinah and quick as thought she seized the sleeping Victoria Eugenia and thrust her into the churn as the nearest place of concealment.

The awakened baby gave a screech but Dinah stopped its mouth with a piece of the licorice she always carried in her pocket with her tobacco box and pipe. Meantime Hetty, determined not to be outdone, caught up Dud, and, opening the meal chest, tumbled him in, telling him in fierce whispers “not to stir nor wink, for thar was a man comin’ to cotch him.”

Snatching a newspaper which lay on the floor, she rolled it together and placed it under the lid, so as to allow the youngster a breathing place. This done, she resumed her seat just as Ben appeared, who, throwing down his pack, accosted her with—

“Wall, a’nt, got your chores done? ’Cause if you have I want to trade a little. I won’t be hard on you,” he continued, as he saw the forbidding expression of her face. “I’ll dicker cheap and take most any kind o’ dud for pay.”

Dicker and chores were Greek to old Hetty, but she fully comprehended the word Dud. He meant her DUD—the one in the meal chest—and she grasped the handle of the frying pan, so as to be ready for what might follow next.

“Let me show you some breastpins,” said Ben, looking round for a chair.

They were all occupied, and as the mischievous Josh pointed to the chest, Ben crossed over, and ere Hetty was aware of his intention, seated himself quite as a matter of course. But not long, for Hetty’s dusky fist flourished in the air, and, more than all, the smothered cry of “Granny, granny, he done sot on me,” which came from beneath him, landed him on the other side of the room, where he struck against the churn; whereupon, Victoria Eugenia set up another yell, which sent him back to the spot where Josh’s cowhides were performing various evolutions by way of showing his delight.

“Thunder!” ejaculated Ben, looking first at the skirts of his swallow-tail, then at the chest, from which Dud was emerging, covered with meal, and then at the churn, over the top of which a pair of little black hands and a piece of licorice were visible, “what’s the meaning of all this?”

No explanation whatever was vouchsafed, and, to this day, Ben does not know the reason why those negroes were stowed away in such novel hiding places.

When the excitement had somewhat subsided, Ben returned to his first intention, behaving so civilly that the fears of the negroes gave way, and Dinah was so well pleased with purchasing a brass pin at half price that Ben ventured, at last to say:

“That little gal, Alice, has been tellin’ me about Mr. Raymond’s marriage. Unlucky, wasn’t he? Shouldn’t wonder though, if he had a kind of hankerin’ after that black-eyed miss. She’s han’some as a picter.”

Dinah needed but this to loosen her tongue. She had long before made up her mind that “Isabel was no kind o’ ’count;” and once the two had come to open hostilities, Isabel accusing Dinah of being a “lazy, gossiping nigger,” while Dinah, in return, had told her “she warn’t no better ’n she should be stickin’ ’round after Mars. Frederic, when nobody knew whether Miss Marian was dead, or not.”

This indignity was reported to Frederic, who reproved old Dinah, sharply; whereupon, she turned toward him, and, to use her favorite expression, “gin him a piece of her mind.”

After this it was generally understood that between Dinah and Isabel here existed no very amicable state of feeling, and when Ben spoke of the latter, the former exploded at once.

“’Twas a burnin’ shame,” she said, “and it mortified her een-a-most to death to see the trollop a tryin’ to set to marster, when nobody know’d for sartin if his fust wife was dead.”

“Marster’s jest as fast as she,” interposed Hetty, who seldom agreed with Dinah.

A contemptuous sneer curled Dinah’s lip as she said to Ben, in a whisper:

“Don’t b’lieve none o’ her trash. Them Higginses allus would lie. I hain’t never seen Marster Frederic do a single thing out o’ the way, ’cept to look at her, jest as Phil used to look at me when he was sparkin’. I don’t think that was very ’spectable in him, to be sure, but looks don’t signify. He dassen’t marry her till he knows for sartin t’other one is dead. He done told Alice so, and she told me;” and then Dinah launched out into praises of the lost Marian, exalting her so highly that Ben tossed into her lap a pair of ear-rings which she had greatly admired.

“Take them,” said he, “for standin’ up for that poor runaway. I like to hear one woman stick to another.”

Dinah cast an exulting glance at Hetty, who, nothing daunted, came forward and said:

“Miss Marian was as likely a gal as thar was in Kentuck, and she, for one, should be as glad to see her back as some o’ them that made sich a fuss about it.”

“Playin’ ’possum,” whispered Dinah. “Them Higginses is up to that.”

Ben probably thought so too, for he paid no attention to Hetty, who, highly indignant started for Isabel, and told her “how Dinah and that fetch-ed peddler done spilt her character entirely.”

“Leave the room,” was Isabel’s haughty answer. “I am above what a poor negro and an ignorant Yankee can say.”

“For the dear Lord’s sake,” muttered the discomfited Hetty; “wonder if she ain’t a Yankee her own self. ’Spects how she done forgot whar she was raised,” and Hetty returned to the kitchen a warmer adherent of Marian than Dinah had ever been.

She, too, was very talkative now, and before nine o’clock Ben had learned all that he expected to learn, and much more. He had ascertained that no one had the slightest suspicion of the reason why Marian went away; that both Frederic and Isabel seemed unhappy; that Dinah and Hetty, too, believed “thar was somethin’ warin’ on thar minds;” that Frederic was discontented, and talked seriously of leaving Redstone Hall in care of an overseer, and moving, in the Autumn to his residence on the Hudson; that Hetty hoped he would, and Dinah hoped he wouldn’t, “’case if he did, it would be next to impossible to get a stroke o’ work out o’ them lazy Higginses.”

“I’ve got all I come for, I b’lieve,” was Ben’s mental comment, as he left the kitchen and returned to the dining room, where he found Frederic alone. “I’ll poke his ribs a little,” he thought, and helping himself to a chair, he began:

“Wall, Square, I’ve been out seein’ your niggers. Got a fine lot on ’em, and I shouldn’t wonder if you was wo’th considerable. Willed to you by your dad, or was it a kind of a dowry come by your wife? You’re a widower, they say;” and the gray eyes looked out at their corners, as Ben thought, “That’ll make him squirm, I guess.”

Frederic turned very white, but his voice was natural as he replied:

“My father was called the richest man in the county, and I was his only child.”

“Ah, yes, come to you that way,” answered Ben, continuing after a moment. “There’s a big house up on the Hudson—to Yonkers—that’s been shet up and rented at odd spells for a good while, and somebody told me it belonged to a Colonel Raymond, who lived South. Mabby that’s yourn?”

“It is,” returned Frederic, “and I expect now to go there in the Fall.”

“I want to know. I shouldn’t s’pose you could be hired to leave this place.”

“I couldn’t be hired to stay. There are too many sad memories connected with it,” was Frederic’s answer, and he paced the floor hurriedly, while Ben continued: “Mabby you’ll be takin’ a new wife there?”

Frederic’s cheek flushed as he replied:

“If I ever marry again, it will not be in years. Would you like to go to bed, sir?”

Ben took the hint and replying, “I don’t care if I dew,” followed the negro, who came at Frederic’s call, up to his room, a pleasant, comfortable chamber, overlooking the river and the surrounding country.

“Golly, this is grand!” said Ben, examining the different articles of furniture, as if he had never seen anything like it before.

The negro, who was Lyd’s husband, made no reply, but, hurrying down stairs to his mother-in-law, he told her, “Thar was somethin’ mighty queer about that man, and if they all found themselves alive in the mornin,’ he should be thankful.”

Unmindful of breast-pin and ear-rings, Dinah became again alarmed, and, bidding Joe see that Victoria Eugenia was safe, she gathered up the forks and spoons, and rolling them in a towel, tucked them inside her straw tick, saying: “I reckon it’ll make him sweat some to hist me and Phil on to the floor;” which was quite probable, considering that the united weight of the worthy couple was somewhat over three hundred!

The morning dawned at last, and, with her fears abated, Dinah washed the silver, made the coffee, broiled the steak and fried the corn meal batter-cakes, which last were at first respectfully declined by Ben, who admitted that they “might be fust-rate, but he didn’t b’lieve they’d set well on his stomach.”

Hetty, who was waiting upon the table, quickly divined the reason, and whispered to him: “Lord bless you, take some; I done sifted the meal!”

This argument was conclusive, and helping himself to the light, steaming cakes, Ben thought, “I may as well eat ’em, for ’taint no wus, nor as bad as them Irish gals does to hum, only I happened to see it!”

Breakfast being over, he offered to settle his bill, which he found was nothing.

“Now, ra-ally, Square,” he said, as Frederic refused to take pay, “I allus hearn that Kentuckians was mighty free-hearted, but I didn’t ’spect you to give me my livin’. I’m much obleeged to you, though, and I shall have more left to eddicate that little sister I was tellin’ you ’bout. I mean to give her tip-top larnin’, and mebby sometime she’ll come here to teach this wee one,” and he laid his hand on Alice’s hair.

The little girl smiled up in his face, and said, “Come again and peddle here, won’t you?”

“Wouldn’t wonder if I turned up amongst you some day,” was his answer; and bidding the family goodbye, he went out into Bruno’s kennel, for until this minute he had forgotten that the dog was to be remembered.

“Keep away from dar,” called out Uncle Phil, while Bruno growled savagely and bounded against the bars as if anxious to pounce upon the intruder.

“I’ve seen enough of him,” thought Ben, and shaking hands with Uncle Phil, he walked rapidly down the avenue and out into the highway.

Marian, he knew, was anxious to hear of his success, and not willing to keep her waiting longer than was necessary, he determined to return at once. Accordingly, while the unsuspecting inmates of Redstone Hall were discussing his late visit and singular appearance, he was on his way to the depot, where he took the first train for Frankfort, and was soon sailing down the Kentucky toward home.

CHAPTER XIII.
PLANS.

Marian was sitting by the window of her little room, looking out into the busy street below, and thinking how differently New York seemed to her now from what it did that dreary day when she wandered down Broadway, and wished that she could die. She was getting accustomed to the city roar, and the sounds which annoyed her so much at first did not trouble her as they once had done. Still there was the same old pain at her heart—a restless, longing desire to hear from home, and know if what she feared were true. She had counted the days of Ben’s absence, and she knew it was almost time for his return. She did not expect him to-day, however, and she paid no attention to the heavy footstep upon the stairs, neither did she hear the creaking of the door; but when Mrs. Burt exclaimed, “Benjamin Franklin! where did you come from?” she started, and in an instant held both his hands in hers.

Wistfully, eagerly she looked up into his face, longing, yet dreading, to ask the important question.

“Have you been there?” she managed to say at last; and Ben replied, “Yes, chicken, I have, I’ve been to Redstun Hall, and seen the hull tribe on ’em. That Josh is a case. Couldn’t understand him no more than if he spoke a furrin tongue.”

“But Frederic—did you see him, and is he—oh, Ben, do tell me—what you know I want to hear?” and Marian trembled with excitement.

“Wall, I will,” answered Ben, dropping into a chair, and coming to the point at once. “Frederic ain’t married to Isabel, nor ain’t a goin’ to be, either.”

“What made him write me that lie?” was Marian’s next question, asked so mournfully that Ben replied:

“A body’d s’pose you was sorry it warn’t the truth he writ.”

“I am glad it is not true,” returned Marian, “but it hurts me so to lose confidence in one I love. How does Frederic look?”

“White as a sheet and poor as a crow,” said Ben. “It’s a wearin’ on him, depend on’t. But she—I tell you she’s a dasher, with the blackest eyes and hair I ever seen.”

“Who?” fairly screamed Marian. “Who? Not Isabel? Oh, Ben, is Isabel there?” And Marian grew as white as Ben had described Frederic to be.

“Yes she is,” returned Ben. “She’s pretendin’ to teach that blind gal, but Frederic ain’t makin’ love to her—no such thing. So don’t go to faintin’ away, and I’ll begin at the beginning and tell you the hull story.”

Thus re-assured, Marian composed herself and listened, while Ben narrated every particular of his recent visit to Redstone Hall.

“I stopped at some of the houses in the neighborhood,” said he, “but I never as’t a question about the Raymonds, for fear of bein’ mistrusted. Come to think on’t, though, I did inquire the road, and they sent me through corn fields, and hemp fields, and mercy knows what; such a way as they have livin’ in the lots? But I kinder like it. Seems like a story, them big houses way off among the trees, with the whitewashed cabins round ’em lookin’ for all the world like a camp-meetin’ in the woods——”

“Yes, yes,” interrupted Marian; “but Frederic—won’t you ever reach him?”

“Not till I tell you about the dogs, and that jaw breakin’ chap they call Josh, with his cow hides, big as a scow-boat, I’ll bet,” was Ben’s answer; and finding it useless to hurry him, Marian summoned all her patience and waited while he waded through his introduction to the blacks, his attempt to be more of a Yankee than he really was, his sliver in his thumb, and, finally his addressing Frederic as Square and inquiring for his wife!

Marian was all attention now, and held her breath, lest she should lose a single word. When he came to Isabel, and described her glowing, sparkling beauty, she trembled in every joint, and felt as if she were turning to stone; but when he spoke of Alice, and the sweet, loving words she had said of the lost one, the cold, hard feeling passed away, and, covering her face with her hands, she wept aloud. Everything which Ben had seen or heard he told, omitting not a single point, but lengthening out his story with surmises and suspicions of his own.

“Alice and Dinah both,” said he, “told me Frederic wouldn’t marry till they knew for certain you was dead, and as he does know for certain, you can calkerlate on that Isabel’s bein’ an old maid for all of him.”

“I never supposed they’d think me drowned when I dropped my glove and handkerchief,” said Marian. “Did they inquire at the depot.”

“Yes—so Alice said,” returned Ben, “and nobody knew’ nothin’ of you; so it was nateral they should think you drownded: but, no matter, it makes it more like a novel, and now I’ll tell you jest what ’tis, wee one, I don’t mean no offense, and you must take it all in good part. You are a great deal better than Isabel, I know; but, as fur as looks and manners is concerned, you can’t hold a candle to her, and a body knowin’ nothing about either would naterally say she was most befittin’ Redstun Hall; but, tell ’em to wait a spell. You hain’t got your growth yet, and you are gettin’ better-lookin’ every day. That sickness made a wonderful change in you, and shavin’ your hair was jest the thing. It’s comin’ out darker, as it always does, and in less than a year I’ll bet my hat on its bein’ a beautiful auburn. You must chirk up and grow fat, for I’m goin’ to send you to school, and have you take lessons on the pianner, and learn French and everything, so that by the time you’re twenty you’ll be the best educated and han’somest gal in the city, and then when the right time comes, if Providence don’t contrive to fetch you two together, Ben Burt will. I shall keep my eye on him, and if he’s gettin’ too thick with Isabel, I’ll drop a sly hint in his ear. They’re goin’ to move up on to the Hudson to the old place—did I tell you?—and mebby you’ll run afoul of him in the street some day.”

“Oh, I hope not—at least, not yet—not till the time you speak of,” said Marian, who had listened eagerly to Ben’s suggestion, and already felt that there was hope for her in the future. She would study so hard, she thought, and learn so fast, and if she only could be thought handsome, or even decent-looking, she would be satisfied, but that was impossible, she feared.

She did not know that, as Ben had said, the severe illness through which she had passed had laid the foundation for a softer, more refined style of beauty than she would otherwise have reached. Her entire constitution seemed to have undergone a change, and now, with hope to buoy her up, she grew stronger, healthier, and, as a natural consequence, handsomer each day. She could not erase from her memory the insult Frederic had offered her, by writing what she believed he did, but her affection for him was strong enough to overlook even that, and she was willing to wait and labor years if at the end of that time she could hope to win his love.

Whatever Ben undertook he was sure to accomplish in the shortest possible time, and before starting upon another peddling excursion, the name of “Marian Grey” was enrolled, among the list of pupils who attended Madam Harcourt’s school. At first she was subject to many annoyances, for, as was quite natural, her companions inquired concerning her standing, and when they learned that her aunt was a sewing woman, and that the queer, awkward fellow who came with her the first day was her cousin and a peddler, they treated her slightingly, and laughed at her plain dress. But Marian did not care. One thought—one feeling alone actuated her; to make herself something of which Frederic Raymond should not be ashamed was her aim, and for this she studied early and late, winning golden laurels in the opinion of her teachers, and coming ere long to be respected and loved by her companions, who little suspected that she was the heiress of untold wealth.

Thus the Summer and a part of the Autumn passed away, and when the semi-annual examination came, Marian Grey stood first in all her classes, acquitting herself so creditably and receiving so much praise, that Ben, who chanced to be present, was perfectly overjoyed, and evinced his pleasure by shedding tears, his usual way of expressing feeling.

From this time forward Marian’s progress was rapid, until even she herself wondered how it were possible for her to learn so fast when she had formerly cared so little for books. Hope, and a joyful anticipation of what would possibly be hers in the future, kept her up and helped her to endure the mental labors which might otherwise have overtaxed her strength. Gradually, too, the old soreness at her heart wore away, and she recovered in a measure her former light-heartedness, until at last her merry laugh was often heard ringing out loud and clear just as it used to do at home in days gone by. Very anxiously Ben watched her, and when on his return from his excursions he found her, as he always did, improved in looks and spirits, he rubbed his hands together and whispered to himself, “She’ll set up for a beauty, yet, and no mistake. That hair of hern is growin’ a splendid color.”

He did not always express these thoughts to Marian, but the little mirror which hung on the wall in her room sometimes whispered to her that the face reflected there was not the same which had looked at her so mournfully on that memorable night when she had left her pillow to see what her points of ugliness were! The one which she had thought the crowning defect of all had certainly disappeared. Her red curls were gone, and in their places was growing a mass of soft wavy hair, which reminded her of the auburn tress she had so much admired and prized, because it was her mother’s. She had no means of knowing how nearly they were alike, for the ringlet was far away, but by comparing her present short curls with those which had been shorn from her head, she saw there was a difference, and she felt a pardonable pride in brushing and cultivating her young hair, which well repaid her labor, growing very rapidly and curling about her forehead in small, round rings, which were far from unbecoming.

Toward the last of November, Ben, who found his peddling profitable, took a trip through Western New York, and did not return until February, when, somewhat to his mother’s annoyance, he brought a sick stranger with him. He had taken the cars at Albany, where he met with the stranger, who offered him a part of his seat and made himself so generally agreeable that Ben’s susceptible heart warmed toward him at once, and when at last, as they drew near New York, the man showed signs of being seriously ill, Ben’s sympathy was roused, and learning that he had no friends in the city, he urged him so strongly to accompany him home for the night, at least, that his invitation was accepted, and the more readily, perhaps, as the stranger’s pocket had been picked in Albany, and he had nothing left except his ticket to New York. This reason was not very satisfactory to Mrs. Burt, who from the first had disliked their visitor’s appearance. He was a powerfully built young man, with black bushy hair, and restless, rolling eyes, which seemed ever on the alert to discover something not intended for them to see. His face wore a hard, dissipated look; and when Mrs. Burt saw how soon after seating himself before the warm fire, he fell asleep, she rightly conjectured that a fit of drunkenness had been the cause of his illness. Still, he was their guest, and she would not treat him uncivilly, so she bade her son to take him to his room, where he lay in the same deep, stupid sleep, breathing so loudly that he could be plainly heard in the adjoining room, where Marian and Ben were talking of the house at Yonkers which was not finished yet, and would not be ready for the family until sometime in May.

Suddenly the loud breathing in the bedroom ceased—the stranger was waking up; but Ben and Marian paid no heed, and talked on as freely as if there were no greedy ears drinking in each word they said—no wild-eyed man leaning on his elbow and putting together, link by link, the chain of mystery until it was as clear to him as noonday. The first sentence which he heard distinctly sobered him at once. It was Marian who spoke, and the words she said were, “I wonder if Isabel Huntington will come with Frederic to Yonkers.”

“Isabel!” the stranger gasped. “What do they know of her?” and sitting up in bed, he listened until he learned what they knew of her, and learned, too, that the young girl whom Ben Burt called his cousin was the runaway bride from Redstone Hall.

Fiercely the black eyes flashed through the darkness, and the fists smote angrily together as the stranger hoarsely whispered:

“The time I’ve waited for has come at last, and the proud lady shall be humbled in the very dust!”

It was Rudolph McVicar who thus threatened evil to Isabel Huntington. He had loved her once, but her scornful refusal of him, even after she was his promised wife, had turned his love to hate, and he had sworn to avenge the wrong should a good chance ever occur. He knew that she was in Kentucky—a teacher at Redstone Hall—and for a time he had expected to hear of her marriage with the heir, but this intelligence did not come, and weary of New Haven, he at last made a trip to New Orleans, determining on his way back to stop for a time in the neighborhood of Redstone Hall, and if possible learn the reason why Isabel had not yet succeeded in securing Frederic Raymond. On the boat in which he took passage on his return were three or four young people from Franklin county, and among them Agnes Gibson and her brother. They were a very merry party, and at once attracted the attention of Rudolph, who, learning that they were from the vicinity of Frankfort, hovered around them, hoping that by some chance he might hear them speak of Isabel. Nor was he disappointed; for one afternoon when they were assembled upon the upper deck, one of their number who lived in Lexington, and who had been absent in California for nearly two years, inquired after Frederic Raymond, whom he had formerly known at school.

“Why,” returned the loquacious Agnes, “did no one write that news to you?” and oblivious entirely of Rudolph McVicar, who at a little distance was listening attentively, she told the story of Frederic’s strange marriage and its sad denouement. Isabel, too, was freely discussed, Miss Agnes saying that Mr. Raymond would undoubtedly marry her, could he know that Marian was dead, but as there were some who entertained doubts upon that point he would hardly dare take any decisive step until uncertainty was made sure.

“When Miss Huntington first came to Redstone Hall,” continued Agnes, “she took no pains whatever to conceal her preference for Mr. Raymond; but latterly a change has come over her, and she hardly appears like the same girl. There seems to be something on her mind, though what it is I have never been able to learn, which is a little strange, considering that she tells me everything.”

Not a word of all this story was lost by McVicar. There was no reason now for his leaving the boat at Louisville. He knew why Isabel was not a bride, and secretly exulting as he thought of her weary restlessness, he kept on his way till he reached Albany, where a debauch of a few days was succeeded by the sickness which had awakened the sympathy of the tender-hearted Ben, and induced the latter to offer him shelter for the night. He was glad of it, now—glad that he had met with Ben, for by that means he had discovered the hiding place of Frederic Raymond’s wife. He did not know of her fortune, but he knew that she was Marian Lindsey; that accidentally, as he supposed, she had stumbled upon Mrs. Burt and Ben, who were keeping her secret from the world, and that was enough for him. That Isabel had something to do with her he was sure, and long after the conversation in the next room had ceased, he lay awake thinking what use he should make of his knowledge, and still not betray those who had befriended him.

Rudolph McVicar was an adept in cunning, and before the morning dawned he had formed a plan by which he hoped to crush the haughty Isabel. Assuming an air of indifference to everything around him, he sauntered out to breakfast, and pretended to eat, while his eyes rested almost constantly on Marian. She was very young, he thought, and far prettier than Agnes Gibson had represented her to be. She was changing in her looks, he said, and two or three years would ripen her into a beautiful woman of whom Frederic Raymond would be proud. Much he wished he knew why she had left Redstone Hall, but as this knowledge was beyond his reach, he contented himself with knowing who she was, and after breakfast was over, he thanked his new acquaintances for their hospitality, and went out into the city, going first to a pawnbroker’s, where he left his watch, receiving in exchange money enough to defray his expenses in the city for several days.

That night, in a private room at the St. Nicholas, he sat alone, bending over a letter, which, when finished, bore a very fair resemblance to an uneducated woman’s handwriting, and which read as follows:

M. Raymond—I now take my pen in hand to inform you that A young Woman, calling herself Marian lindsey has ben staying with me awhile And she said you was her Husband what she came of and left you for I don’t know and I spose its none of my Biznes all I have to do is to tell you that she died wun week ago come Sunday with the canker-rash and she made me Promise to rite and tell you she was ded and that she forgives you all your Sins and hope you wouldn’t wate long before you marred agen it would of done your Hart good to hear her taulk like a Sante as she did. I should of writ soonner only her sicknes hindered me about gettin reddy for a journey ime goin to take my only Brother lives in Scotland and ime goin out to live with him i was most reddy when Marian took sick if she had lived she was coming back to you I bleave and now that shes ded ime going rite of in the —— which sales tomorrough nite else ide ask you to come down and see where she died and all about it. i made her as comfitable as I could and hopin you wouldn’t take it to hard for Deth is the Lot of all i am your most Humble Servant

Sarah Green.

“There,” soliloquized Rudolph, reading over the letter. “That covers the whole ground, and still gives him no clue in case he should come to New York. The —— does sail the very day I have named, and though ‘Sarah Green’ may not be among her passengers, it answers my purpose quite as well. I believe I’ve steered clear of all doubtful points which might lead him to suspect it a forgery. He knows Marian would not attempt to deceive him thus, and he will, undoubtedly, think old Mrs. Green some good soul, who dosed the patient with saffron tea, and then saw her decently interred! He’ll have a nice time hunting up her grave if he should undertake that. But he won’t—he’ll be pleased enough to know that he is free, for by all accounts he didn’t love her much, and in less than six weeks he’ll be engaged to Isabel. But I’ll be on their track. I’ll watch them narrowly, and when the day is set, and the guests are there, one will go unbidden to the marriage feast, and the story that uninvited guest can tell will humble the proud beauty to the dust. He will tell her that this letter was a forgery, and Sarah Green a myth: that Marian Lindsey lives, and Frederic Raymond, if he takes another wife, can be indicted for bigamy; and when he sees her eyes flash fire, and her cheek grow pale with rage and disappointment, Rudolph McVicar will be avenged.”

This, then, was the plan which Rudolph had formed, and, without wavering for an instant in his purpose, he sealed the letter, and directing it to Frederic, sent it on its way, going himself the next morning to New Haven, where he had some money deposited in the bank. This he withdrew, and after a few days started for Lexington, where he intended to remain and watch the proceedings at Redstone Hall, until the denouement of his plot.

CHAPTER XIV.
THE EFFECT.

Not quite one year has passed away since the warm Spring night when Ben Burt first strolled leisurely up the long avenue leading to Redstone Hall. It was April, then, and the early flowers were in bloom, but now the chill March winds are blowing, and the brown stocks of the tall rose-tree brush against the window, from which a single light streams out into the darkness. It is the window of the little library where we have seen Frederic before, and where we meet him once again. He has changed somewhat since we saw him last, and there is upon his face a sad, thoughtful expression, as if far down in his heart there were a haunting memory which would follow him through all time, and embitter every hour.

Little by little, step by step, he had come to hate the wealth which had tempted him to sin—to loathe the beautiful home he once loved so well—and this had prompted him to leave it and go back to the old house on the river, where his early boyhood was passed. There were not so many mournful memories clustering around that spot, he thought, and if he once were there, he might perhaps forget the past, and be happy again. He would open an office in the city, and if possible earn his own living, so as not to spend more of Marian’s fortune than was necessary. He could not tell why he wished to save it. He only knew that he could not bear to use it, and he roused himself at last, determining to do something for himself. This plan of moving to the Hudson was opposed by Isabel, who liked the easy, luxurious life she led at Redstone Hall; but, for once, Frederic would not listen to her, and he had made his arrangements to leave Kentucky in May, at which time his house would be in readiness to receive him. Isabel would go with him, of course—she was necessary to him now, though, faithful to the promise made to little Alice, he had never talked to her of love. And she was glad that he had not; for, with the knowledge she possessed, she would not have dared to listen to his suit, and she often questioned herself as to what the end would be.

One year or more of the dreary seven was gone, but the future looked almost hopeless to her, and she was sometimes tempted to go away and leave the dangerous game at which she was so hazardously playing. Still, when she seriously contemplated such a proceeding, she shrunk from it—for, even though she were never Frederic’s wife, she would rather remain where she was, and see that no other came to dispute the little claim she had. All her assurance was gone, and in her dread lest Frederic should say the words she must not hear, she assumed toward him a half distant, half bashful manner, far more attractive than a bolder course of conduct would have been, and Frederic, while watching her in this new phase of character, struggled manfully against the feeling which sometimes prompted him to break his promise to the blind girl. She was faulty, he knew—far more so than he had once imagined—but she was brilliant, beautiful, accomplished, and he thought that he loved her.

But not of her was he thinking that chill March night when he sat alone in the library watching the flickering of the lamp, and listening to the evening wind, as it shook the bushes beneath his window. It was Marian’s seventeenth birthday, and he was thinking of her, wondering what she would have been had she lived to see this day. She was surely dead, he thought, or some tidings of her would have come to him ere this, and when he remembered how gentle, how pure and self-denying her short life had been, he said involuntarily, “Poor Marian—she deserved a better fate, and should she come back to me again I would prove to her that I am not all unworthy of her love.”

There was a shuffling tread in the hall, and Josh appeared bringing several letters. One bore the Louisville post-mark—one was from New Orleans—one from Lexington, and one from Sarah Green!

“Who writes to me from New York?” was Frederic’s mental query, and tearing open the wrapper he drew nearer to him the lamp and read, while there crept over him a nameless terror as if even while he was thinking of the lost, the grave had opened at his feet and shown him where she lay; not in the moaning river—not in the deep, dark woods, nor on the western prairies, as he had sometimes feared, but far away in the great city, where there was no one to pity—no eye to weep for her save that of the rude woman who had written him the letter.

There Marian had suffered and died for him. His Marian—his young girl-wife! He could call her so now, and he did, saying it softly, reverently, as we speak always of the departed, while the tears he was not ashamed to weep, dropped upon the soiled sheet. He did not think of doubting it. There was no reason why he should, and his heart went out after the dead as it had never gone after the living. It seemed to him so terrible that she should die among strangers, so far from home; and he wondered much how she ever chanced to get there. She had remembered him to the last, “forgiving all his sins,” the woman said, and knowing how much those few words meant, he said again, “Poor Marian,” just as the door opened and Alice came slowly in.

There was a grand party that night at the house of Lawyer Gibson, and at Isabel’s request Alice had come to ask how long before the carriage would be ready. Dinah had told her that Frederic was in the library but he sat so still she thought he was not there, and she said inquiringly, “Frederic?”

“Yes, darling,” was his answer in a tone which startled the sensitive child, for she detected in it a sound of tears, and hurrying to his side she passed her hand over his face to assure herself that she heard aright.

“Has something dreadful happened?” she asked, as she felt the moisture on his eye-lids.

Taking her on his lap, and laying his burning cheek against her cool forehead, Frederic said to her very tenderly and low:

“Alice, poor Marian is dead! Here is the letter which came to tell us,” and he placed it in her hand. There was a sudden upward flashing of the brown eyes, and then their soft light was quenched in tears, as, burying her face in the young man’s bosom, the blind girl sobbed, “Oh, no, no, Frederic, no.”

For several minutes she wept passionately, while her little frame shook with strong emotion. Then lifting up her head and reaching toward the spot where she knew the letter lay, she said:

“Read it to me, Frederic,” and he did read, pausing occasionally as he was interrupted by her low moaning cry.

“Is that all?” she asked, when he had finished. “Didn’t you leave out a word?”

“Not one,” was his reply, and with quivering lips the heart-broken child continued, “Marian sent no message for poor blind Alice to remember—she never thought of me who loved her so much. Why didn’t she, Frederic?” and the sightless eyes looked beseechingly at him as if he could explain the mystery.

Poor child! Rudolph McVicar did not know how strong was the affection between those two young girls, or he would surely have sent a message to one who seemed almost a part of Marian herself, and it was this very omission which finally led the close reasoning child to doubt the truth of the letter. But she did not doubt it now. Marian was really dead to her, and for a longtime she sat with Frederic, saying nothing, but by her silence manifesting to him how great was her grief at this sudden bereavement.

At last remembering her errand, she told him why she had come, and asked what she should say to Isabel.

“Tell her I shall not go,” he said, “but she need not remain at home for that. The carriage can be ready at any time, and Alice will tell her the rest? You’ll do it better than I.”

Alice would rather that some one else should carry to Isabel tidings which she felt intuitively would be received with more pleasure than pain, but if Frederic requested it of her she would do it, and she started to return. To her the night and the day were the same, and ordinarily it mattered not whether there were lamps in the hall or not, but now, as she passed from the library into the adjoining room, there came over her a feeling of such utter loneliness and desolation that she turned back and said to Frederic:

“Will you go with me up the stairs, for now that Marian is dead, the night is darker than it ever was before.”

He appreciated her feelings, and taking her by the hand, led her to the door of Isabel’s room. Very impatiently Isabel had waited for her, wishing to know what hour Frederic intended starting, and if there would be time for Luce, her waiting maid, to curl her long, black hair. Accidentally she had overheard a gentleman say that if she wore curls she would be the most beautiful woman in Kentucky, and as he was to be present at the party she determined to prove his assertion.

“I hope that young one stays well,” she said, angrily, as the moments went by, and at last, as Alice did not come, she bade Luce put the iron in the fire, and commence her operations.

The negress accordingly obeyed the orders, and six long curls were streaming down the lady’s back, while a seventh was wound around the hissing iron in close proximity to her ear, when Alice came in, and hurrying up to her side, began:

“Oh, Miss Huntington, poor, dear Marian wasn’t dead all the time they thought she was. She was in New York, with Mrs. ——”

She did not finish the sentence; for, feeling certain that her treachery was about to be disclosed, the guilty Isabel jumped so suddenly as to bring the hot iron directly across her ear and a portion of her forehead. Maddened with the pain, and a dread of impending disgrace, she struck the innocent girl a blow which sent her reeling across the floor.

“Oh, Lordy!” exclaimed Luce, untwisting the hair so rapidly that a portion of it was torn from the head—“oh, Lordy! Miss Isabel, Alice never tached you;” and, throwing the iron upon the hearth, she hurried to the prostrate child, who had thrown herself upon the lounge and was sobbing so loud and hysterically that Isabel herself was alarmed, and while bathing her blistered ear, tried to stammer out some apology for what she had done.

“I supposed you carelessly ran against me,” she said; “and it hurt me so I didn’t know what I was doing. Pray, don’t cry that way. You’ll raise the house;” and she took hold of Alice’s shoulder.

“I wish she would,” muttered Luce; and, stooping down, she whispered: “Screech louder, so as to fotch Marster Frederic, and tell him jest how she done sarved you!”

But nothing could be further from Alice’s mind than crying for effect. It was not so much the indignity she had suffered, nor yet the pain of the blow which made her weep so bitterly. It was rather the utter sense of desolation, the feeling that her last hope had drifted away with the certainty of Marian’s death, and for a time she wept on passionately; while Isabel, with a hurricane in her bosom, walked the floor, wondering if her perfidy would ever be discovered, and feeling that she cared but little now whether it were, or not. Suspense was terrible, and when the violence of Alice’s sobs had subsided, she said to her:

“Where is Marian, and when is she coming home?”

“Oh, never, never!” answered the child. “She can’t come back, for she’s dead now, Marian is;” and Alice covered her face again with her hands.

“Dead!” exclaimed Isabel, in a far different voice from that in which she had spoken before. “What do you mean?” and passing her arm very caressingly around the little figure lying on the lounge, she continued: “I am sorry I struck you, Alice. I didn’t know what I was doing, and you must forgive me, will you, darling? There, dry your eyes, and tell me all about poor Marian. When did she die, and where?”

As well as she could for her tears, Alice told what she knew, and satisfied that she was in no way implicated, Isabel became still more amiable, even speaking pleasantly to Luce and telling her she might do what she pleased the remainder of the evening.

“Of course I shouldn’t think of attending the party now, even if I were not so dreadfully burned. Poor Frederic! how badly he must feel!”

“He does,” said Alice, “and he cried, too.”

Isabel curled her proud lip contemptuously, and dipping her handkerchief again in the water, she applied it to her blistered ear, thinking to herself that he would probably be easily consoled. It would be proper, too, for her to commence the consoling process at once, by expressing her sympathy; and leaving Alice alone she went to the library where Frederic still was sitting, so absorbed in his own sad reflections that he did not observe her approach until she said, “Alice tells me you have heard from Marian,” then he started suddenly, and turning toward her, answered, “Yes, you can read what is written here if you like,” and he passed her McVicar’s letter.

It did seem to Isabel that there was something familiar about the writing, particularly in the formation of the capitals, but she suspected no fraud, and accepted the whole as coming from Sarah Green.

“This is some new acquaintance Marian picked up,” she thought. “The woman speaks of having known her but a short time. Probably she left Mrs. Daniel Burt and stumbled upon Sarah Green,” and with an exultant smile upon her beautiful face, she put the letter down, and laying her hand very lightly on Frederic’s shoulder, said, “I am sorry for you, Frederic, though it is better, of course, to know just what did become of the poor girl.”

Frederic could not tell why it was that Isabel’s words of sympathy grated harshly on his ear. He only knew that they did, and he was glad when she left him alone, telling him she should not, of course, attend the party, and saying in reply to his question as to what ailed her ear, that Luce, who was curling her hair, carelessly burned it.

“By the way,” she continued, “when I felt the hot iron, I jumped and throwing out my hand accidentally hit Alice on her head, and, if you’ll believe me, the sensitive child thinks I intended it, and has almost cried herself sick.”

This falsehood she deemed necessary, in case the truth of the matter should ever reach Frederic through another channel, and feeling confident that she was safe in every respect, and that the prize she so much coveted was nearly won, she left him and sought her mother’s chamber.

In the kitchen, the news of Marian’s certain death was received with noisy demonstrations—old Dinah and Hetty trying hard to outdo each other, and see which should shed the most and the biggest tears. The woollen aprons of both were brought into constant requisition, while Hetty rang so many changes upon the virtues of the departed that Uncle Phil became disgusted, and said “for his part he’d hearn enough ’bout dead folks. He liked Miss Marian as well as anybody, but he did up his mournin’ them times that he wet hisself to the skin a tryin’ to fish her out of the river. He thought his heart would bust then, though he knew all the time she wasn’t thar, and he told ’em so, too. He knew she’d run away to New York, and he allus s’posed they’d hear she died summers at the South. He wan’t disappointed. He could tell by his feelin’s when anything was gwine to happen, and for more’n a week back he’d had it on his mind that Miss Marian was dead—they couldn’t fool him!” and satisfied that he had impressed his audience with a sense of his foreknowledge, Uncle Phil pulled off his boots and started for bed, leaving Dinah and Hetty to discuss the matter at their leisure and speculate upon the probable result.

“I can tell you,” said Dinah, “it won’t be no time at all afore Marster’ll be settin’ to that Isabel, and if he does, I ‘clar for’t I’ll run away, or hire out, see if I don’t. I ain’t a goin’ to be sassed by none of yer low flung truck and hev ’em carryin’ the keys. She may jest go back whar she come from, and I’ll tell her so, too. I’ll gin her a piece of my mind.”

“She is gwine back,” suggested Hetty, who, faithful to the memory of Miss Beatrice, admired Isabel on account of a fancied resemblance between the two. “Don’t you mind how Marster is a gwine to move up to somewhar?”

“That’s nothin’,” returned Dinah. “They’ll come back in the Fall, but I shan’t be here. I’ll hire myself out, and you kin be the head a spell.”

This prospect was not an unpleasant one to Hetty, who looked with a jealous eye upon Dinah’s rather superior position, and as a sure means of attaining the object of her ambition and becoming in turn the favorite, she warmly espoused the cause of Isabel, and waged many a battle of words with Dinah, who took no pains to conceal her dislike. Thus two or three weeks went by, and as nothing occurred to cause Dinah immediate alarm, her fears gradually subsided, until at last she forgot them altogether, while even Marian ceased to be a daily subject of conversation.

To Frederic reality was more endurable than suspense, for he could look the future in the face and think what he would do. He was free to marry Isabel, he believed; but, as was quite natural, he cared less about it now than when there was an obstacle in his way. There was no danger of losing her, he was sure, and he could wait as long as he pleased! Once he thought of going to New York to make some inquiries, and if possible find Marian’s grave, but when he reflected that Sarah Green was on the ocean, even before her letter reached Kentucky, he decided to defer the matter until their removal to Yonkers, which was to take place about the middle of May. Isabel, too, had her own views upon the subject. There no longer existed a reason why Frederic should not address her, and in her estimation nothing could be more proper than to christen the new home with a bride. So she bent all her energies to the task, smiling her sweetest smile, saying her softest words, and playing the amiable lady to perfection. But it availed her nothing, and she determined at last upon a bolder movement.

Finding Frederic alone in the parlor, one day, she said:

“I suppose it will not affect you materially if mother and I leave when you remove to Yonkers. Agnes Gibson, you know, is soon to be married, and she has invited me to go with her to Florida, where, she says, I can procure a good situation as music-teacher, and mother wishes to go back to New Haven.”

The announcement, and the coolness with which it was made, startled Frederic, and he replied, rather anxiously:

“I have never contemplated a separation. I shall need your mother there more than I do here, for I shall not have Dinah.”

“Perhaps you can persuade her to stay, but I think it best for me to go,” returned Isabel, delighted with her success.

Frederic Raymond did not wish Isabel to leave him, and, after a moment, he said:

“Why must you go, Isabel? Do you wish for a larger salary? Are you tired of us—of me?” And the last words were spoken hesitatingly, as if he doubted the propriety of his saying them.

“Oh, Frederic!” and in the soft, black eyes raised for an instant to his face, and then modestly withdrawn, there was certainly a tear! “Oh, Frederic!” was all she said, and Frederic felt constrained to answer: “What is it, Isabel? Why do you wish to go?”

“I don’t—I don’t,” she answered, passionately; “but respect for myself demands it. People are already talking about my living here with you; and now poor Marian is dead and you are a widower, it will be tenfold worse. I wish they would let us alone, for I have been so happy here and am so much attached to Alice. It will almost break my heart to leave her!”

Isabel Huntington was wondrously beautiful then, and Frederic Raymond was sorely tempted to bid her stay, not as Alice’s governess, nor yet as the daughter of his housekeeper, but as his wife and mistress of his house. Several times he tried to speak, and at last, crossing over to where she sat, he began—“Isabel, I have never heard that people were talking of you; there is no reason why they should, but if they are I can devise a method of stopping it and still keeping you with us. I have never spoken to you of—” love, he was going to say, and the graceful head was already bent to catch the sound, when a little voice chimed in, “Please, Frederic, I am here,” and looking up they saw before them Alice.

She had entered unobserved and was standing just within the door, where she heard what Frederic said. Intuitively she felt what would follow next, and scarcely knowing what she did, she had apprised them of her presence.

“The brat!” was Isabel’s mental comment, while Frederic was sensible of a feeling of relief, as if he had suddenly wakened from a spell, or been saved from some great peril. For several moments Isabel sat, hoping Alice would leave the room, but she did not, and in no very amiable mood the lady was herself constrained to go, by a call from her mother, who wished to see her on some trivial matter.

When she was gone, Alice groped her way to the sofa, and climbing upon it said to Frederic, “Won’t you read me that letter again which Mrs. Green wrote to you?”

He complied with her request, and when he had finished, the child continued, “If Marian had really died, wouldn’t she have sent some message to me, and wouldn’t that woman have told us how she happened to be way off there, and all about it?”

“If Marian really died!” repeated Frederic. “Do you doubt it?”

“Yes,” returned the child, “Marian loved me most as well as she did you, and she surely would have talked of me and sent me some word; then, too, if there much difference between scarlet fever and canker-rash? Don’t some folks call it by both names?”

“I believe they do,” said Frederic, wondering to what all this was tending.

“Marian had the scarlet fever, and I, too, just after I came here,” was Alice’s next remark. “You were at college, but I remember it, and so does Dinah, for I asked her a little while ago. Can folks have it twice?” and the blind eyes looked up at Frederic, as if sure that this last argument at least were proof conclusive of Marian’s existence.

“Sometimes, but not often,” answered Frederic, the shadow of a doubt creeping into his own mind.

“And if they do,” persisted Alice, who had been consulting with Dinah—“if they do, they seldom have it hard enough to die, so Dinah says; and I don’t believe that was a good, true letter. Somebody wrote it, to be wicked. Marian is alive, I almost know.”

“Must you see her dead body, to be convinced?” asked Frederic, a little impatiently; and Alice rejoined:

“No, no; but somehow it don’t seem right for you to—to—oh, Frederic!” and, bursting into tears, she came at once to the root of the whole matter.

She had thought a great deal about the letter, wondering why Marian had failed to speak of her, and at last rejecting it as an impossibility. Suddenly, too, she remembered that once, when she and Marian were sick, she heard some of the neighbors speak of their disease as scarlet fever, while others called it the canker-rash; and all united in saying they could have it but once. This had led to inquiries of Dinah, and had finally resulted in her conviction that Marian might possibly be living. Full of this new idea, she had hastened to Frederic, and accidentally overheard what he was saying to Isabel. She comprehended it, too, and knew that but for her unexpected presence he would, perhaps, have asked the lady to be his wife, and she felt again as if Marian were there urging her to stand once more between Frederic and temptation. All this she told to him, and the proud, haughty man, who would have spurned a like interference from any other source, listened patiently to the pleadings of the childish voice, which said to him so earnestly:

“Don’t let Isabel be your wife!”

“What objection have you to her?” he asked; and when she replied, “She isn’t good,” he questioned her further as to the cause of her dislike—“was there really a reason, or was it mere prejudice?”

“I try to like her,” said Alice, “and sometimes I do real well, but she don’t act alone with me like she does when you are round. She’ll be just as cross as fury, and if you come in, she’ll smooth my hair and call me ‘little pet.’”

“Does she ever strike you?” asked Frederic, feeling a desire to hear Alice’s version of that story.

Instantly tears came in Alice’s eyes, and she replied, “Only once—and she said she didn’t mean that—but, Frederic, she did,” and in her own way Alice told the story, which sounded to Mr. Raymond more like the truth than the one he had heard from Isabel. Gradually the conviction was forcing itself upon him that Isabel was not exactly what she seemed. Still he could not suddenly shake off the chain which bound him, and when Alice said to him in her odd, straightforward way, “Don’t finish what you were saying to Isabel until you’ve been to New York and found if the letter is true,” he answered, “Fie, Alice, you are unreasonable to ask such a thing of me. Marian is dead. I have no doubt of it, and I am free from the promise made to you more than a year since.”

“May be she isn’t,” was Alice’s reply, “and if she is, we shall both feel better, if you go and see. Go, Frederic, do. It won’t take long, and if you find she is really dead, I’ll never speak another naughty word of Isabel, but try to love her just as I want to love your wife. Will you go, Frederic? I heard you say you ought to see the house before we moved, and Yonkers is close to New York, isn’t it?”

This last argument was more convincing than any which Alice had offered, for Frederic had left the entire management of repairs to one whom he knew understood such matters better than himself, consequently he had not been there at all, and he had several times spoken of going up to see that all was right. Particularly would he wish to do this if he took thither a bride in May, and to Alice’s suggestion he replied, “I might, perhaps, do that for the sake of gratifying you.”

“Oh, if you only would!” answered Alice. “You’ll find her somewhere—I know you will—and then you’ll be so glad you went.”

Frederic was not quite so sure of that, but it was safe to go, and while Isabel had been communicating to her mother what he had been saying to her, and asking if it were not almost a proposal, he was deciding to start for New York immediately. Alice’s reasons for doubting the authenticity of the letter seemed more and more plausible the longer he thought of them, and at supper that night he astonished both Mrs. Huntington and daughter by saying that he was going North in a few days, and he wished the former to see that his wardrobe was in a proper condition for traveling. Isabel’s face grew dark as night, and the wrathful expression of her eyes was noticeable even to him. “There is a good deal of temper there,” was his mental comment, while Isabel feigned some trivial excuse and left the room to hide the anger she knew was visible upon her face. He had commenced proposing to her, she was sure, and he should not leave Redstone Hall until he explained himself more fully. Still it would not be proper for her to broach the subject—her mother must do that. It was a parent’s duty to see that her daughter’s feelings were not trifled with, and by dint of cajolery, entreaties and threats, she induced the old lady to have a talk with Frederic, and ask him what his intentions were.

Mrs. Huntington was not very lucid in her remarks, and without exactly knowing what she meant, Frederic replied at random that he was in earnest in all he had said to Isabel about her remaining there, that he did not wish her to go away for she seemed one of the family, and that he would speak with her further upon the subject when he came back. This was not very definite, but Mrs. Huntington brushed it up a little ere repeating it to Isabel, who readily accepted it as an intimation that after his return, he intended asking her directly to be his wife. Accordingly she told Agnes Gibson confidentially what her expectations were, and Agnes told it confidentially to several others, who had each a confidential friend, and so in course of a few days it was generally understood that Redstone Hall was to have another mistress. Agnes in particular was very busy disseminating news, hoping by this means to turn the public gossip from herself and the white-haired man, or rather the plantation in Florida, which she was soon to marry. In spite of her protestations to the contrary people would say that money and not love actuated her choice, and she was glad of anything which would give her a little rest. So she repeated Isabel’s story again and again, charging each and every one never to mention it and consulting between-times with her bosom friend as to what her arrangements were, and suggesting that they be married on the same day and so make the same tour. On the subject of bridal presents Agnes had a kind of mania, and knowing this, some of her friends, who lived at a distance and could not be present at the ceremony, sent theirs in advance—several of them as a matter of course deciding upon the same thing, so that in Agnes’ private drawer there were now deposited three fish knives and forks, all of which were the young lady’s particular aversion. She would dispose of one of them at all hazards, she thought, and receive more than an equivalent in return, so she began to pave the way for a costly bridal present from the future Mrs. Frederic Raymond, by hinting of an elegant fish knife and fork, which in its satin-lined box would look handsomely upon the table, and Isabel, though detesting the article and thinking she should prefer almost anything else, said she was delighted, and when her friend came home from the south, she should invite her to dinner certainly once a week.

This arrangement was generally understood, as were many others of a similar nature, until at last even the bridal dress was selected, and people said it was making in Lexington, where Frederic was well known, and where the story of his supposed engagement circulated rapidly, reaching to the second-rate hotel where Rudolph McVicar was a boarder. Exultingly his wild eyes flashed, and when he heard, as he did, that the wedding was fixed for the 20th of May, which he knew was Isabel’s birthday, he counted the hours which must elapse ere the moment of his triumph came. And while he waited thus, and rumor, with her lying tongue, told each day some fresh falsehood of “that marriage in high life,” Frederic Raymond went on his way, and with each milestone passed, drew nearer and nearer to the lost one—the Marian who would stand between him and Isabel.

CHAPTER XV.
THE HOUSE ON THE RIVER.

“Marian,” said Ben, one pleasant April morning, “Frederic’s house is finished in tip-top style, and if you say so, we’ll go out and take a look. It will do you good to see the old place once more and know just how things are fixed.”

“Oh, I’d like it so much,” returned Marian, “but what if I should fall upon Frederic?”

“No danger,” answered Ben; “the man who has charge of everything told me he wasn’t comin’ till May, and the old woman who is tendin’ to things knows I have seen Mr. Raymond, for I told her so, and she won’t think nothin’; so clap on your clothes in a jiff, for we’ve barely time to reach the cars.”

Marian did not hesitate long ere deciding to go, and in a few moments they were in the street. As they were passing the —— Hotel, Ben suddenly left her, and running up the steps spoke to one of the servants with whom he was acquainted. Returning ere long, he said, by way of apology, “I was in there last night to see Jim, and he told me there was a man took sick with a ravin’ fever, pretty much like you had when you bit your tongue most in two.”

Marian shuddered involuntarily, and without knowing why, felt a deep interest in the stranger, thinking how terrible it was to be sick and alone in a crowded, noisy hotel.

“Is he better?” she asked, and Ben replied, “No, ten times wus—he’ll die most likely. But hurry up—here’s the omnibus we want,” and in the excitement of securing a seat, they both forgot the sick man.

The trip to Yonkers was a pleasant one, for to Marian it seemed like going home, and when, after reaching the station, they entered the lumbering stage and wound slowly up the long, steep hill, she recognized many familiar way marks, and drawing her vail over her face, wept silently as she remembered all she had passed through since the night when Col. Raymond first took her up that same long hill, and told her by the way, of his boy Frederic, who would be delighted with a sister. The fond old man was dead now, and she, the little girl he had loved so much, was a sad lonely woman, going back to visit the spot which had been so handsomely fitted up without a thought of her.

The house itself was greatly changed, but the view it commanded of the river and the scenery beyond was the same, and leaning against a pillar Marian tried to fancy that she was a child again and listening for the bold footsteps of the handsome, teasing boy, once her terror and her pride. But all in vain she listened: the well-remembered foot-fall did not come: the handsome boy was not there, and even had he been, she would scarcely have recognized him in the haughty, elegant young man, her husband. Yes, he was her husband, and she repeated the name to herself, and when at last Ben touched her on the shoulder, saying, “I have told Miss Russell my sister was here, and she says you can go over the house,” she started as if waking from a dream.

“Let us go through the garden first,” she said, as she led the way to the maple tree where summers before he had built her little play-house, and where on the bark, just as high as his head then came, the name of Frederic was cut.

Far below it, and at a point which her red curls had reached, there was another name—her own—and Frederic’s jack-knife had made that, too, while she stood by and said to him, “I wish I was Marian Raymond, instead of Marian Lindsey.”

How distinctly she remembered the characteristic reply:

“If you should happen to be my wife, you would be Marian Raymond; but pshaw, I shall marry a great deal prettier woman than you will ever be, and you may live with us if you want to, and take care of the children. I mean to have a lot!”

She had not thought of this speech in years, but it come back to her vividly now, as did many other things which had occurred there long ago. Within the house everything was changed, but they had no trouble in identifying the different rooms, and she lingered long in the one she felt sure was intended for Frederic himself, sitting in the chair where she knew he would often sit, and wondering if, while sitting there, he would ever think of her. Perhaps he might be afraid of meeting her accidentally in New York, and so he would seldom come there; or, if he did, it would be after dark, or when she was not in the street, and thus she should possibly never see him, as she hoped to do. The thought was a sad one, and never before had the gulf between herself and Frederic seemed so utterly impassible as on that April morning when, in his room and his arm-chair, the girl-wife sat and questioned the dark future of what it had in store for her.

Once she was half tempted to leave some momento—something which would tell him she had been there. She spurned the idea as soon as formed. She would not intrude herself upon him a second time, and rising at last, she arranged the furniture more to her taste, changed the position of a picture, moved the mirror into a perfect angle, set Frederic’s chair before the window looking out, upon the river, and then, standing in the door, fancied that she saw him, with his handsome face turned to the light, and his rich brown hair shading his white brow. At his feet, and not far away was a little stool, and if she could only sit there once, resting her head upon his knee and hear him speaking to her kindly, affectionately, she felt that she would gladly die, and leave to another the caresses she could never hope to receive.

Isabel’s chamber was visited next, and Marian’s would have been less than a woman’s nature could she have looked, without a pang, upon the costly furniture and rare ornaments which had been gathered there. In the disposal of the furniture there was a lack of taste—a decidedly Mrs. Russell air; but Marian had no wish to interfere. There was something sickening in the very atmosphere of her rival’s apartment, and with a long, deep sigh, she turned away. Opening the door of an adjoining chamber, she stood for a moment motionless, while her lips moved nervously, for she knew that this was Alice’s room. It was smaller than the others, and with its neat white furniture, seemed well adapted to the pure, sinless child who was to occupy it. Here too, she tarried long, gazing, through blinded tears, upon the little rocking-chair just fitted to Alice’s form, looping up the soft lace curtains, brushing the dust from the marble mantle, and patting lovingly the snowy pillows, for the sake of the fair head which would rest there some night.

“There are no flowers here,” said she, glancing at the tiny vases on the stand. “Alice is fond of flowers, and though they will be withered ere she comes, she will be sure to find them, and who knows but their faint perfume may remind her of me,” and going out into the garden she gathered some hyacinths and violets which she made into bouquets and placed them in the vases, and bidding the old woman change the water every day, until they began to fade, and then leave them to dry until the blind girl came. “Ben told me of her; he once staid at Redstone Hall all night,” she said, in answer to the woman’s inquiring look. “He says she is a sweet young creature, and I thought flowers might please her.”

“Fresh ones would,” returned Mrs. Russell “but them that’s withered ain’t no use. S’pose I fling ’em away when they get old and put in some new the day she comes?”

“No, no, not for the world, leave them as they are,” and Marian spoke so earnestly that the old lady promised compliance with her request.

“Be you that Yankee peddler’s sister,” she asked, as she followed Marian down the stairs. “If you be, nater cut up a curis caper with one or t’other of you, for you ain’t no more alike than nothin’.”

“I believe I do not resemble him much,” was Marian’s evasive answer, as with a farewell glance at the old place, she bade Mrs. Russell good-by and went with Ben to the gate where the stage was waiting to take them back to the depot.

It was dark when they reached New York, and as they passed the —— Hotel a second time, Marian spoke of the sick man, and wondered how he was.

“I might go in and see,” said Ben, “but it’s so late I guess I won’t, particularly as he’s nothin’ to us.”

“But he’s something to somebody,” returned Marian, and as she followed on after Ben, her thoughts turned continually upon him, wondering if he had a mother—a sister—or a wife, and if they knew how sick he was.

While thus reflecting they reached home, where they found Mrs. Burt entertaining a visitor—a Martha Gibbs, who for some time had been at the —— Hotel, in the capacity of chamber-maid, but who was to leave there the next day. Martha’s parents lived in the same New England village where Mrs. Burt had formerly resided, and the two thus became acquainted, Martha making Mrs. Burt the depository of all her little secrets and receiving in return much motherly advice. She was to be married soon, and though her destination was a log house in the West, and her bridal trousseau consisted merely of three dresses—a silk, a delaine and a calico—it was an affair of great consequence to her, and she had come as usual to talk it over with Mrs. Burt, feeling glad at the absence of Ben and Marian, the latter of whom she supposed was an orphan niece of her friend’s husband. The return of the young people operated as a restraint upon her, and changing the conversation, she spoke at last of a sick man who was up in the third story in one of the rooms of which she had the charge.

“He had the typhoid fever,” she said, “and was raving distracted with his head. They wanted some good experienced person to take care of him, and had asked her to stay, she seemed so handy, but she couldn’t. John wouldn’t put their wedding off, she knew, and she must go, though she did pity the poor young man—he raved and took on so, asking them if anybody had seen Marian, or knew where she was buried!”

Up to this point Marian had listened, because she knew it was the same man of whom Ben had told her in the morning; but now the pulsations of her heart stopped, her head grew dizzy, her brain whirled, and she was conscious of nothing except that Ben made a hurried movement and then passed his arm around her, while he held a cup of water to her lips, sprinkling some upon her face, and saying, in a natural voice, “Don’t you want a drink? My walk made me awful dry.”

It was dark in the room, for the lamp was not yet lighted, and thus Martha did not see the side-play going on. She only knew that Ben was offering Marian some water; but Mrs. Burt understood it, and, when sure that Marian would not faint, she said:

“Where did the young man come from, and what is his name? Do you know?”

“He registered himself as F. Raymond, Franklin County, Kentucky,” returned the girl; “and that’s the bother of it. Nobody knows where to direct a letter to his friends. But how I have staid. I must go this minute,” and greatly to the relief of the family, Martha took her leave.

Scarcely had the door closed after her, when Marian was on her knees, and, with her head in Mrs. Burt’s lap, was begging of her to offer her services as nurse to Frederic Raymond!

“He must not die there alone,” she cried. “Say you will go, or my heart will burst. They know Martha for a trusty girl, and they will take you on her recommendation. Help me, Ben, to persuade her,” she continued, appealing to the young man, who had not yet spoken upon the subject.

He had been thinking of it, however, and as he could see no particular objection, he said, at last:

“May as well go, I guess. It won’t do no hurt, any how, and mebby it’ll be the means of savin’ his life. You can tell Martha how’t you s’pose he’ll pay a good price for nussin’, and she’ll think it’s the money you are after.”

This suggestion was so warmly seconded by Marian, that Mrs. Burt finally consented to seeing Martha, and asking her what she thought of the plan. Accordingly, early the next morning, she sought an interview with the young woman, inquiring, first, how the stranger was, and then, continuing—

“What do you think of my turning nurse awhile and taking care of him? I am used to such folks, and I presume the gentleman is plenty able to pay.”

She had dragged this last in rather bunglingly, but it answered every purpose, for Martha, who knew her thrifty habits, understood at once that money was the inducement, and she replied, “Of course he is. His watch is worth two hundred dollars, to say nothing of a diamond pin. I for one shall be glad to have you come, for I am going away some time to-day, and there’ll be nobody in particular to take care of him. I’ll speak about it right away.”

The result of this speaking was that Mrs. Burt’s offered services were readily accepted, for Martha was known to be an honest, faithful girl, and any one whom she recommended must, of course, be respectable and trusty. By some chance, however, there was a misunderstanding about the name, which was first construed into Burton and then into Merton, and as Martha, who alone could rectify the error, left that afternoon, the few who knew of the sick man and his nurse, spoke of the latter as a “Mrs. Merton, from the country, probably.” So when at night Mrs. Burt appeared and announce herself as ready to assume her duties, she was surprised at hearing herself addressed by her new name, and she was about to correct it when she thought, “It doesn’t matter what I’m called, and perhaps on the whole, I’d rather not be known by my real name. I don’t believe much in goin’ out nussin’ any way, and I guess I’ll let ’em call me what they want to.”

She accordingly made no explanation, but followed the servant girl up three long flights of stairs, and turning down a narrow hall, stood ere long at the door of the sick room.

CHAPTER XVI.
THE FEVER.

Night and day Frederic Raymond had traveled, never allowing himself a minute’s rest, nor even stopping at Yonkers, so intent was he upon reaching New York and finding, if possible, some clue to Marian. It was a hopeless task, for he had no starting point—nothing which could guide him in the least, save the name of Sarah Green, and even that was not in the Directory, while to inquire for her former place of residence, was as preposterous as Marian’s inquiry for Mrs. Daniel Burt! Still, whatever he could do he did, traversing street after street, threading alley after alley, asking again and again of the squalid heads thrust from the dingy windows, if Sarah Green had ever lived in that locality, and receiving always the same impudent stare and short answer, “No.”

Once, in another and worse part of the city, he fancied he had found her, and that she had not sailed for Scotland as she had written, for they had told him that “Sal Green lived, up in the fourth story,” and climbing the crazy stairs, he knocked at the low, dark door, shuddering involuntarily and experiencing a feeling of mortified pride as he thought it possible that Marian—his wife—had toiled up that weary way to die. The door was opened by a blear-eyed, hard-faced woman, who started at sight of the elegant stranger, and to his civil questions replied rather gruffly, “Yes, I’m Sal Green, I s’pose, or Sarah, jest which you choose to call me, but the likes of Marian Lindsey never came near me,” and glancing around the dirty, wretched room, Frederic was glad that it was so. He would rather not find her, or hear tidings of her, than to know that she had lived and died in such a place as this, and with a sickening sensation he was turning away, when the woman, who was blessed with a remarkable memory and never forgot anything to which her attention was particularly directed, said to him, “You say it’s a year last Fall sence she left home.”

“Yes, yes,” he replied eagerly, and she continued, “You say she dressed in black, and wore a great long vail?”

“The same, the same,” he cried, advancing into the room and thrusting a bill into the long hand, “oh, my good woman, have you seen her, and where is she now?”

“The Lord knows, mebby, but I don’t,” answered the woman, who was identical with the one who had so frightened Marian by watching her on that day when she sat in front of Trinity and wished that she could die, “I don’t know as I ever seen her at all,” she continued, “but a year ago last November such a girl as you described, with long curls that looked red in the sunshine, sat on the steps way down by Trinity and cried so hard that I noticed her, and knew she warn’t a beggar by her dress. It was gettin’ dark, and I was goin’ to speak to her when Joe Black came up and asked her what ailed her, or somethin’. He ain’t none of the likeliest,” and a grim smile flitted over the visage of the wrinkled hag.

“Oh, Heaven,” cried Frederic, pressing his hands to his head, as if to crush the horrid fear. “God save her from that fate. Is this all you know? Can’t you tell me any more? I’ll give you half my fortune if you’ll bring back my poor, lost Marian, just as she was when she left me.”

The offer was a generous one, and Sal was tempted for a moment to tell him some big lie, and thus receive a companion to the bill she clutched so greedily, but the agonizing expression of his white face kindled a spark of pity within her bosom, and she replied, “I did not finish tellin’ you that while Joe was talking and had seemingly persuaded her to go with him, a tall chap that I never seen before knocked him flat, and took the girl with him, and that’s why I remember it so well.”

“Who was he, this tall man? Where did he go?” and Frederic wiped from his forehead the great drops of sweat forced out by terrible fear.

“I told you I never seen him before,” was Sally’s answer, “but he had a good face—a milk and water face—as if he never plotted no mischief in his life. She’s safe with him, I’m sure. I’d trust my daughter with him, if I had one, and know he wouldn’t harm her. He spoke to her tender-like, and she looked glad, I thought.”

Frederic felt that this information was better than none, for it was certain it was Marian whom the woman had seen, and, in a measure comforted by her assurance of Ben Burt’s honesty, he bade her good morning, and walked away.

At last, worn out and discouraged, he returned to his hotel, where he lay now burning with fever, and, in his delirium, calling sometimes for Isabel, sometimes for Alice, and again for faithful Dinah, but never asking why Marian did not come. She was dead, and he only begged of those around him to take her away from Joe Black, or show him where her grave was made, so he could go home and tell the blind girl he had seen it. Every ray of light which it was possible to shut out had been excluded from the room, for he had complained much of his eyes, and when Mrs. Burt entered, she could discover only the outline of a ghastly face resting upon the pillows, scarcely whiter than itself. It was a serious case, the attending physician said, and so she thought when she looked into his wild, bright eyes, and felt his rapid pulse. To her he put the same question he had asked nearly of every one:

“Do you know where Marian is?”

“Marian!” she repeated, feeling a little uncertain how to answer.

“Humor him! say you do!” whispered the physician, who was just taking his leave. And very truthfully Mrs. Burt replied:

“Yes, I know where she is! She will come to you to-morrow.”

“No!” he answered mournfully. “The dead never come back, and it must not be, either. Isabel is coming then, and the two can’t meet together here, for—. Come nearer, woman, while I tell you I loved Isabel the best, and that’s what made the trouble. She is beautiful, but Marian was good—and do you know Marian was the Heiress of Redstone Hall; but I’m not going to use her money.”

“Yes, I know,” returned Mrs. Burt, trying to quiet him, but in vain.

He would talk—sometimes of Marian, and sometimes of Sarah Green, and the dreary room where he had been.

“It made Marian tired,” he said, “to climb those broken stairs—tired, just as he was now. But she was resting so quietly in Heaven, and the April sun was shining on her grave. It was a little grave—a child’s grave, as it were—for Marian was not so tall nor so old as Isabel.”

In this way he rambled on, and it was not until the morning dawned that he fell into a heavy sleep, and Mrs. Burt had leisure to reflect upon the novel position in which she found herself.

“It was foolish in me to give up to them children,” she said, “but now that I am here, I’ll make the best of it, and do as well as I can. Marian shan’t come, though! It would kill her dead to hear him going on.”

Mrs. Burt was a little rash in making this assertion, for even while she spoke, Marian was in the reception-room below, inquiring for the woman who took care of Mr. Raymond. Not once during the long night had her eye-lids closed in sleep, and with the early morning she had started for the hotel, leaving Ben to get his breakfast as he could.

“Say Marian Grey wishes to see her,” she said, in answer to the inquiry as to what name the servant was to take to No. ——.

“My goodness!” exclaimed Mrs. Burt; “why didn’t Ben keep her at home?” and, gliding down the stairs, she tried to persuade Marian to return.

But when she saw the firm, determined expression in the young girl’s eye, she knew it was useless to reason with her, and saying, rather pettishly, “You must expect to hear some cuttin’ things,” she bade her follow up the stairs. Frederic still lay sleeping, his face turned partly to one side, and his hand resting beneath his head. His rich brown hair, now damp with heavy moisture, was pushed back from his white forehead, which, gleaming through the dusky darkness, first showed to Marian where he lay. The gas-light hurt his eyes, and the lamp, which was kept continually burning, was so placed that its dim light did not fall on him, and a near approach was necessary to tell her just how he looked. He was fearfully changed, and, with a bitter moan, she laid her head beside him on the pillow, so that her short curls mingled with his darker locks, and she felt his hot breath on her cheek.

“Frederic—dear Frederic!” she said, and at the sound of her voice he moved uneasily, as if about to waken.

“Come away, come away,” whispered Mrs. Burt. “He may know you, and a sudden start would kill him.”

But Marian was deaf to all else save the whispered words dropping from the sick man’s lips. They were of home, of Alice, of the library, and oh, joy! could it be she heard aright—did he speak of her? Was it Marian he said? Yes, it was Marian, and with a cry of delight, which started Mrs. Burt to her feet, and penetrated even to the ear of the unconscious Frederic, she pressed her lips upon the very spot which they had touched before on that night when she gave him her first kiss. Slowly his eyes unclosed, but the wildness was still there, and Mrs. Burt, who stood anxiously watching him, felt glad that it was so. Slowly they wandered about the room, resting first upon the door, then on the chandelier, then on the ceiling above, and dropping finally lower, until at last they met and were riveted upon Marian, who, with clasped hands, stood breathlessly awaiting the result.

“Will he know her? Does he know her?” was the mental query of Mrs. Burt; while Marian’s fast-breathing heart asked the same question eagerly. There was a wavering, a fierce struggle between delirium and reason, and then, with a faint smile, he said:

“Did you kiss me just now?” and he pointed to the spot upon his forehead.

Marian nodded, for she could not speak, and he continued:

“Marian kissed me there, too! Little Marian, who went away, and it has burned and burned into my veins until it set my brain on fire. Nobody has kissed me since, but Alice. Did you know Alice, girl?”

“Yes,” answered Marian, keen disappointment swelling within her bosom and forcing the great tears from her eyes.

She had almost believed he would recognize her, but he did not; and sinking down by his side, she buried her face in the bed-clothes, and sobbed aloud.

“Don’t cry, little girl,” he said, evidently disturbed at the sight of her tears. “I cried when I thought Marian was dead, but that seems so long ago.”

“Oh Frederic—” and forgetful of everything, Marian sprang to her feet. “Oh, Frederic, is it true? Did you cry for me?”

At the sound of his own name the sick man looked bewildered, while reason seemed struggling again to assert its rights, and penetrate the misty fog by which it was enveloped. Very earnestly he looked at the young girl, who returned his gaze with one in which was concentrated all the yearning love and tenderness, she had cherished for him so long.

“Are you Marian?” he asked, and in an instant the excited girl wound her arms around his neck, and laying her cheek against his own, replied:

“Yes, Frederic yes. Don’t you know me, your poor lost Marian?”

Very caressingly he passed his hand over her short silken curls—pushed them back from her forehead—examined them more closely, and then whispered mournfully,

“No, you are not Marian. This is not her hair. But I like you,” he continued, as he felt her tears drop on his face; “and I wish you to stay with me, and when the pain comes back charm it away with your soft hands. They are little hands,” and he took them between his own, “but not so small as Marian’s were when I held one in my hand and promised I would love her. It seemed like some tiny rose leaf, and I could have crushed it easily, but I did not; I only crushed her heart, and she fled from me forever, for ’twas a lie I told her,” and his voice sunk to a lower tone. “I didn’t love her then—I don’t know as I love her now, for Isabel is so beautiful. Did you ever see Isabel, girl?”

“Oh, Frederic,” groaned Marian, and wresting her hands from his grasp, she tottered to a chair, while he looked after her wistfully.

“Will she go away?” he said to Mrs. Burt. “Will she leave me alone, when she knows Alice is not here nor Isabel? I wish Isabel would come, don’t you?”

There was another moan of anguish, and, rolling his bright eyes in the direction of the arm-chair, the poor man whispered:

“Hark! that’s the sound I heard the night Marian went away! I thought then ’twas the wind, but I knew afterwards that it was she, when her soul parted with her body, and it’s followed me ever since. There is not a spot at Redstone Hall that is not haunted with that cry. I’ve heard it at midnight, at noonday—in the storm and in the rushing river—where we thought she was buried. All but Alice—she knew she wasn’t, and she sent me here to look. She don’t like Isabel, and is afraid I’ll marry her. Maybe I shall, sometime! Who knows?”

And he laughed in delirious glee.

“Heaven keep me, too, from going mad?” cried Marian. “Oh! why did I come here?”

“I told you not to all the time,” was Mrs. Burt’s consolatory remark; which, however was lost on Marian, who, seizing her bonnet and shawl, rushed from the room, unmindful of the outstretched arms which seemed imploring her to stay.

The fresh morning air revived her fainting strength, but did not cool the feverish agony at her heart, and she sped onward, until she reached her home, where she surprised Ben at his solitary breakfast, which he had prepared himself.

“Oh! Ben, Ben!” she cried, coming so suddenly upon him that he upset the coffee-pot into which he was pouring some hot water. “Would it be wicked for you to kill me dead, or for me to kill myself?”

“What’s to pay now?” asked Ben, using the skirt of his coat for a holder in picking up the steaming coffee-pot.

Very hastily Marian related her adventures in the sick room, telling how Frederic had talked of marrying Isabel before her very face.

“Crazy as a loon,” returned Ben. “I shouldn’t think nothin’ of that. You say he talked as though he thought you was dead, and of course he don’t know what he’s sayin’. Have they writ to his folks?”

“Yes,” returned Marian, who had made a similar inquiry of Mrs. Burt. “They directed a letter to ‘Frederic Raymond’s friends, Franklin County, Kentucky,’ but that may not reach them in a long time.”

“Wouldn’t it be a Christian act,” returned Ben “for us, who know jest who he is, to telegraph to that critter, and have her come? By all accounts he wants to see her, and it may do him good.”

Marian felt that it would be right, and, though it cost her a pang, she said, at last:

“Yes, Ben, you may telegraph; but what name will you append?”

“Benjamin Butterworth, of course,” he replied. “They’ll remember the peddler, and think it nateral I should feel an interest.” And leaving Marian to take charge of the breakfast table, he started for the office.

Meantime the sick room was the scene of much excitement—Frederic raving furiously, and asking for “the girl with the soft hands and silken hair.” Sometimes he called her Marian, and begged of them to bring her back, promising not to make her cry again.

“There is a mystery connected with this Marian he talks so much about,” said the physician, who was present, “and he seems to fancy a resemblance between her and the girl who left here this morning. What may I call her name?”

“Marian, my daughter,” came involuntarily from Mrs. Burt, whose mental rejoinder was, “God forgive me for that lie, if it was one. Names and things is gettin’ so twisted up that it takes more than me to straighten ’em!”

“Well, then,” continued the physician, “suppose you send for her. It will never do for him to get so excited. He is wearing out too fast.”

“I will go for her myself,” said Mrs. Burt, who fancied some persuasion might be necessary ere Marian could be induced to return.

But she was mistaken, for when told that Frederic’s life depended upon his being kept quiet, and his being kept quiet depended upon her presence, Marian consented, and nerved herself to hear him talk, as she knew he would, of her rival.

“If he lives, I will be satisfied,” she thought, “even though he never did or can love me,” and with a strong, brave heart, she went back again to the sick man, who welcomed her joyfully, and folding his feeble arms around her neck, stroked again her hair, as he said, “You will not leave me, Marian, till Isabel is here. Then you may go—back to the grave I cannot find, and we will go home together.”

Marian could not answer him, neither was it necessary that she should. He was satisfied to have her there, and with her sitting at his side, and holding his hand in hers, he became as gentle as a child. Occasionally he called her “little girl,” but oftener “Marian,” and when he said that name, he always smoothed her hair, as if he pitied her, and knew he had done her a wrong. And Marian felt each day more and more that the wound she hoped had partly healed was bleeding afresh with a new pain, for while he talked of Marian as a mother talks of an unfortunate child, he spoke of Isabel with all a lover’s pride, and each word was a dagger to the heart of the patient watcher, who sat beside him day and night, until her eyes were heavy, and her cheeks were pale with her unbroken vigils.

“Do you then love this Isabel so much?” she said to him one day, and sinking his voice to a whisper he replied, “Yes, and I love you, too, though not like her, because I loved her first.”

“And Marian?” questioned the young girl, “Don’t you love her?”

Oh, how eagerly she waited for the answer, which when it came almost broke her heart.

“Not as I ought to—not as I have prayed that I might, and not as I should, perhaps, if she hadn’t been to me what she is. Poor child,” he continued, brushing away the tears which rolled like rain down Marian’s cheeks, “poor child, are you crying for Marian?”

“Yes—yes, for Marian—for poor heart-broken me;” and the wretched girl buried her face in the pillow beside him, for he held her firmly by the wrist, and she could not get away.

In this manner several days went by, and over the intellect so obscured there shone no ray or reason, while the girlish face grew whiter and whiter each morning light, and at last the physician said that she must rest, or her strength would be exhausted.

“Let me stay a little longer,” she pleaded—“stay at least until Miss Huntington arrives.”

“Miss who?” asked the doctor. “Do you then know his family?”

“A friend of mine knows them,” answered Marian, a deep flush stealing over her cheek.

“I hope, then, they will reward you well,” continued the physician. “The young man would have died but for you. It is remarkable what control you have over him.”

But Marian wished for no reward. It was sufficient for her to know that she had been instrumental in saving his life, even though she had saved it for Isabel. The physician said that Frederic was better, and that afternoon, seated in the large arm-chair, she fell into a refreshing sleep, from which she was finally aroused by Mrs. Burt, who bending over her, whispered in her ear:

“Wake up. She’s come—she’s here—Miss Huntington!”

There was magic in that name, and it roused the sleeping girl at once, sending a quiver of pain through her heart, for her post she knew was to be given to another. Not both of them could watch by Frederic, and she, who in all the world had the best right to stay, must go; but not until she had looked upon her rival and had seen once the face which Frederic called so beautiful. This done, she would go away and die, if it were possible, and stand no longer between Frederic and the bride he so much desired. She did not understand why he had so often spoken of herself as being dead, when he knew that she was not. It was a vagary of his brain, she said—he had had many since she came there, and she hoped he would sometimes talk of her to Isabel, just as he had talked of Isabel to her. There was a hurried consultation between herself and Mrs. Burt, with regard to their future proceedings, and it was finally decided that the latter should remain a few days longer, and so report the progress of affairs to Marian, who, of course, must go away. This arrangement being made they sat down and rather impatiently waited for the coming of Isabel, who was in her room resting after her tiresome journey.

“Oh how can she wait so long?” thought Marian, glancing at Frederic, who was sleeping now more quietly than he had done before for a long time.

She did not know Isabel Huntington, and she could not begin to guess how thoroughly selfish she was, nor how that selfishness was manifest in every movement. The letter, which at last had gone to Frankfort, was received the same day with the telegram, and as a natural consequence, threw the inmates of Redstone Hall into great excitement. Particularly was this the case with Isabel, who unmindful of everything, wrang her hands despairingly, crying out, “Oh! what shall I do if he dies?”

“Do!” repeated Dinah, forgetting her own grief in her disgust. “For the Lord’s sake, can’t you do what you allus did? Go back whar you come from, you and your mother, in course.”

Isabel deigned no reply to this remark, but hurried to her chamber, where she commenced the packing of her trunk.

“Wouldn’t it look better for me to go?” suggested Mrs. Huntington, and Isabel answered:

“Certainly not, the telegram was directed to me. No one knows me in New York, and I don’t care what folks say here. If he lives I shall be his wife, of course, else why should he send for me. It’s perfectly natural that I should go.” And thinking to herself that she would rather Frederic should die than to live for another, she completed her hasty preparations, and was on her way to the depot before the household had time to realize what they were doing.

In passing the house of Lawyer Gibson she could not forbear stopping a moment to communicate the sad news to her particular friend, who, while condoling with her, thought to herself, “He does care more for her than I supposed, or he would not have not sent for her.”

“When will you come back?” she asked, and Isabel replied, “Not until he is better or worse. Oh, Agnes; what if he should die. Imagine Mr. Rivers at the point of death and you will know just how I feel.”

“Certainly, very, indeed,” was the meaningless answer of Agnes, who, as the day of her bridal drew near, began to fancy that she might be easily consoled in case anything should come between herself and the white haired Floridan. “Perhaps you will be married before you return,” she suggested, and Isabel, who had thought of the same possibility, replied, “Don’t, pray, speak of such a thing—it seems terrible when Frederic is so sick.”

“You won’t cotch the cars if you ain’t keerful,” chimed in Uncle Phil, and kissing each other a most affectionate good-by, the young ladies parted, Agnes thinking to herself, “I reckon I wouldn’t go off to New York after a man who hadn’t really proposed—but then it’s just like her,” while Isabel’s mental comment was, “It’s time Agnes was married, for she’s really beginning to look old; I wouldn’t have my grandfather though!”

So much for girlish friendships!

Distressed and anxious as Isabel seemed, it was no part of her intention to travel nights, for that would give her a sallow, jaded look; so she made the journey leisurely, and even after her arrival, took time to rest and beautify ere presenting herself to Frederic. She had ascertained that he was better, and had the best of care, so she remained quietly in her chamber an hour or so, and it was not until after dark that she bade the servant show her the way to the sick room.

“I will tell them you are coming,” suggested the polite attendant, and, going on before her, he said to Mrs. Burt that “Miss Huntington would like to come in.”

In the farthest corner in the room, where the shadows were the deepest, and where she would be the least observed, sat Marian, her hands clasped tightly together, her head bent forward, and her eyes fixed intently upon the door through which her rival would enter. Frederic was awake, and, missing her from her post, was about asking for her, when Isabel appeared, looking so fresh, so glowing, so beautiful, that for an instant Marian forgot everything in her admiration of the queenly creature, who, bowing civilly to Mrs. Burt, glided to the bedside, and sank upon her knees, gracefully—very gracefully—just as she had done at a private rehearsal in her own room! Tighter the little hands were clasped together, and the head which had dropped before was erect now, as Marian watched eagerly for what would follow next.

“Dear Frederic,” said Isabel, and over the white face in the arm-chair the hot blood rushed in torrents for it seemed almost an insult to hear him thus addressed—“Dear Frederic, do you know me? I am Isabel;” and, unmindful of Mrs. Burt, or yet of the motionless figure sitting near, she kissed his burning forehead, and said again; “Do you know me?”

The nails were marking dark rings now in the tender flesh, while the blue eyes flashed until they grew almost as black as Isabel’s, and still Marian did not move. She could not, until she heard what answer would be given. As the physician had predicted, Frederic was better since his refreshing sleep, and through the misty vail enshrouding his reason a glimmer of light was shining. The voice was a familiar one, and though it partly bewildered him, he know who it was that bent so fondly over him. It was somebody from home, and with a thrill of pleasure akin to what one feels when meeting a fellow countryman far away on a foreign shore, he twined his arms around her neck, and said to her joyfully: “You are Isabel, and you’ve come to make me well.”

Isabel was about to speak again, when a low sob startled her, and, turning in the direction from whence it came, she met a fierce, burning gaze which riveted her as by some magnetism to the spot, and for a moment the two looked intently into each other’s eyes. Isabel and Marian, the one stamping indelibly upon her memory the lineaments of a face which had stolen and kept a heart which should have been her own, while the other wondered much at the strange white face which even through the darkness seemed quivering with pain.

Purposely Mrs. Burt stepped between them, and thus the spell was broken, Isabel turning again to Frederic, while Marian, unlocking her stiff fingers, grasped her bonnet and glided from the room so silently that Isabel knew not she was gone until she turned her head and found the chair empty.

“Who was that?” she said to Mrs. Burt—“that young girl who just went out?”

“My daughter,” answered Mrs. Burt, again mentally asking forgiveness for the falsehood told, and thinking to herself, “Mercy knows it ain’t my nater to lie, but when a body gets mixed up in such a scrape as this, I’d like to see ’em help it!”

After the first lucid interval, Frederic relapsed again into his former delirious mood, but did not ask for Marian. He seemed satisfied that Isabel was there, and he fell asleep again, resting so quietly that when it was eleven Isabel arose and said, “He is doing so well I believe I will retire. I never sat up with a sick person in my life, and should be very little assistance to you. That daughter of yours is somewhere around, I suppose, and will come if you need help.”

Mrs. Burt nodded, thinking how different was this conduct from that of the unselfish Marian, who had watched night after night without giving herself the rest she absolutely needed. Isabel, on the contrary, had no idea of impairing her beauty, or bringing discomfort to herself by spending many hours at a time in that close, unwholesome atmosphere, and while Marian in her humble apartment was weeping bitterly, she was dreaming of returning to Kentucky as a bride. Frederic could scarcely do less than reward her kindness by marrying her as soon as he was able. She could take care of him so much better, she thought, and ere she fell asleep she had arranged it all in her own mind, and had fancied her mother’s surprise at receiving a letter signed by her new name, “Isabel H. Raymond.” She would retain the “H,” she said. She always liked to see it, and she hoped Agnes Gibson, if she persisted in that foolish fancy of the fish knife, would have it marked in this way!

It was long after daylight ere she awoke, and when she did her first thought was of her pleasant dream and her second of the girl she had seen the night before. “How white she was,” she said, as she made her elaborate toilet, “and how those eyes of hers glared at me, as if I had no business here. Maybe she has fallen in love while taking care of him;” and Isabel laughed aloud at the very idea of a nursing woman’s daughter being in love with the fastidious Frederic! Once she thought of Mrs. Daniel Burt, wondering where she lived, and half wishing she could find her, and, herself unknown, could question her of Marian.

“Maybe this Mrs. Merton knows something of her,” she said, and thinking she would ask her if a good opportunity should occur, she gave an extra brush to her glossy hair, looked in a small hand mirror to see that the braids at the back of her head were right, threw open her wrapper a little more to show her flounced cambric skirt, and then went to the breakfast room, where three attendants, attracted by her style and the prospect of a fee, bowed obsequiously and asked what she would have. This occupied nearly another hour, and it was almost ten ere she presented herself to Mrs. Burt, who was growing very faint and weary.

At the physician’s request more light had been admitted into the room, and Frederic, who was much better this morning, recognized Isabel at once. He had a faint remembrance of having seen her the previous night, but it needed Mrs. Burt’s assertion to confirm his conjecture, and he greeted her now as if meeting her for the first time. Many questions he asked of the people at home, and how they had learned of his illness.

“We received a letter and a telegram both,” said Isabel, continuing, “You remember that booby peddler who sold Alice the bracelet and frightened the negroes so? Well, he must have telegraphed, for his name was signed to the dispatch, ‘Benjamin Butterworth.’”

Mrs. Burt was very much occupied with something near the table, and Frederic did not notice her confusion as he replied, “He was a kind-hearted man, I thought, but I wonder how he heard of my illness, and where he is now. Mrs. Merton, has a certain Ben Butterworth inquired for me since I was sick?”

“I know nobody by that name,” returned Mrs. Burt, and without stopping to think that her question might lead to some inquiries from Frederic, Isabel rejoined, “Well, do you know a Mrs. Daniel Burt?”

“Mrs. Daniel Burt!” repeated Frederic, as if trying to recall something far back in the past, while the lady in question started so suddenly as to drop the cup of hot water she held in her hand.

Stooping down to pick up the cup, she said something about its having burned her, and added, “I ain’t much acquainted in the city, and never know my next door neighbors.”

“Mrs. Daniel Burt,” Frederic said again, “I have surely heard that name before. Who is she, Isabel?”

It was Isabel’s turn now to answer evasively; but being more accustomed to dissimulate than her companion, she replied, quite as a matter of course, “You may have heard mother speak of her in New Haven. I used to know her when I was a little girl, and I believe she lives in New York. She was a very good, but common kind of woman, and one with whom I should not care to associate, though mother, I dare say, would be glad to hear from her.”

“The impudent trollop,” muttered Mrs. Burt, marvelling at the conversation, and wondering which was trying to deceive the other, Frederic or Isabel. “The former couldn’t hoodwink her,” she said, “even if he did Isabel. She understood it all, and he knew who Mrs. Daniel Burt was just as well as she did, for even if he had forgotten that she once lived with his father, Marian’s letter had refreshed his memory, and he was only ‘putting on’ for the sake of misleading Isabel. But where in the world did that jade know her!” that was a puzzle, and settling it in her own mind that there were two of the same name, she left the room and went down to her breakfast.

During the day not a word was said of Marian. Isabel was evidently too much pleased with Frederic’s delight at seeing her to think of anything else, while Mrs. Burt did not consider it necessary to speak of her. Frederic, too, for a time had forgotten her, but as the day drew near its close, he relapsed into a thoughtful mood, replying to Isabel’s frequent remarks either in monosyllables or not at all. As the darkness increased he seemed to be listening intently, and when a step was heard upon the stairs or in the hall without, his face would light up with eager expectation and then be as suddenly overcast as the footstep passed his door. Gradually there was creeping into his mind a vague remembrance of something or somebody, which for many days had been there with him, gliding so noiselessly about the room that he had almost fancied it trod upon the air, and he could scarcely tell whether it were a spirit or a human being like himself. Little by little the outline so dimly discerned assumed a form, and the form was that of a young girl—a very fair young girl, with sweet blue eyes, and soft, baby hands, which had held his aching head and smoothed his tangled hair, oh, so many times. Her voice too, was low and gentle, and reminding him of some sad strain of music heard long, long ago. It seemed to him, too, that she called him Frederic, dropping hot tears upon his face. But where was she now? Why didn’t she come again, and who was she—that little blue-eyed girl? For a time the vision faded and all was confused again, but the reality came back ere long, and listening eagerly for something which never came, he thought and thought until great drops of sweat stood thickly upon his brow; and Isabel, wiping them away, became alarmed at the wildness of his eye and the rapid beating of his pulse. A powerful anodyne was administered, and he slept at last a fitful feverish sleep, which however, did him good, and in the morning he was better than he had been before.

Mrs. Burt, who had watched him carefully, knew that the danger was past, and that afternoon she left him with Isabel, while she went home, where she found Marian seriously ill, with Ben taking care of her in his kind but awkward manner.

“Did Frederic remember me? Does he know I have been there?” were Marian’s first questions, and when Mrs. Burt replied in the negative, she turned away whispering, mournfully, “It is just as well.”

“He is doing well,” said Mrs. Burt, “and as you need me more than he does now, I shall come home and let that Isabel take care of him. It won’t hurt her any, the jade. She can telegraph for her mother if she chooses.”

Accordingly, she returned to the sick room, where she found Frederic asleep and Isabel reading a novel.

To her announcement of leaving, the latter made no objection. She was rather pleased than otherwise, for, as Frederic grew stronger, the presence of a third person, and a stranger, too, might be disagreeable. She would telegraph for her mother, of course, as she did not think it quite proper to stay there alone. But her mother was under her control; she could dispose of her at any time, so she merely stopped her reading long enough to say, “Very well, you can go if you like. How much is your charge?”

Mrs. Burt did not hesitate to tell her; and Isabel, who had taken care of Frederic’s purse, paid her, and then resumed her book, while Mrs. Burt, with a farewell glance at her patient, went from the room, without a word of explanation as to where she could be found in case they wished to find her.

It was dark when Frederic awoke, and it was so still around him that he believed himself alone.

“They have all left me,” he said; “Mrs. Merton, Isabel, and that other one, that being of mystery—who was she—who could she have been?” and shutting his eyes, he tried to bring her before him just as he had often seen her bending o’er his pillow.

He knew now that it was not a phantom of his brain, but a reality. There had been a young girl there, and when the world without was darkest, and he was drifting far down the river of death, her voice had called him back, and her hands had held him up so that he did not sink in the deep, angry waters. There were tears many times upon her face, he remembered, and once he had wiped them away, asking why she cried. It was a pretty face, he said, a very pretty face, and the sunny eyes of blue seemed shining on him even now, while the memory of her gentle acts was very, very sweet, thrilling him with an undefined emotion, and awakening within his bosom a germ of the undying love he was yet to feel for the mysterious stranger. She had called him Frederic, too, while he had called her Marian. She had answered to that name, she asked him of Isabel, and—“oh, Heaven!” he cried, starting quickly and clasping both hands upon his head. Like a thunderbolt it burst upon him, and for an instant his brain seemed all on fire. “It was Marian!—it was Marian!” he essayed to say, but his lips refused to move, and when Isabel, startled by his sudden movement, struck a light and came to his bedside, she saw that he had fainted!

In great alarm she summoned help, begging of those who came to go at once for Mrs. Merton. But no one knew of the woman’s place of residence, and as she had failed to inquire, it was a hopeless matter. Slowly Frederic came back to consciousness, and when he was again alone with Isabel he said to her, “Where is that woman who took care of me?”

“She is gone,” said Isabel. “Gone to her home.”

“Gone,” he repeated. “When did she go, and why?”

Isabel told him the particulars of Mrs. Burt’s going, and he continued:

“Was there no one else here when you came? No young girl with soft blue eyes?” and he looked eagerly at her.

“Yes,” she replied. “There was a queer acting thing sitting in the arm-chair the night I first came in—”

“Who was she, and where is she now?” he asked and Isabel answered, “I am sure I don’t know where she is, for she vanished like a ghost.”

“Yes, yes; but who was she? Did she have no name?” and Frederic clutched Isabel’s arm nervously.

“Mrs. Merton told me it was her daughter—that is all I know,” said Isabel; and in a tone of disappointment he continued:

“Will you tell me just how she looked, and how she acted when you first saw her?”

“One would suppose you deeply interested in your nurse’s daughter;” and the glittering black eyes flashed scornfully upon Frederic, who replied:

“I am interested, for she saved my life. Tell me, won’t you, how she looked?”

“Well, then,” returned Isabel pettishly, “she was about fifteen, I think—certainly not older than that. Her face was very white, with big, blue eyes, which glared at me like a wild beast’s; and what is queerer than all, she actually sobbed when I, or rather, you kissed me; perhaps you have forgotten that you did?”

He had forgotten it, for the best of reasons, but he did not contradict her, so intent was he upon listening to her story.

“I had not observed her particularly before; but when I heard that sound I turned to look at her, while she stared at me as impudently as if I had no business here. That woman stepped between us purposely I know, for she seemed excited; and when I saw the arm-chair again the girl was gone.”

Thus far everything, except the probable age, had confirmed his suspicions; but there was one question more—an all-important one—and with trembling eagerness he asked:

“What of her hair? Did you notice that?”

“It was brown, I think,” said Isabel—“short in her neck and curly round her forehead. I should say her hair was rather handsome.”

With a sigh of disappointment Frederic turned upon his pillow, saying to her:

“That will do—I’ve heard enough.”

Isabel’s last words had brought back to his mind something which he had forgotten until now—the girl’s hair was short, and he remembered distinctly twining the soft rings around his fingers. They were not long, red curls, like those described by Sally Green. It wasn’t Marian’s hair—it wasn’t Marian at all; and in his weakness his tears dropped silently upon the pillow, for the disappointment was terrible. All that night and the following day he was haunted with thoughts of the young girl, and at last, determining to see her again and know if she were like Marian, he said to Isabel:

“Send for Mrs. Merton. I wish to talk with her.”

“It is an impossibility,” returned Isabel: “for, when she left us, I carelessly neglected to ask where she lived——”

“Inquire below, then,” persisted Frederic. “Somebody will certainly know, and I must find her.”

Isabel complied with his request, and soon returned with the information that no one knew aught of Mrs. Merton’s whereabouts, though it was generally believed that she came from the country, and at the time of coming to the hotel was visiting friends in the city.

“Find her friends, then,” continued Frederic, growing more and more excited and impatient.

This, too, was impossible, for everything pertaining to Mrs. Merton was mere conjecture. No one could tell where she lived, or whither she had gone; and the sick man lamented the circumstance so often that Isabel more than once lost her temper entirely, wondering why he should be so very anxious about a woman who had been well paid for her services—“yes, more than paid, for her price was a most exorbitant one.”

Meantime, Mrs. Huntington, who, on the receipt of Isabel’s telegram, had started immediately, arrived, laden with trunks, bandboxes, and bags, for the old lady was rather dressy, and fancied a large hotel a good place to show her new clothes. On learning that Frederic was very much better, and that she had been sent for merely on the score of propriety, she seemed somewhat out of humor—“Not that she wanted Frederic to die,” she said, “and she was glad of course that he was getting well, but she didn’t like to be scared the way she was; a telegram always made her stomach tremble so that she didn’t get over it in a week; she had traveled day and night to get there, and didn’t know what she could have done if she hadn’t met Rudolph McVicar in Cincinnati.”

“Rudolph!” exclaimed Isabel. “Pray, where is he now?”

“Here in this very hotel,” returned her mother. “He came with me all the way, and seemed greatly interested in you, asking a thousand questions about when you expected to be married. Said he supposed Frederic’s illness would postpone it awhile, and when I told him you wan’t even engaged as I knew of, he looked disappointed. I believe Rudolph has reformed!”

“The wretch!” muttered Isabel, who rightly guessed that Rudolph’s interest was only feigned.

He had heard of her sudden departure for New York, and had heard also (Agnes Gibson being the source whence the information came) that she might, perhaps, be married as soon as Frederic was able to sit up. Accordingly, he had himself started northward, stumbling upon Mrs. Huntington in Cincinnati, and coming with her to New York, where he stopped at the same hotel, intending to remain there and wait for the result. He did not care to meet Isabel face to face, while she was quite as anxious to avoid an interview with him; and after a few days she ceased to be troubled about him at all. Frederic absorbed all her thoughts, he appeared so differently from what he used to do—talking but little either to herself or her mother, and lying nearly all the day with his eyes shut, though she knew he was not asleep; and she tried in vain to fathom the subject of his reflections. But he guarded that secret well, and day after day he thought on, living over again the first weeks of his sickness in that chamber, until at last the conviction was fixed upon his mind that, spite of the short hair, spite of the probable age, spite of the story about Mrs. Merton’s daughter, or yet the letter from Sarah Green, that young girl who had watched with him so long and then disappeared so mysteriously, was none other than Marian—his wife. He did not shudder now when he repeated that last word to himself. It sounded pleasantly, for he knew it was connected with the sweet, womanly love which had saved him from death. The brown hair which Isabel had mentioned he rejected as an impossibility. It had undoubtedly looked dark to her, but it was red still, though worn short in her neck, for he remembered that distinctly. Sarah Green’s letter was a forgery—Alice’s prediction was true, and Marian still lived.

But where was she now? Why had she left him so abruptly? and would he ever find her? Yes, he would, he said. He would spare no time, no pains, no money in the search; and when he found her he would love and cherish her as she deserved. He was beginning to love her now, and he wondered at his infatuation for Isabel, whose real character was becoming more and more apparent to him. His changed demeanor made her cross and fretful; while Alice Gibson’s letter, asking when she was to be married, and saying people there expected her to return a bride, only increased her ill-humor, which manifested itself several times toward her mother, in Frederic’s presence.

At last, in a fit of desperation, she wrote to Agnes Gibson that she never expected to be married—certainly not to Frederic Raymond—and if every young lady matrimonially inclined should nurse her intended husband through a course of fever, she guessed they would become disgusted with mankind generally, and that man in particular! This done, Isabel felt better—so much better indeed that she resolved upon another trial to bring about her desired object, and one day, about two weeks after her mother’s arrival, she said to Frederic:

“Now that you are nearly well, I believe I shall go to New Haven, and, after a little, mother will come, too. I shall remain there, I think, though mother, I suppose, will keep house for you this year, as she has engaged to do.”

To this suggestion Frederic did not reply just as she thought he would.

“It was a good idea,” he said, “for her to visit her old home, and he presumed she would enjoy it.” Then he added, very faintly: “Alice will need a teacher here quite as much as in Kentucky, and you can retain your situation if you choose.”

Isabel bit her lip, and her black eyes flashed angrily as she replied:

“I am tired of teaching only one pupil, for there is nothing to interest me, and I am all worn out, too.”

She did look pale, and, touched with pity, Frederic said to her, very kindly:

“You do seem weary, Isabel. You have been confined with me too long, and I think you had better go at once. I will run down to see you, if possible, before I return to Kentucky.”

This gave her hope, and, drying her eyes, which were filled with tears, Isabel chatted pleasantly with him about his future plans, which had been somewhat disarranged by his unexpected illness. He could not now hope to be settled at Riverside, as he called his new home, until some time in June—perhaps not so soon—but he would let her know, he said, in time to meet him there.

A day or two after this conversation, Isabel started for New Haven, whither in the course of a week she was followed by both her mother and Rudolph, the latter of whom was determined not to lose sight of her until sure that the engagement, which he somewhat doubted, did not in reality exist.

CHAPTER XVII.
THE SEARCH.

When the carriage containing Mrs. Huntington rolled away from the hotel, Frederic, who was standing upon the steps, experienced a feeling of relief in knowing that, as far as personal acquaintances were concerned, he was now alone and free to commence his search for Marian. Each day the conviction had been strengthened that she was alive—that she had been with him a few weeks before—and now every energy should be devoted to finding her. Once he thought of advertising, but she might not see the paper, and as he rather shrank from making his affairs thus public, he abandoned the project, determining, however, to leave no other means untried; he would hunt the city over, inquire at every house, and then scour the surrounding country. It might be months, or it might be years, ere this were accomplished; but accomplish it he would, and with a brave, hopeful heart, he started out, taking first a list of all the Mertons in the Directory, then searching out and making of them the most minute inquiries, except, indeed, in cases where he knew, by the nature of their surroundings, that none of their household had officiated in the capacity of nurse. The woman who had taken care of him was poor and uneducated, and he confined himself mostly to that class of people.

But all in vain. No familiar face ever came at his call. Nobody knew her whom he sought—no one had heard of Marian Lindsey, and at last he thought of Sally Green, determining to visit her again, and, if possible, learn something more of the girl she had described. Perhaps she could direct him to Joe Black, who might know the tall man last seen with Marian. The place was easily found, and the dangerous stairs creaked again to his eager tread. Sal knew him at once, and tucking her grizzly hair beneath her dirty cap, waited to hear his errand, which was soon told. Could she give him any further information of that young girl, had she ever heard of her since his last visit there, and would she tell him where to find Joe Black?—he might know who the man was, and thus throw some light on the mystery.

“Bless your heart,” answered the woman, “Joe died three weeks ago with the delirium tremens, so what you git out of him won’t help you much. I told you all I knew before; or no, come to think on’t, I seen ’em go into a Third avenue car, and that makes me think the feller lived up town. But law, you may as well hunt for a needle in a haystack as to hunt for a lost gal in New York. You may git out all the police you’ve a mind to, and then you ain’t no better off. Ten to one they are wus than them that’s hidin’ her, if they do wear brass buttons and feel so big,” and Sal shook her brawny arm threateningly at some imaginary officers of justice.

With a feeling of disgust, Frederic turned away, and, retracing his steps, came at last to the Park, where he entered a Third avenue car, though why he did so he scarcely knew. He did not expect to find her there, but he felt a satisfaction in thinking she had once been over that route—perhaps in that very car—and he looked curiously in the faces of his fellow-passengers as they entered and left. Wistfully, too, he glanced out at the houses they were passing, saying to himself: “Is it there Marian lives, or there?” and once when they stopped for some one to alight, his eye wandered down the opposite street, resting at last upon a window high up in a huge block of buildings. There was nothing peculiar about that window—nothing to attract attention, unless it were the neat white fringed curtain which shaded it, or the rose geranium which in its little earthen pot seemed to indicate that the inmates of that tenement retained a love for flowers and country fashions, even amid the smoke and the dust of the city. Frederic saw the white curtain, and it reminded him of the one which years ago hung in his bedroom at the old place on the river. He saw the geranium, too, and the figure which bent over it to pluck the withered leaf. Then the car moved on, and to the weary man sitting in the corner there came no voice to tell how near he had been to the lost one, for that window was Mrs. Burt’s, and the bending figure—Marian.

He had seen her—he had passed within a few rods of her and she could have heard him had he shouted aloud, but for all the good that this did him she might have been miles and miles away, for he never dreamed of the truth, and day after day he continued his search, while the excitement, the fatigue, and the constant disappointment, told fearfully upon his constitution. Still he would not give it up, and every morning he went forth with hope renewed, only to return at night weary, discouraged, and sometimes almost despairing of success.

Once, at the close of a rainy afternoon, he entered again a Third avenue car, which would leave him not very far from his hotel. It had been a day of unusual fatigue with him, and utterly exhausted, he sank into the corner seat, while passenger after passenger crowded in, their damp overcoats and dripping umbrellas filling the vehicle with a sickly steam, which affected him unpleasantly, causing him to lean his aching head upon his hand, and so shut out what was going on around him. They were full at last—every seat, every standing point was taken, and still the conductor said there was room for another, as he passed in a delicate young girl, who modestly drew her vail over her face to avoid the gaze of the men, some of whom stared rather rudely at her. Just after she came in, Frederic looked up, but the thick folds of the vail told no tales of the sudden paling of the lip, the flushing of her cheek, and the quiver of the eye-lids. Neither did the violent trembling of her body, nor the quick pressure of her hand upon her side convey to him other impression than that she was tired—faint, he thought—and touching his next neighbor with his elbow, he compelled him to move along a few inches, while he did the same, and so made room for the girl between himself and the door.

“Sit here, Miss,” he said, and he turned partly toward her, as if to shield her from the crowd, for he felt intuitively that she was not like them.

Her hands, which chanced to be ungloved and grasped the handle of her basket, were small, very small, and about the joints were little laughing dimples, looking very tempting to Frederic Raymond, who was a passionate admirer of pretty hands, and who now felt a strong desire to clasp the tiny snowflakes just within his reach.

Involuntarily he thought of those which had so lately held his feverish head; they must have been much like the little ones holding so fast the basket, and he wished that chance had brought Marian there instead of the young girl sitting so still beside him. A strange sensation thrilled him at the very idea of meeting her thus, while his heart beat fast, but never said to him that it was Marian herself! Why didn’t it? He asked himself that question a thousand times in after years, saying he should know her again, but he had no suspicion of it now, though when they stopped at the same street down which he once had looked at the open window, and when the seat beside him was empty, he did experience a sense of loneliness—a feeling as if a part of himself had gone with the young girl. Suddenly remembering that in his abstraction he had come higher up than he wished to do, he also alighted, and standing upon the muddy pavement, looked after the tripping figure moving so rapidly toward the window where the geranium was blossoming, and where a light was shining now. It disappeared at last, and mentally chiding him for stopping in the rain to watch a perfect stranger, Frederic turned back in the direction of his hotel, while the girl, who had so awakened his interest, rushed up the narrow stairs, and bounded into the room where Mrs. Burt was sitting, exclaimed: