X. THE RIVALS…

X. THE RIVALS

One word-yes or no! and it means Death or life! Speak, are you his wife?

--Anon.

Heedless as the mad, of night, of storm, and danger, Nora hurried desperately on. She was blinded by the darkness and smothered by the thickly-falling snow, and torn by the thorns and briars of the brushwood; but not for these impediments would the frantic girl abate her speed. She slipped often, hurt herself sometimes, and once she fell and rolled down the steep hill-side until stopped by a clump of cedars. But she scrambled up, wet, wounded, and bleeding, and tore on, through the depths of the valley and up the opposite heights. Panting, breathless, dying almost, she reached Brudenell Hall.

The house was closely shut up to exclude the storm, and outside the strongly barred window-shutters there was a barricade of drifted snow. The roofs were all deeply covered with snow, and it was only by its faint white glare in the darkness that Nora found her way to the house. Her feet sank half a leg deep in the drifts as she toiled on towards the servants' door. All was darkness there! if there was any light, it was too closely shut in to gleam abroad.

For a moment Nora leaned against the wall to recover a little strength, and then she knocked. But she had to repeat the summons again and again before the door was opened. Then old Jovial appeared--his mouth and eyes wide open with astonishment at seeing the visitor.

"Name o' de law, Miss Nora, dis you? What de matter? Is you clean tuk leave of your senses to be a-comin' up here, dis hour of de night in snowstorm?" he cried.

"Let me in, Jovial! Is Mr. Herman Brudenell at home?" gasped Nora, as without waiting for an answer she pushed past him and sunk into the nearest chair.

"Marser Bredinell home? No, miss! Nor likewise been home since late last night. He went away' mediately arter interdoocing de young madam to de ole one; which she tumbled in upon us with a whole raft of waiting maids, and men, and dogs, and birds, and gold fishes, and debil knows what all besides, long arter midnight last night--and so he hasn't been hearn on since, and de fambly is in de greatest 'stress and anxiety. Particular she, poor thing, as comed so far to see him! And we no more s'picioning as he had a wife, nor anything at all, 'til she tumbled right in on top of us! Law, Miss Nora, somefin werry particular must have fetch you out in de snow to-night, and 'deed you do look like you had heard bad news! Has you hearn anything 'bout him, honey?"

"Is it true, then?" moaned Nora, in a dying tone, without heeding his last question.

"Which true, honey?"

"About the foreign lady coming here last night and claiming to be his wife?"

"As true as gospel, honey--which you may judge the astonishment is put on to us all."

"Jovial, where is the lady?"

"Up in de drawing-room, honey, if she has not 'tired to her chamber."

"Show me up there, Jovial, I must see her for myself," Nora wailed, with her head fallen upon her chest.

"Now, sure as the world, honey, you done heard somefin 'bout de poor young marser? Is he come to an accident, honey?" inquired the man very uneasily.

"Who?" questioned Nora vaguely.

"The young marser, honey; Mr. Herman Brudenell, chile!"

"What of him?" cried Nora--a sharp new anxiety added to her woe.

"Why, law, honey, aint I just been a-telling of you? In one half an hour arter de forein lady tumbled in, young marse lef' de house an' haint been seen nor heard on since. I t'ought maybe you'd might a hearn what's become of him. It is mighty hard on her, poor young creatur, to be fairly forsok de very night she come."

"Ah!" cried Nora, in the sharp tones of pain--"take me to that lady at once! I must, must see her! I must hear from her own lips--the truth!"

"Come along then, chile! Sure as the worl' you has hearn somefin, dough you won't tell me; for I sees it in your face; you's as white as a sheet, an' all shakin' like a leaf an' ready to drop down dead! You won't let on to me; but mayhaps you may to her," said Jovial, as he led the way along the lighted halls to the drawing-room door, which, he opened, announcing:

"Here's Miss Nora Worth, mistess, come to see Lady Hurt-my-soul."

And as soon as Nora, more like a ghost than a living creature, had glided in, he shut the door, went down on his knees outside and applied his ear to the key-hole.

Meanwhile Nora found herself once more in the gorgeously furnished, splendidly decorated, and brilliantly lighted drawing room that had been the scene of her last night's humiliation. But she did not think of that now, in this supreme crisis of her fate.

Straight before her, opposite the door by which she entered, was an interesting tableau, in a dazzling light--it was a sumptuous fireside picture--the coal-fire glowing between the polished steel bars of the wide grate, the white marble mantel-piece, and above that, reaching to the lofty ceiling, a full-length portrait of Herman Brudenell; before the fire an inlaid mosaic table, covered with costly books, work-boxes, hand-screens, a vase of hot-house flowers, and other elegant trifles of luxury; on the right of this, in a tall easy-chair, sat Mrs. Brudenell; on this side sat the Misses Brudenell; these three ladies were all dressed in slight mourning, if black silk dresses and white lace collars can be termed such; and they were all engaged in the busy idleness of crochet work; but on a luxurious crimson velvet sofa, drawn up to the left side of the fire, reclined a lady dressed in the deepest mourning, and having her delicate pale, sad face half veiled by her long, soft black ringlets.

While Nora gazed breathlessly upon this pretty creature, whom she recognized at once as the stranger, Mrs. Brudenell slowly raised her head and stared at Nora.

"You here, Nora Worth! How dare you? Who had the insolence to let you in?" she said, rising and advancing to the bell-cord. But before she could pull it Nora Worth lifted her hand with that commanding power despair often lends to the humblest, and said:

"Stop, madam, this is no time to heap unmerited scorn upon one crushed to the dust already, and whose life cannot possibly offend you or cumber the earth much longer. I wish to speak to that lady."

"With me!" exclaimed Lady Hurstmonceux, rising upon her elbow and gazing with curiosity upon the beautiful statue that was gliding toward her as if it were moved by invisible means.

Mrs. Brudenell paused with her hand upon the bell-tassel and looked at Nora, whose lovely face seemed to have been thus turned to stone in some moment of mortal suffering, so agonized and yet so still it looked! Her hair had fallen loose and hung in long, wet, black strings about her white bare neck, for she had neither shawl nor bonnet; her clothes were soaked with the melted snow, and she had lost one shoe in her wild night walk.

Mrs. Brudenell shuddered with aversion as she looked at Nora; when she found her voice she said:

"Do not let her approach you, Berenice. She is but a low creature; not fit to speak to one of the decent negroes even; and besides she is wringing wet and will give you a cold."

"Poor thing! she will certainly take one herself, mamma; she looks too miserable to live! If you please, I would rather talk with her! Come here, my poor, poor girl! what is it that troubles you so? Tell me! Can I help you? I will, cheerfully, if I can." And the equally "poor" lady, poor in happiness as Nora herself, put her hand in her pocket and drew forth an elegant portmonnaie of jet.

"Put up your purse, lady! It is not help that I want--save from God! I want but a true answer to one single question, if you will give it to me."

"Certainly, I will, my poor creature; but stand nearer the fire; it will dry your clothes while we talk."

"Thank you, madam, I do not need to."

"Well, then, ask me the question that you wish to have answered. Don't be afraid, I give you leave, you know," said the lady kindly.

Nora hesitated, shivered, and gasped; but could not then ask the question that was to confirm her fate; it was worse than throwing the dice upon which a whole fortune was staked; it was like giving the signal for the ax to fall upon her own neck. At last, however, it came, in low, fearful, but distinct words:

"Madam, are you the wife of Mr. Herman Brudenell?"

"Nora Worth, how dare you? Leave the room and the house this instant, before I send for a constable and have you taken away?" exclaimed Mrs. Brudenell, violently pulling at the bell-cord.

"Mamma, she is insane, poor thing! do not be hard on her," said Lady Hurstmonceux gently; and then turning to poor Nora she answered, in the manner of one humoring a maniac:

"Yes, my poor girl, I am the wife of Mr. Herman Brudenell. Can I do anything for you?"

"Nothing, madam," was the answer that came sad, sweet, and low as the wail of an Aeolian harp swept by the south wind.

The stranger lady's eyes were bent with deep pity upon her; but before she could speak again Mrs. Brudenell broke into the discourse by exclaiming:

"Do not speak to her, Berenice! I warned you not to let her speak to you, but you would not take my advice, and now you have been insulted."

"But, mamma, she is insane, poor thing; some great misery has turned her brain; I am very sorry for her," said the kind-hearted stranger.

"I tell you she is not! She is as sane as you are! Look at her! Not in that amazed, pitying manner, but closely and critically, and you will see what she is; one of those low creatures who are the shame of women and the scorn of men. And if she has misery for her portion, she has brought it upon herself, and it is a just punishment."

The eyes of Lady Hurstmonceux turned again upon the unfortunate young creature before her, and this time she did examine her attentively, letting her gaze rove over her form.

This time Nora did not lift up her hands to cover her burning face; that marble face could never burn or blush again; since speaking her last words Nora had remained standing like one in a trance, stone still, with her head fallen upon her breast, and her arms hanging listlessly by her side. She seemed dead to all around her.

Not so Lady Hurstmonceux; as her eyes roved over this form of stone her pale face suddenly flushed, her dark eyes flashed, and she sprang up from the sofa, asking the same question that Mrs. Brudenell had put the evening before.

"Girl! what is it to you whether Mr. Brudenell has a wife or not? What are you to Mr. Herman Brudenell?"

"Nothing, madam; nothing for evermore," wailed Nora, without looking up or changing her posture.

"Humph! I am glad to hear it, I am sure!" grunted Mrs. Brudenell.

"Nothing? you say; nothing?" questioned Lady Hurstmonceux.

"Nothing in this world, madam; nothing whatever! so be at ease." It was another wail of the storm-swept heart-strings.

"I truly believe you; I ought to have believed without asking you; but who, then, has been your betrayer, my poor girl?" inquired the young matron in tones of deepest pity.

This question at length shook the statue; a storm passed through her; she essayed to speak, but her voice failed.

"Tell me, poor one; and I will do what I can to right your wrongs. Who is it?"

"Myself!" moaned Nora, closing her eyes as if to shut out all light and life, while a spasm drew back the corners of her mouth and convulsed her face.

"Enough of this, Berenice! You forget the girls!" said Mrs. Brudenell, putting her hand to the bell and ringing again.

"I beg your pardon, madam; I did indeed forget the presence of the innocent and happy in looking upon the erring and wretched," said Lady Hurstmonceux.

"That will do," said the elder lady. "Here is Jovial at last! Why did you not come when I first rang?" she demanded of the negro, who now stood in the door.

"I 'clare, mist'ess, I never heerd it de fust time, madam."

"Keep your ears open in future, or it will be the worse for you! And now what excuse can you offer for disobeying my express orders, and not only admitting this creature to the house, but even bringing her to our presence?" demanded the lady severely.

"I clare 'fore my 'vine Marster, madam, when Miss Nora come in de storm to de kitchen-door, looking so wild and scared like, and asked to see de young madam dere, I t'ought in my soul how she had some news of de young marster to tell! an' dat was de why I denounced her into dis drawin'-room."

"Do not make such a mistake again! if you do I will make you suffer severely for it! And you, shameless girl! if you presume to set foot on these premises but once again, I will have you sent to the work-house as a troublesome vagrant."

Nora did not seem to hear her; she had relapsed into her stony, trance-like stupor.

"And now, sir, since you took the liberty of bringing her in, put her out--out of the room, and out of the house!" said Mis. Brudenell.

"Mamma! what! at midnight! in the snow-storm?" exclaimed Lady Hurstmonceux, in horror.

"Yes! she shall not desecrate the bleakest garret, or the lowest cellar, or barest barn on the premises!"

"Mamma! It would be murder! She would perish!" pleaded the young lady.

"Not she! Such animals are used to exposure! And if she and all like her were to 'perish,' as you call it, the world would be so much the better for it! They are the pests of society!"

"Mamma, in pity, look at her! consider her situation! She would surely die! and not alone, mamma! think of that!" pleaded Berenice.

"Jovial! am I to be obeyed or not?" sternly demanded the elder lady.

"Come, Miss Nora; come, my poor, poor child," said Jovial, in a low tone, taking the arm of the miserable girl, who turned, mechanically, to be led away.

"Jovial, stop a moment! Mrs. Brudenell, I have surely some little authority in my husband's house; authority that I should be ashamed to claim in the presence of his mother, were it not to be exercised in the cause of humanity. This girl must not leave the house to-night," said Berenice respectfully, but firmly.

"Lady Hurstmonceux, if you did but know what excellent cause you have to loathe that creature, you would not oppose my orders respecting her; if you keep her under your roof this night you degrade yourself; and, finally, if she does not leave the house at once I and my daughters must--midnight and snow-storm, notwithstanding. We are not accustomed to domicile with such wretches," said the old lady grimly.

Berenice was not prepared for this extreme issue; Mrs. Brudenell's threat of departing with her daughters at midnight, and in the storm, shocked and alarmed her; and the other words reawakened her jealous misgivings. Dropping the hand that she had laid protectingly upon Nora's shoulder, she said:

"It shall be as you please, madam. I shall not interfere again."

This altercation had now aroused poor Nora to the consciousness that she herself was a cause of dispute between the two ladies; so putting her hand to her forehead and looking around in a bewildered way, she said:

"No; it is true; I have no right to stop here now; I will go!"

"Jovial," said Berenice, addressing the negro, "have you a wife and a cabin of your own?"

"Yes, madam; at your sarvice."

"Then let it be at my service in good earnest to-night, Jovial; take this poor girl home, and ask your wife to take care of her to-night; and receive this as your compensation," she said, putting a piece of gold in the hand of the man.

"There can be no objection to that, I suppose, madam?" she inquired of Mrs. Brudenell.

"None in the world, unless Dinah objects; it is not every honest negro woman that will consent to have a creature like that thrust upon her. Take her away, Jovial!"

"Come, Miss Nora, honey; my ole 'oman aint agwine to turn you away for your misfortins: we leabes dat to white folk; she'll be a mother to you, honey; and I'll be a father; an' I wish in my soul as I knowed de man as wronged you; if I did, if I didn't give him a skin-full ob broken bones if he was as white as cotton wool, if I didn't, my name aint Mr. Jovial Brudenell, esquire, and I aint no gentleman. And if Mr. Reuben Gray don't hunt him up and punish him, he aint no gentleman, neither!" said Jovial, as he carefully led his half fainting charge along the passages back to the kitchen.

The servants had all gone to bed, except Jovial, whose duty it was, as major-domo, to go all around the house the last thing at night to fasten the doors and windows and put out the fires and lights. So when they reached the kitchen it was empty, though a fine fire was burning in the ample chimney.

"There, my poor hunted hare, you sit down there an' warm yourself good, while I go an' wake up my ole 'oman, an' fetch her here to get something hot for you, afore takin' of you to de cabin, an' likewise to make a fire dere for you; for I 'spects Dinah hab let it go out," said the kind-hearted old man, gently depositing his charge upon a seat in the chimney corner and leaving her there while he went to prepare for her comfort.

When she was alone Nora, who had scarcely heeded a word of his exhortation, sat for a few minutes gazing woefully into vacancy; then she put her hand to her forehead, passing it to and fro, as if to clear away a mist--a gesture common to human creatures bewildered with sorrow; then suddenly crying out:

"My Lord! It is true! and I have no business here! It is a sin and a shame to be here! or anywhere! anywhere in the world!" And throwing up her arms with a gesture of wild despair, she sprang up, tore open the door, and the second time that night rushed out into the storm and darkness.

The warm, light kitchen remained untenanted for perhaps twenty minutes, when Jovial, with his Dinah on his arm and a lantern in his hand, entered, Jovial grumbling:

"Law-a-mity knows, I don't see what she should be a-wantin' to come here for! partic'lar arter de treatment she 'ceived from ole mis'tess las' night! tain't sich a par'dise nohow for nobody--much less for she! Hi, 'oman!" he suddenly cried, turning the rays of the lantern in all directions, though the kitchen was quite light enough without them.

"What de matter now, ole man?" asked Dinah.

"Where Nora? I lef' her here an' she aint here now! where she gone?"

"Hi, ole man, what you ax me for? how you 'spect I know?"

"Well, I 'clare ef dat don't beat eberyting!"

"Maybe she done gone back in de house ag'in!" suggested Dinah.

"Maybe she hab; I go look; but stop, first let me look out'n de door to see if she went away," said Jovial, going to the door and holding the lantern down near the ground.

"Yes, Dinah, 'oman, here day is; little foot-prints in de snow a-goin' away from de house an' almost covered up now! She done gone! Now don't dat beat eberything? Now she'll be froze to death, 'less I goes out in de storm to look for her; an' maybe she'll be froze anyway; for dere's no sartainty 'bout my findin' of her. Now aint dat a trial for any colored gentleman's narves! Well den, here goes! Wait for me here, ole 'omen, till I come back, and if I nebber comes, all I leabes is yourn, you know," sighed the old man, setting down the lantern and beginning to button up his great coat preparatory to braving the storm.

But at this moment a figure came rushing through the snow towards the kitchen door.

"Here she is now; now, ole 'oman! get de gruel ready!" exclaimed Jovial, as the snow-covered form rushed in. "No, it aint, nyther! Miss Hannah! My goodness, gracious me alibe, is all de worl' gone ravin', starin', 'stracted mad to-night? What de debil fotch you out in de storm at midnight?" he asked, as Hannah Worth threw off her shawl and stood in their midst.

"Oh, Jovial! I am looking for poor Nora! Have you seen anything of her?" asked Hannah anxiously.

"She was here a-sittin' by dat fire, not half an hour ago. And I lef her to go and fetch my ole 'oman to get somefin hot, and when I come back, jes' dis wery minute, she's gone!"

"Where, where did she go?" asked Hannah, clasping hear hands in the agony of her anxiety.

"Out o' doors, I see by her little foot-prints a-leading away from de door; dough I 'spects dey's filled up by dis time. I was jes' agwine out to look for her."

"Oh, bless you, Jovial!"

"Which way do you think she went, Miss Hannah?"

"Home again, I suppose, poor child."

"It's a wonder you hadn't met her."

"The night is so dark, and then you know there is more than one path leading from Brudenell down into the valley. And if she went that way she took a different path from the one I came by."

"I go look for her now! I won't lose no more time talkin'," and the old man clapped his hat upon his head and picked up his lantern.

"I will go with you, Jovial," said Nora's sister.

"No, Miss Hannah, don't you 'tempt it; tain't no night for no 'oman to be out."

"And dat a fact, Miss Hannah! don't you go! I can't 'mit of it! You stay here long o' me till my ole man fines her and brings her back here; an' I'll have a bit of supper ready, an' you'll both stop wid us all night," suggested Dinah.

"I thank you both, but I cannot keep still while Nora is in danger! I must help in the search for her," insisted Hannah, with the obstinacy of a loving heart, as she wrapped her shawl more closely around her shoulders and followed the old man out in the midnight storm. It was still snowing very fast. Her guide went a step in front with the lantern, throwing a feeble light upon the soft white path that seemed to sink under their feet as they walked. The old man peered about on the right and left and straight before him, so as to miss no object in his way that might be Nora.

"Jovial," said Hannah, as they crept along, "is it true about the young foreign lady that arrived here last night and turned out to be the wife of Mr. Herman?"

"All as true as gospel, honey," replied the old man, who, in his love of gossip, immediately related to Hannah all the particulars of the arrival of Lady Hurstmonceux and the flight of Herman Brudenell. "Seems like he run away at the sight of his wife, honey; and 'pears like she thinks so too, 'cause she's taken of it sorely to heart, scarce' holdin' up her head since. And it is a pity for her, too, poor young thing; for she's a sweet perty young cre'tur', and took Miss Nora's part like an angel when de old madam was a-callin' of her names, and orderin' of her out'n de house."

"Calling her names! ordering her out of the house! Did Mrs. Brudenell dare to treat Nora Worth so?" cried Hannah indignantly.

"Well, honey, she did rayther, that's a fact. Law, honey, you know yourself how ha'sh ladies is to poor young gals as has done wrong. A hawk down on a chicken aint nuffin to 'em!"

"But my sister has done no wrong; Nora Worth is as innocent as an angel, as honorable as an empress. I can prove it, and I will prove it, let the consequences to the Brudenells be what they may! Called her ill names, did she? Very well! whether my poor wronged child lives or dies this bitter night, I will clear her character to-morrow, let who will be blackened instead of her! Ordered her out of the house, did she? All right! we will soon see how long the heir himself will be permitted to stop there! There's law in the land, for rich as well as poor, I reckon! Threatened her with a constable, did she? Just so! I wonder how she will feel when her own son is dragged off to prison! That will take her down--"

Hannah's words were suddenly cut short, for Jovial, who was going on before her, fell sprawling over some object that lay directly across the path, and the lantern rolled down the hill.

"What is the matter, Jovial?" she inquired.

"Honey, I done fell--fell over somefin' or oder; it is--law, yes--"

"What, Jovial?"

"It's a 'oman, honey; feels like Miss Nora."

In an instant Hannah was down on her knees beside the fallen figure, clearing away the snow that covered it.

"It is Nora," she said, trying to lift the insensible body; but it was a cold, damp, heavy weight, deeply bedded in the snow, and resisted all her efforts.

"Oh, Jovial, I am afraid she is dead! and I cannot get her up! You come and try!" wept Hannah.

"Well, there now, I knowed it--I jest did; I knowed if she was turned out in de snow-storm this night she'd freeze to death! Ole mist'ess aint no better dan a she-bearess!" grumbled the old man, as he rooted his arms under the cold dead weight of the unfortunate girl, and with much tugging succeeded in raising her.

"Now, den, Miss Hannah, hadn't I better tote her back to my ole 'oman?"

"No; we are much nearer the hut than the hall, and even if it were not so, I would not have her taken back there."

They were in fact going up the path leading to the hut on the top of the hill. So, by dint of much lugging and tugging, and many breathless pauses to rest, the old man succeeded in bearing his lifeless burden to the hut.

XI. THE MARTYRS OF LOVE

She woke at length, but not as sleepers wake, Rather the dead, for life seemed something new, A strange sensation which she must partake Perforce, since whatsoever met her view Struck not her memory; though a heavy ache Lay at her heart, whose earliest beat, still true, Brought back the sense of pain, without the cause, For, for a time the furies made a pause.

--Byron.

So Nora's lifeless form was laid upon the bed. Old Mrs. Jones, who had fallen asleep in her chair, was aroused by the disturbance, and stumbled up only half awake to see what was the matter, and to offer her assistance.

Old Jovial had modestly retired to the chimney corner, leaving the poor girl to the personal attention of her sister.

Hannah had thrown off her shawl and bonnet, and was hastily divesting Nora of her wet garments, when the old nurse appeared at her side.

"Oh, Mrs. Jones, is she dead?" cried the elder sister.

"No," replied the oracle, putting her warm hand upon the heart of the patient, "only in a dead faint and chilled to the marrow of her bones, poor heart! Whatever made her run out so in this storm? Where did you find her? had she fallen down in a fit? What was the cause on it?" she went on to hurry question upon question, with the vehemence of an old gossip starving for sensation news.

"Oh, Mrs. Jones, this is no time to talk! we must do something to bring her to life!" wept Hannah.

"That's a fact! Jovial, you good-for-nothing, lazy, lumbering nigger, what are ye idling there for, a-toasting of your crooked black shins? Put up the chunks and hang on the kettle directly," said the nurse with authority.

Poor old Jovial, who was anxious to be of service, waiting only to be called upon, and glad to be set to work, sprung up eagerly to obey this mandate.

Thanks to the huge logs of wood used in Hannah's wide chimney, the neglected fire still burned hotly, and Jovial soon had it in a roaring blaze around the suspended kettle.

"And now, Hannah, you had better get out her dry clothes and a thick blanket, and hang 'em before the fire to warm. And give me some of that wine and some allspice to heat," continued Mrs. Jones.

The sister obeyed, with as much docility as the slave had done, and by their united efforts the patient was soon dressed in warm dry clothes, wrapped in a hot, thick blanket, and tucked up comfortably in bed. But though her form was now limber, and her pulse perceptible, she had not yet spoken or opened her eyes. It was a half an hour later, while Hannah stood bathing her temples with camphor, and Mrs. Jones sat rubbing her hands, that Nora showed the first signs of returning consciousness, and these seemed attended with great mental or bodily pain, it was difficult to tell which, for the stately head was jerked back, the fair forehead corrugated, and the beautiful lips writhen out of shape.

"Fetch me the spiced wine now, Hannah," said the nurse; and when it was brought she administered it by teaspoonfuls. It seemed to do the patient good, for when she had mechanically swallowed it, she sighed as with a sense of relief, sank back upon her pillow and closed her eyes. Her face had lost its look of agony; she seemed perfectly at ease. In a little while she opened her eyes calmly and looked around. Hannah bent over her, murmuring:

"Nora, darling, how do you feel? Speak to me, my pet!"

"Stoop down to me, Hannah! low, lower still, I want to whisper to you."

Hannah put her ear to Nora's lips.

"Oh, Hannah, it was all true! he was married to another woman." And as she gasped out these words with a great sob, her face became convulsed again with agony, and she covered it with her hands.

"Do not take this so much to heart, sweet sister. Heaven knows that you were innocent, and the earth shall know it, too; as for him, he was a villain and a hypocrite not worth a tear," whispered Hannah.

"Oh, no, no, no! I am sure he was not to blame. I cannot tell you why, because I know so little; but I feel that he was faultless," murmured Nora, as the spasm passed off, leaving her in that elysium of physical ease which succeeds great pain.

Hannah was intensely disgusted by Nora's misplaced confidence; but she did not contradict her, for she wished to soothe, not to excite the sufferer.

For a few minutes Nora lay with her eyes closed and her hands crossed upon her bosom, while her watchers stood in silence beside her bed. Then springing up with wildly flaring eyes she seized her sister, crying out:

"Hannah! Oh, Hannah!"

"What is it, child?" exclaimed Hannah, in affright.

"I do believe I'm dying--and, oh! I hope I am."

"Oh, no, ye aint a-dying, nyther; there's more life than death in this 'ere; Lord forgive ye, girl, fer bringing such a grief upon your good sister," said Mrs. Jones grimly.

"Oh, Mrs. Jones, what is the matter with her? Has she taken poison, do you think? She has been in a great deal of trouble to-night!" cried Hannah, in dismay.

"No, it's worse than pi'sen. Hannah, you send that ere gaping and staring nigger right away directly; this aint no place, no longer, for no men-folks to be in, even s'posin they is nothin' but nigger cre-turs.".

Hannah raised her eyes to the speaker. A look of intelligence passed between the two women. The old dame nodded her head knowingly, and then Hannah gently laid Nora back upon her pillow, for she seemed at ease again now, and went to the old man and said:

"Uncle Jovial, you had better go home now. Aunt Dinah will be anxious about you, you know."

"Yes, honey, I knows it, and I was only awaitin' to see if I could be of any more use," replied the old man, meekly rising to obey.

"I thank you very much, dear old Uncle Jovial, for all your goodness to us to-night, and I will knit you a pair of nice warm socks to prove it."

"Laws, child, I don't want nothing of no thanks, nor no socks for a-doin' of a Christian man's duty. And now, Miss Hannah, don't you be cast down about this here misfortin'; it's nothin' of no fault of yours; everybody 'spects you for a well-conducted young 'oman; an' you is no ways 'countable for your sister's mishaps. Why, there was my own Aunt Dolly's step-daughter's husband's sister-in-law's son as was took up for stealin' of sheep. But does anybody 'spect me the less for that? No! and no more won't nobody 'spect you no less for poor misfortinit Miss Nora. Only I do wish I had that ere scamp, whoever he is, by the ha'r of his head! I'd give his blamed neck one twist he wouldn't 'cover of in a hurry," said the old man, drawing himself up stiffly as he buttoned his overcoat.

"And now good-night, chile! I'll send my ole 'oman over early in de mornin', to fetch Miss Nora somefin' nourishin, an' likewise to see if she can be of any use," said Jovial, as he took up his hat to depart.

The snow had ceased to fall, the sky was perfectly clear, and the stars were shining brightly. Hannah felt glad of this for the old man's sake, as she closed the door behind him.

But Nora demanded her instant attention. That sufferer was in a paroxysm of agony stronger than any that had yet preceded it.

There was a night of extreme illness, deadly peril, and fearful anxiety in the hut.

But the next morning, just as the sun arose above the opposite heights of Brudenell, flooding all the cloudless heavens and the snow-clad earth with light and glory, a new life also arose in that humble hut upon the hill.

* * * * *

Hannah Worth held a new-born infant boy in her arms, and her tears fell fast upon his face like a baptism of sorrow.

The miserable young mother lay back upon her pillow--death impressed upon the sunken features, the ashen complexion, and the fixed eyes.

"Oh, what a blessing if this child could die!" cried Hannah, in a piercing voice that reached even the failing senses of the dying girl.

There was an instant change. It was like the sudden flaring up of an expiring light. Down came the stony eyes, melting with tenderness and kindling with light. All the features were softened and illumined.

Those who have watched the dying are familiar with these sudden re-kindlings of life. She spoke in tones of infinite sweetness:

"Oh, do not say so, Hannah! Do not grudge the poor little thing his life! Everything else has been taken from him, Hannah!--father, mother, name, inheritance, and all! Leave him his little life: it has been dearly purchased! Hold him down to me, Hannah; I will give him one kiss, if no one ever kisses him again."

"Nora, my poor darling, you know that I will love your boy, and work for him, and take care of him, if he lives; only I thought it was better if it pleased God that he should go home to the Saviour," said Hannah, as she held the infant down to receive his mother's kiss.

"God love you, poor, poor baby!" said Nora, putting up her feeble hands, and bringing the little face close to her lips. "He will live, Hannah! Oh, I prayed all through the dreadful night that he might live, and the Lord has answered my prayer," she added, as she resigned the child once more to her sister's care.

Then folding her hands over her heart, and lifting her eyes towards heaven with a look of sweet solemnity, and, in a voice so deep, bell-like, and beautiful that it scarcely seemed a human one, she said:

"Out of the Depths have I called to Thee, and Thou hast heard my voice."

And with these sublime words upon her lips she once more dropped away into sleep, stupor, or exhaustion--for it is difficult to define the conditions produced in the dying by the rising and falling of the waves of life when the tide is ebbing away. The beautiful eyes did not close, but rolled themselves up under their lids; the sweet lips fell apart, and the pearly teeth grew dry.

Old Mrs. Jones, who had been busy with a saucepan over the fire, now approached the bedside, saying:

"Is she 'sleep?"

"I do not know. Look at her, and see if she is," replied the weeping sister.

"Well, I can't tell," said the nurse, after a close examination.

And neither could Hippocrates, if he had been there.

"Do you think she can possibly live?" sobbed Hannah.

"Well--I hope so, honey. Law, I've seen 'em as low as that come round again. Now lay the baby down, Hannah Worth, and come away to the window; I want to talk to you without the risk of disturbing her."

Hannah deposited the baby by its mother's side and followed the nurse.

"Now you know, Hannah, you must not think as I'm a hard-hearted ole 'oman; but you see I must go."

"Go! oh, no! don't leave Nora in her low state! I have so little experience in these cases, you know. Stay with her! I will pay you well, if I am poor."

"Child, it aint the fear of losin' of the pay; I'm sure you're welcome to all I've done for you."

"Then do stay! It seems indeed that Providence himself sent you to us last night! What on earth should we have done without you! It was really the Lord that sent you to us."

"'Pears to me it was Old Nick! I know one thing: I shouldn't a-come if I had known what an adventur' I was a-goin' to have," mumbled the old woman to herself.

Hannah, who had not heard her words, spoke again:

"You'll stay?"

"Now, look here, Hannah Worth, I'm a poor old lady, with nothing but my character and my profession; and if I was to stay here and nuss Nora Worth, I should jes' lose both on 'em, and sarve me right, too! What call have I to fly in the face of society?"

Hannah made no answer, but went and reached a cracked tea-pot from the top shelf of the dresser, took from it six dollars and a half, which was all her fortune, and came and put it in the hand of the nurse, saying:

"Here! take this as your fee for your last night's work and go, and never let me see your face again if you can help it."

"Now, Hannah Worth, don't you be unreasonable--now, don't ye; drat the money, child; I can live without it, I reckon; though I can't live without my character and my perfession; here, take it, child--you may want it bad afore all's done; and I'm sure I would stay and take care of the poor gal if I dared; but now you know yourself, Hannah, that if I was to do so, I should be a ruinated old 'oman; for there ain't a respectable lady in the world as would ever employ me again."

"But I tell you that Nora is as innocent as her own babe; and her character shall be cleared before the day is out!" exclaimed Hannah, tears of rage and shame welling to her eyes.

"Yes, honey, I dessay; and when it's done I'll come back and nuss her--for nothing, too," replied the old woman dryly, as she put on her bonnet and shawl.

This done she returned to the side of Hannah.

"Now, you know I have told you everything what to do for Nora; and by-and-by, I suppose, old Dinah will come, as old Jovial promised; and maybe she'll stay and 'tend to the gal and the child; 'twon't hurt her, you know, 'cause niggers aint mostly got much character to lose. There, child, take up your money; I wouldn't take it from you, no more'n I'd pick a pocket. Good-by."

Hannah would have thrown the money after the dame as she left the hut, but that Nora's dulcet tones recalled her:

"Hannah, don't!"

She hurried to the patient's bedside; there was another rising of the waves of life; Nora's face, so dark and rigid a moment before, was now again soft and luminous.

"What is it, sister?" inquired Hannah, bending over her.

"Don't be angry with her, dear; she did all she could for us, you know, without injuring herself--and we had no right to expect that."

"But--her cruel words!"

"Dear Hannah, never mind; when you are hurt by such, remember our Saviour; think of the indignities that were heaped upon the Son of God; and how meekly he bore them, and how freely he forgave them."

"Nora, dear, you do not talk like yourself."

"Because I am dying, Hannah. My boy came in with the rising sun, and I shall go out with its setting."

"No, no, my darling--you are much better than you were. I do not see why you should die!" wept Hannah.

"But I do; I am not better, Hannah--I have only floated back. I am always floating backward and forward, towards life and towards death; only every time I float towards death I go farther away, and I shall float out with the day."

Hannah was too much moved to trust herself to speak.

"Sister," said Nora, in a fainter voice, "I have one last wish."

"What is it, my own darling?"

"To see poor, poor Herman once more before I die."

"To forgive him! Yes, I suppose that will be right, though very hard," sighed the elder girl.

"No, not to forgive him, Hannah--for he has never willingly injured me, poor boy; but to lay my hand upon his head, and look into his eyes, and assure him with my dying breath that I know he was not to blame; for I do know it, Hannah."

"Oh, Nora, what faith!" cried the sister.

The dying girl, who, to use her own words, was floating away again, scarcely heard this exclamation, for she murmured on in a lower tone, like the receding voice of the wind:

"For if I do not have a chance of saying this to him, Hannah--if he is left to suppose I went down to the grave believing him to be treacherous--it will utterly break his heart, Hannah; for I know him, poor fellow---he is as sensitive as--as--any--." She was gone again out of reach.

Hannah watched the change that slowly grew over her beautiful face: saw the grayness of death creep over it--saw its muscles stiffen into stone--saw the lovely eyeballs roll upward out of sight--and the sweet lips drawn away from the glistening teeth.

While she thus watched she heard a sound behind her. She turned in time to see the door pushed open, and Herman Brudenell--pale, wild, haggard, with matted hair, and blood-shot eyes, and shuddering frame--totter into the room.

XII. HERMAN'S STORY

Thus lived--thus died she; never more on her Shall sorrow light or shame. She was not made, Through years of moons, the inner weight to bear, Which colder hearts endure 'til they are laid By age in earth: her days and pleasures were Brief but delightful--such as had not stayed Long with her destiny; but she sleeps well By the sea-shore, whereon she loved to dwell.

--Byron.

Hannah arose, met the intruder, took his hand, led him to the bed of death and silently pointed to the ghastly form of Nora.

He gazed with horror on the sunken features, gray complexion, upturned eyes, and parted lips of the once beautiful girl.

"Hannah, how is this--dying?" he whispered huskily.

"Dying," replied the woman solemnly.

"So best," he whispered, in a choking voice.

"So best," she echoed, as she drew away to the distant window. "So best, as death is better than dishonor. But you! Oh, you villain! oh, you heartless, shameless villain! to pass yourself off for a single man and win her love and deceive her with a false marriage!"

"Hannah! hear me!" cried the young man, in a voice of anguish.

"Dog! ask the judge and jury to hear you when you are brought to trial for your crime! For do you think that I am a-going to let that girl go down to her grave in undeserved reproach? No, you wretch! not to save from ruin you and your fine sisters and high mother, and all your proud, shameful race! No, you devil! if there is law in the land, you shall be dragged to jail like a thief and exposed in court to answer for your bigamy; and all the world shall hear that you are a felon and she an honest girl who thought herself your wife when she gave you her love!"

"Hannah, Hannah, prosecute, expose me if you like! I am so miserable that I care not what becomes of me or mine. The earth is crumbling under my feet! do you think I care for trifles? Denounce, but hear me! Heaven knows I did not willingly deceive poor Nora! I was myself deceived! If she believed herself to be my wife, I as fully believed myself to be her husband."

"You lie!" exclaimed this rude child of nature, who knew no fine word for falsehood.

"Oh, it is natural you should rail at me! But, Hannah, my sharp, sharp grief makes me insensible to mere stinging words. Yet if you would let me, I could tell you the combination of circumstances that deceived us both!" replied Herman, with the patience of one who, having suffered the extreme power of torture, could feel no new wound.

"Tell me, then!" snapped Hannah harshly and incredulously.

He leaned against the window-frame and whispered:

"I shall not survive Nora long; I feel that I shall not; I have not taken food or drink, or rested under a roof, since I heard that news, Hannah. Well, to explain--I was very young when I first met her---"

"Met who?" savagely demanded Hannah.

"My first wife. She was the only child and heiress of a retired Jew-tradesman. Her beauty fascinated an imbecile old nobleman, who, having insulted the daughter with 'liberal' proposals, that were scornfully rejected, tempted the father with 'honorable' ones, which were eagerly accepted. The old Jew, in his ambition to become father-in-law to the old earl, forgot his religious prejudices and coaxed his daughter to sacrifice herself. And thus Berenice D'Israeli became Countess of Hurstmonceux. The old peer survived his foolish marriage but six months, and died leaving his widow penniless, his debts having swamped even her marriage portion. His entailed estates went to the heir-at-law, a distant relation--"

"What in the name of Heaven do you think I care for your countesses! I want to know what excuse you can give for your base deception of my sister," fiercely interrupted Hannah.

"I am coming to that. It was in the second year of the Countess Hurstmonceux's widowhood that I met her at Brighton. Oh, Hannah, it is not in vanity; but in palliation of my offense that I tell you she loved me first. And when a widow loves a single man, in nine cases out of ten she will make him marry her. She hunted me down, ran me to earth--"

"Oh, you wretch! to say such things of a lady!" exclaimed the woman, with indignation.

"It is true, Hannah, and in this awful hour, with that ghastly form before me, truth and not false delicacy must prevail. I say then that the Countess of Hurstmonceux hunted me down and run me to earth, but all in such feminine fashion that I scarcely knew I was hunted. I was flattered by her preference, grateful for her kindness and proud of the prospect of carrying off from all competitors the most beautiful among the Brighton belles; but all this would not have tempted me to offer her my hand, for I did not love her, Hannah."

"What did tempt you then?" inquired the woman.

"Pity; I saw that she loved me passionately, and--I proposed to her."

"Coxcomb! do you think she would have broken her heart if you hadn't?"

"Yes, Hannah, to tell the truth, I did think so then; I was but a boy, you know; and I had that fatal weakness of which I told you--that which dreaded to inflict pain and delighted to impart joy. So I asked her to marry me. But the penniless Countess of Hurstmonceux was the sole heiress of the wealthy old Jew, Jacob D'Israeli. And he had set his mind upon her marrying a gouty marquis, and thus taking one step higher in the peerage; so of course he would not listen to my proposal, and he threatened to disinherit his daughter if she married me. Then we did what so many others in similar circumstances do--we married privately. Soon after this I was summoned home to take possession of my estates. So I left England; but not until I had discovered the utter unworthiness of the siren whom I was so weak as to make my wife. I did not reproach the woman, but when I sailed from Liverpool it was with the resolution never to return."

"Well, sir! even supposing you were drawn into a foolish marriage with an artful woman, and had a good excuse for deserting her, was that any reason why you should have committed the crime of marrying Nora?" cried the woman fiercely.

"Hannah, it was not until after I had read an account of a railway collision, in which it was stated that the Countess of Hurstmonceux was among the killed that I proposed for Nora. Oh, Hannah, as the Lord in heaven hears me, I believed myself to be a free, single man, a widower, when I married Nora! My only fault was too great haste. I believed Nora to be my lawful wife until the unexpected arrival of the Countess of Hurstmonceux, who had been falsely reported among the killed."

"If this is so," said Hannah, beginning to relent, "perhaps after all you are more to be pitied than blamed."

"Thank you, thank you, Hannah, for saying that! But tell me, does she believe that I willfully deceived her? Yet why should I ask? She must think so! appearances are so strong against me," he sadly reflected.

"But she does not believe it; her last prayer was that she might see you once more before she died, to tell you that she knew you were not to blame," wept Hannah.

"Bless her! bless her!" exclaimed the young man.

Hannah, whose eyes had never, during this interview, left the face of Nora, now murmured:

"She is reviving again; will you see her now?"

Herman humbly bowed his head and both approached the bed.

That power--what is it?--awe?--that power which subdues the wildest passions in the presence of death, calmed the grief of Herman as he stood over Nora.

She was too far gone for any strong human emotion; but her pale, rigid face softened and brightened as she recognized him, and she tried to extend her hand towards him.

He saw and gently took it, and stooped low to hear the sacred words her dying lips were trying to pronounce.

"Poor, poor boy; don't grieve so bitterly; it wasn't your fault," she murmured.

"Oh, Nora, your gentle spirit may forgive me, but I never can forgive myself for the reckless haste that has wrought all this ruin!" groaned Herman, sinking on his knees and burying his face on the counterpane, overwhelmed by grief and remorse for the great, unintentional wrong he had done; and by the impossibility of explaining the cause of his fatal mistake to this poor girl whose minutes were now numbered.

Softly and tremblingly the dying hand arose, fluttered a moment like a white dove, and then dropped in blessing on his head.

"May the Lord give the peace that he only can bestow; may the Lord pity you, comfort you, bless you and save you forever, Herman, poor Herman!"

A few minutes longer her hand rested on his head, and then she removed it and murmured:

"Now leave me for a little while; I wish to speak to my sister."

Herman arose and went out of the hut, where he gave way to the pent-up storm of grief that could not be vented by the awful bed of death.

Nora then beckoned Hannah, who approached and stooped low to catch her words.

"Sister, you would not refuse to grant my dying prayers, would you?"

"Oh, no, no, Nora!" wept the woman.

"Then promise me to forgive poor Herman the wrong that he has done us; he did not mean to do it, Hannah."

"I know he did not, love; he explained it all to me. The first wife was a bad woman who took him in. He thought she had been killed in a railway collision, when he married you, and he never found out his mistake until she followed him home."

"I knew there was something of that sort; but I did not know what. Now, Hannah, promise me not to breathe a word to any human being of his second marriage with me; it would ruin him, you know, Hannah; for no one would believe but that he knew his first wife was living all the time. Will you promise me this, Hannah?"

Even though she spoke with great difficulty, Hannah did not answer until she repeated the question.

Then with a sob and a gulp the elder sister said:

"Keep silence, and let people reproach your memory, Nora? How can I do that?"

"Can reproach reach me--there?" she asked, raising her hand towards heaven.

"But your child, Nora; for his sake his mother's memory should be vindicated!"

"At the expense of making his father out a felon? No, Hannah, no; people will soon forget he ever had a mother. He will only be known as Hannah Worth's nephew, and she is everywhere respected. Promise me, Hannah."

"Nora, I dare not."

"Sister, I am dying; you cannot refuse the prayer of the dying."

Hannah was silent.

"Promise me! promise me! promise me! while my ears can yet take in your voice!" Nora's words fell fainter and fainter; she was failing fast.

"Oh, Heaven, I promise you, Nora--the Lord forgive me for it!" wept Hannah.

"The Lord bless you for it, Hannah." Her voice sunk into murmurs and the cold shades of death crept over her face again; but rallying her fast failing strength she gasped:

"My boy, quick! Oh, quick, Hannah!"

Hannah lifted the babe from his nest and held him low to meet his mother's last kiss.

"There, now, lay him on my arm, Hannah, close to my left side, and draw my hand over him; I would feel him near me to the very last."

With trembling fingers the poor woman obeyed.

And the dying mother held her child to her heart, and raised her glazing eyes full of the agony of human love to Heaven, and prayed:

"O pitiful Lord, look down in mercy on this poor, poor babe! Take him under thy care!" And with this prayer she sank into insensibility.

Hannah flew to the door and beckoned Herman. He came in, the living image of despair. And both went and stood by the bed. They dared not break the sacred spell by speech. They gazed upon her in silent awe.

Her face was gray and rigid; her eyes were still and stony; her breath and pulse were stopped. Was she gone? No, for suddenly upon that face of death a great light dawned, irradiating it with angelic beauty and glory; and once more with awful solemnity deep bell-like tones tolled forth the notes.

"Out of the depths have I called to Thee And Thou hast heard my voice."

And with these holy words upon her lips the gentle spirit of Nora Worth, ruined maiden but innocent mother, winged its way to heaven.

XIII. THE FLIGHT OF HERMAN

Tread softly--bow the head-- In reverent silence bow; There's one in that poor shed, One by that humble bed, Greater than thou!

Oh, change! Stupendous change! Fled the immortal one! A moment here, so low, So agonized, and now-- Beyond the sun!

--Caroline Bowles.

For some time Hannah Worth and Herman Brudenell remained standing by the bedside, and gazing in awful silence upon the beautiful clay extended before them, upon which the spirit in parting had left the impress of its last earthly smile!

Then the bitter grief of the bereaved woman burst through all outward restraints, and she threw herself upon the bed and clasped the dead body of her sister to her breast, and broke into a tempest of tears and sobs and lamentations.

"Oh, Nora! my darling! are you really dead and gone from me forever? Shall I never hear the sound of your light step coming in, nor meet the beamings of your soft eyes, nor feel your warm arms around my neck, nor listen to your coaxing voice, pleading for some little indulgence which half the time I refused you?

"How could I have refused you, my darling, anything, hard-hearted that I was! Ah! how little did I think how soon you would be taken from me, and I should never be able to give you anything more! Oh, Nora, come back to me, and I will give you everything I have--yes, my eyes, and my life, and my soul, if they could bring you back and make you happy!

"My beautiful darling, you were the light of my eyes and the pulse of my heart and the joy of my life! You were all that I had in the world! my little sister and my daughter and my baby, all in one! How could you die and leave me all alone in the world, for the love of a man? me who loves you more than all the men on the earth could love!

"Nora, I shall look up from my loom and see your little wheel standing still--and where the spinner? I shall sit down to my solitary meals and see your vacant chair--and where my companion? I shall wake in the dark night and stretch out my arms to your empty place beside me--and where my warm loving sister? In the grave! in the cold, dark, still grave!

"Oh, Heaven! Heaven! how can I bear it?--I, all day in the lonely house! all night in the lonely bed! all my life in the lonely world! the black, freezing, desolate world! and she in her grave! I cannot bear it! Oh, no, I cannot bear it! Angels in heaven, you know that I cannot! Speak to the Lord, and ask him to take me!

"Lord, Lord, please to take me along with my child. We were but two! two orphan sisters! I have grown gray in taking care of her! She cannot do without me, nor I without her! We were but two! Why should one be taken and the other left? It is not fair, Lord! I say it is not fair!" raved the mourner, in that blind and passionate abandonment of grief which is sure at its climax to reach frenzy, and break into open rebellion against Omnipotent Power.

And it is well for us that the Father is more merciful than our tenderest thoughts, for he pardons the rebel and heals his wounds.

The sorrow of the young man, deepened by remorse, was too profound for such outward vent. He leaned against the bedpost, seemingly colder, paler, and more lifeless than the dead body before him.

At length the tempest of Hannah's grief raged itself into temporary rest. She arose, composed the form of her sister, and turned and laid her hand upon the shoulder of Herman, saying calmly:

"It is all over. Go, young gentleman, and wrestle with your sorrow and your remorse, as you may. Such wrestlings will be the only punishment your rashness will receive in this world! Be free of dread from me. She left you her forgiveness as a legacy, and you are sacred from my pursuit. Go, and leave me with my dead."

Herman dropped upon his knees beside the bed of death, took the cold hand of Nora between his own, and bowed his head upon it for a little while in penitential homage, and then arose and silently left the hut.

After he had gone, Hannah remained for a few minutes standing where he had left her, gazing in silent anguish upon the dark eyes of Nora, now glazed in death, and then, with reverential tenderness, she pressed down the white lids, closing them until the light of the resurrection morning should open them again.

While engaged in this holy duty, Hannah was interrupted by the re-entrance of Herman.

He came in tottering, as if under the influence of intoxication; but we all know that excessive sorrow takes away the strength and senses as surely as intoxication does. There is such a state as being drunken with grief when we have drained the bitter cup dry!

"Hannah," he faltered, "there are some things which should be remembered even in this awful hour."

The sorrowing woman, her fingers still softly pressing down her sister's eyelids, looked up in mute inquiry.

"Your necessities and--Nora's child must be provided for. Will you give me some writing materials?" And the speaker dropped, as if totally prostrated, into a chair by the table.

With some difficulty Hannah sought and found an old inkstand, a stumpy pen, and a scrap of paper. It was the best she could do. Stationery was scarce in the poor hut. She laid them on the table before Herman. And with a trembling hand he wrote out a check upon the local bank and put it in her hand, saying:

"This sum will provide for the boy, and set you and Gray up in some little business. You had better marry and go to the West, taking the child with you. Be a mother to the orphan, Hannah, for he will never know another parent. And now shake hands and say good-by, for we shall never meet again in this world."

Too thoroughly bewildered with grief to comprehend the purport of his words and acts, Hannah mechanically received the check and returned the pressure of the hand with which it was given.

And the next instant the miserable young man was gone indeed.

Hannah dropped the paper upon the table; she did not in the least suspect that that little strip of soiled foolscap represented the sum of five thousand dollars, nor is it likely that she would have taken it had she known what it really was. Hannah's intellects were chaotic with her troubles. She returned to the bedside and was once more absorbed in her sorrowful task, when she was again interrupted.

This time it was by old Dinah, who, having no hand at liberty, shoved the door open with her foot, and entered the hut.

If "there is but one step between the sublime and the ridiculous," there is no step at all between the awful and the absurd, which are constantly seen side by side. Though such a figure as old Dinah presented, standing in the middle of the death-chamber, is not often to be found in tragic scenes. Her shoulders were bent beneath the burden of an enormous bundle of bed clothing, and her arms were dragged down by the weight of two large baskets of provisions. She was much too absorbed in her own ostentatious benevolence to look at once towards the bed and see what had happened there. Probably, if she glanced at the group at all, she supposed that Hannah was only bathing Nora's head; for instead of going forward or tendering any sympathy or assistance, she just let her huge bundle drop from her shoulders and sat her two baskets carefully upon the table, exclaiming triumphantly:

"Dar! dar's somefin to make de poor gal comfo'ble for a mont' or more! Dar, in dat bundle is two thick blankets and four pa'r o' sheets an' pilly cases, all out'n my own precious chist; an' not beholden to ole mis' for any on 'em," she added, as she carefully untied the bundle and laid its contents, nicely folded, upon a chair.

"An' dar!" she continued, beginning to unload the large basket--"dar's a tukky an' two chickuns offen my own precious roost; nor likewise beholden to ole mis for dem nyder. An' dar! dar's sassidges and blood puddin's out'n our own dear pig as me an' ole man Jov'al ris an' kilt ourselves; an' in course no ways beholden to ole mis'," she concluded, arranging these edibles upon the table.

"An' dar!" she recommenced as she set the smaller basket beside the other things, "dar's a whole raft o''serves an' jellies and pickles as may be useful. An' dat's all for dis time! An' now, how is de poor gal, honey? Is she 'sleep?" she asked, approaching the bed.

"Yes; sleeping her last sleep, Dinah," solemnly replied Hannah.

"De Lor' save us! what does you mean by dat, honey? Is she faint?"

"Look at her, Dinah, and see for yourself!"

"Dead! oh, Lor'-a-mercy!" cried the old woman, drawing back appalled at the sight that met her eyes; for to the animal nature of the pure African negro death is very terrible.

For a moment there was silence in the room, and then the voice of Hannah was heard:

"So you see the comforts you robbed yourself of to bring to Nora will not be wanted, Dinah. You must take them back again."

"Debil burn my poor, ole, black fingers if I teches of 'em to bring 'em home again! S'posin' de poor dear gal is gone home? aint you lef wid a mouf of your own to feed, I wonder? Tell me dat?" sobbed the old woman.

"But, Dinah, I feel as if I should never eat again, and certainly I shall not care what I eat. And that is your Christmas turkey, too, your only one, for I know that you poor colored folks never have more."

"Who you call poor? We's rich in grace, I'd have you to know! 'Sides havin' of a heap o' treasure laid up in heaven, I reckons! Keep de truck, chile; for 'deed you aint got no oder 'ternative! 'Taint Dinah as is a-gwine to tote 'em home ag'n. Lor' knows how dey a'mos' broke my back a-fetchin' of 'em over here. 'Taint likely as I'll be such a consarned fool as to tote 'em all de way back ag'in. So say no more 'bout it, Miss Hannah! 'Sides which how can we talk o' sich wid de sight o' she before our eyes! Ah, Miss Nora! Oh, my beauty! Oh, my pet! Is you really gone an' died an' lef' your poor ole Aunt Dinah behind as lubbed you like de apple of her eye! What did you do it for, honey? You know your ole Aunt Dinah wasn't a-goin' to look down on you for nothin' as is happened of," whined the old woman, stooping and weeping over the corpse. Then she accidentally touched the sleeping babe, and started up in dismay, crying:

"What dis? Oh, my good Lor' in heaben, what dis?"

"It is Nora's child, Dinah. Didn't you know she had one?" said Hannah; with a choking voice and a crimson face.

"Neber even s'picioned! I knowed as she'd been led astray, poor thin', an' as how it was a-breakin' of her heart and a-killin' of her! Leastways I heard it up yonder at de house; but I didn't know nuffin' 'bout dis yere!"

"But Uncle Jovial did."

"Dat ole sinner has got eyes like gimlets, dey bores into eberyting!"

"But didn't he tell you?"

"Not a singly breaf! he better not! he know bery well it's much as his ole wool's worf to say a word agin dat gal to me. No, he on'y say how Miss Nora wer' bery ill, an' in want ob eberyting in de worl' an' eberyting else besides. An' how here wer' a chance to 'vest our property to 'vantage, by lendin' of it te de Lor', accordin' te de Scriptur's as 'whoever giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord.' So I hunted up all I could spare and fotch it ober here, little thinkin' what a sight would meet my old eyes! Well, Lord!"

"But, Dinah," said the weeping Hannah, "you must not think ill of Nora! She does not deserve it. And you must not, indeed."

"Chile, it aint for me to judge no poor motherless gal as is already 'peared afore her own Righteous Judge."

"Yes, but you shall judge her! and judge her with righteous judgment, too! You have known her all your life--all hers, I mean. You put the first baby clothes on her that she ever wore! And you will put the last dress that she ever will! And now judge her, Dinah, looking on her pure brow, and remembering her past life, is she a girl likely to have been 'led astray,' as you call it?"

"No, 'fore my 'Vine Marster in heaben, aint she? As I 'members ob de time anybody had a-breaved a s'picion ob Miss Nora, I'd jest up'd an' boxed deir years for 'em good--'deed me! But what staggers of me, honey, is dat! How de debil we gwine to 'count for dat?" questioned old Dinah, pointing in sorrowful suspicion at the child.

For all answer Hannah beckoned to the old woman to watch her, while she untied from Nora's neck a narrow black ribbon, and removed from it a plain gold ring.

"A wedding-ring!" exclaimed Dinah, in perplexity.

"Yes, it was put upon her finger by the man that married her. Then it was taken off and hung around her neck, because for certain reasons she could not wear it openly. But now it shall go with her to the grave in its right place," said Hannah, as she slipped the ring upon the poor dead finger.

"Lor', child, who was it as married of her?"

"I cannot tell you. I am bound to secrecy."

The old negress shook her head slowly and doubtfully.

"I's no misdoubts as she was innocenter dan a lamb, herself, for she do look it as she lay dar wid de heabenly smile frozen on her face; but I do misdoubts dese secrety marriages; I 'siders ob 'em no 'count. Ten to one, honey, de poor forso'k sinner as married her has anoder wife some'ers."

Without knowing it the old woman had hit the exact truth.

Hannah sighed deeply, and wondered silently how it was that neither Dinah nor Jovial had ever once suspected their young master to be the man.

Old Dinah perceived that her conversation distressed Hannah, and so she threw off her bonnet and cloak and set herself to work to help the poor bereaved sister.

There was enough to occupy both women. There was the dead mother to be prepared for burial, and there was the living child to be cared far.

By the time that they had laid Nora out in her only white dress, and had fed the babe and put it to sleep, and cleaned up the cottage, the winter day had drawn to its close and the room was growing dark.

Old Dinah, thinking it was time to light up, took a home-dipped candle from the cupboard, and seeing a piece of soiled paper on the table, actually lighted her candle with a check for five thousand dollars!

And thus it happened that the poor boy who, without any fault of his mother, had come into the world with a stigma on his birth, now, without any neglect of his father, was left in a state of complete destitution as well as of entire orphanage.

On the Tuesday following her death poor Nora Worth was laid in her humble grave under a spreading oak behind the hut.

This spot was selected by Hannah, who wished to keep her sister's last resting-place always in her sight, and who insisted that every foot of God's earth, enclosed or unenclosed--consecrated or unconsecrated--was holy ground.

Jim Morris, Professor of Odd Jobs for the country side, made the coffin, dug the grave, and managed the funeral.

The Rev. William Wynne, the minister who had performed the fatal nuptial ceremony of the fair bride, read the funeral services over her dead body.

No one was present at the burial but Hannah Worth, Reuben Gray, the two old negroes, Dinah and Jovial, the Professor of Odd Jobs, and the officiating clergyman.

XIV. OVER NORA'S GRAVE

Oh, Mother Earth! upon thy lap, Thy weary ones receiving, And o'er them, silent as a dream, Thy grassy mantle weaving, Fold softly, in thy long embrace, That heart so worn and broken, And cool its pulse of fire beneath Thy shadows old and oaken. Shut out from her the bitter word, And serpent hiss of scorning: Nor let the storms of yesterday Disturb her quiet morning.

--Whittier.

When the funeral ceremonies were over and the mourners were coming away from the grave, Mr. Wynne turned to them and said:

"Friends, I wish to have some conversation with Hannah Worth, if you will excuse me."

And the humble group, with the exception of Reuben Gray, took leave of Hannah and dispersed to their several homes. Reuben waited outside for the end of the parson's interview with his betrothed.

"This is a great trial to you, my poor girl; may the Lord support you under it!" said Mr. Wynne, as they entered the hut and sat down.

Hannah sobbed.

"I suppose it was the discovery of Mr. Brudenell's first marriage that killed her?"

"Yes, sir," sobbed Hannah.

"Ah! I often read and speak of the depravity of human nature; but I could not have believed Herman Brudenell capable of so black a crime," said Mr. Wynne, with a shudder.

"Sir," replied Hannah, resolved to do justice in spite of her bleeding heart, "he isn't so guilty as you judge him to be. When he married Norah he believed that his wife had been killed in a great railway crash, for so it was reported in all the newspaper accounts of the accident; and he never saw it contradicted."

"His worst fault then appears to have been that of reckless haste in consummating his second marriage," said Mr. Wynne.

"Yes; and even for that he had some excuse. His first wife was an artful widow, who entrapped him into a union and afterwards betrayed his confidence and her own honor. When he heard she was dead, you see, no doubt he was shocked; but he could not mourn for her as he could for a true, good woman."

"Humph! I hope, then, for the sake of human nature that he is not so bad as I thought him. But now, Hannah, what do you intend to do?"

"About what?" inquired the poor woman sadly.

"About clearing the memory of your sister and the birth of her son from unmerited shame," replied Mr. Wynne gravely.

"Nothing," she answered sadly.

"Nothing?" repeated the minister, in surprise.

"Nothing," she reiterated.

"What! will you leave the stigma of undeserved reproach upon your sister in her grave and upon her child all his life, when a single revelation from you, supported by my testimony, will clear them both?" asked the minister, in almost indignant astonishment.

"Not willingly, the Lord above knows. Oh, I would die to clear Nora from blame!" cried Hannah, bursting into a flood of tears.

"Well, then, do it, my poor woman! do it! You can do it," said the clergyman, drawing his chair to her side and laying his hand kindly on her shoulder. "Hannah, my girl, you have a duty to the dead and to the living to perform. Do not be afraid to attempt it! Do not be afraid to offend that wealthy and powerful family! I will sustain you, for it is my duty as a Christian minister to do so, even though they--the Brudenells--should afterwards turn all their great influence in the parish against me. Yes, I will sustain you, Hannah! What do I say? I? A mightier arm than that of any mortal shall hold you up!"

"Oh, it is of no use! the case is quite past remedying," wept Hannah.

"But it is not, I assure you! When I first heard the astounding news of Brudenell's first marriage with the Countess of Hurstmonceaux, and his wife's sudden arrival at the Hall, and recollected at the same time his second marriage with Nora Worth, which I myself had solemnized, my thoughts flew to his poor young victim, and I pondered what could be done for her, and I searched the laws of the land bearing upon the subject of marriage. And I found that by these same laws--when a man in the lifetime of his wife marries another woman, the said woman being in ignorance of the existence of the said wife, shall be held guiltless by the law, and her child or children, if she have any by the said marriage, shall be the legitimate offspring of the mother, legally entitled to bear her name and inherit her estates. That fits precisely Nora's case. Her son is legitimate. If she had in her own right an estate worth a billion, that child would be her heir-at-law. She had nothing but her good name! Her son has a right to inherit that--unspotted, Hannah! mind, unspotted! Your proper way will be to proceed against Herman Brudenell for bigamy, call me for a witness, establish the fact of Nora's marriage, rescue her memory and her child's birth from the slightest shadow of reproach, and let the consequences fall where they should fall, upon the head of the man! They will not be more serious than he deserves. If he can prove what he asserts--that he himself was in equal ignorance with Nora of the existence of his first wife, he will be honorably acquitted in the court, though of course severely blamed by the community. Come, Hannah, shall we go to Baymouth to-morrow about this business?"

Hannah was sobbing as if her heart would break.

"How glad I would be to clear Nora and her child from shame, no one but the Searcher of Hearts can know! But I dare not! I am bound by a vow! a solemn vow made to the dying! Poor girl! with her last breath she besought me not to expose Mr. Brudenell, and not to breathe one word of his marriage with her to any living soul!" she cried.

"And you were mad enough to promise!"

"I would rather have bitten my tongue off than have used it in such a fatal way! But she was dying fast, and praying to me with her uplifted eyes and clasped hands and failing breath to spare Herman Brudenell. I had no power to refuse her--my heart was broken. So I bound my soul by a vow to be silent. And I must keep my sacred promise made to the dying; I must keep it though, till the Judgment Day that shall set all things right, Nora Worth, if thought of it all, must be considered a fallen girl and her son the child of sin!" cried Hannah, breaking into a passion of tears and sobs.

"The devotion of woman passes the comprehension of man," said the minister reflectively. "But in sacrificing herself thus, had she no thought of the effect upon the future of her child?"

"She said he was a boy; his mother would soon be forgotten; he would be my nephew, and I was respected," sobbed Hannah.

"In a word, she was a special pleader in the interest of the man whose reckless haste had destroyed her!"

"Yes; that was it! that was it! Oh, my Nora! oh, my young sister! it was hard to see you die! hard to see you covered up in the coffin! but it is harder still to know that people will speak ill of you in your grave, and I cannot convince them that they are wrong!" said Hannah, wringing her hands in a frenzy of despair.

For trouble like this the minister seemed to have no word of comfort. He waited in silence until she had grown a little calmer, and then he said:

"They say that the fellow has fled. At least he has not been seen at the Hall since the arrival of his wife. Have you seen anything of him?"

"He rushed in here like a madman the day she died, received her last prayer for his welfare, and threw himself out of the house again, Heaven only knows where!"

"Did he make no provision for this child?"

"I do not know; he said something about it, and he wrote something on a paper; but indeed I do not think he knew what he was about. He was as nearly stark mad as ever you saw a man; and, anyway, he went, off without leaving anything but that bit of paper; and it is but right for me to say, sir, that I would not have taken anything from him on behalf of the child. If the poor boy cannot have his father's family name he shall not have anything else from him with my consent! Those are my principles, Mr. Wynne! I can work for Nora's orphan boy just as I worked for my mother's orphan girl, which was Nora, herself, sir."

"Perhaps you are right, Hannah. But where is that paper. I should much like to see it," said the minister.

"The paper he wrote and left, sir?"

"Yes; show it to me."

"Lord bless your soul, sir, it wasn't of no account; it was the least little scrap, with about three lines wrote on it; I didn't take any care of it. Heavens knows that I had other things to think of than that. But I will try to find it if you wish to look at it," said Hannah, rising.

Her search of course was vain, and after turning up everything in the house to no purpose she came back to the parson, and said:

"I dare say it is swept away or burnt up; but, anyway, it isn't worth troubling one's self about it."

"I think differently, Hannah; and I would advise you to search, and make inquiry, and try your best to find it. And if you do so, just put it away in a very safe place until you can show it to me. And now good-by, my girl; trust in the Lord, and keep up your heart," said the minister, taking his hat and stick to depart.

When Mr. Wynne had gone Reuben Gray, who had been walking about behind the cottage, came in and said:

"Hannah, my dear, I have got something very particular to say to you; but I feel as this is no time to say it exactly, so I only want to ask you when I may come and have a talk with you, Hannah."

"Any time, Reuben; next Sunday, if you like."

"Very well, my dear; next Sunday it shall be! God bless you, Hannah; and God bless the poor boy, too. I mean to adopt that child, Hannah, and cowhide his father within an inch of his life, if ever I find him out!"

"Talk of all this on Sunday when you come, Reuben; not now, oh, not now!"

"Sartinly not now, my dear; I see the impropriety of it. Good-by, my dear. Now, shan't I send Nancy or Peggy over to stay with you?"

"Upon no account, Reuben."

"Just as you say, then. Good-by, my poor dear."

And after another dozen affectionate adieus Reuben reluctantly dragged himself from the hut.

XV. NORA'S SON

Look on this babe; and let thy pride take heed, Thy pride of manhood, intellect or fame, That thou despise him not; for he indeed, And such as he in spirit and heart the same, Are God's own children in that kingdom bright, Where purity is praise, and where before The Father's throne, triumphant evermore, The ministering angels, sons of light, Stand unreproved because they offer there, Mixed with the Mediator's hallowing prayer, The innocence of babes in Christ like this.

--M.F. Tupper.

Hannah was left alone with her sorrows and her mortifications.

Never until now had she so intensely realized her bereavement and her solitude. Nora was buried; and the few humble friends who had sympathized with her were gone; and so she was alone with her great troubles. She threw herself into a chair, and for the third or fourth time that day broke into a storm of grief. And the afternoon had faded nearly into night before she regained composure. Even then she sat like one palsied by despair, until a cry of distress aroused her. It was the wail of Nora's infant. She arose and took the child and laid it on her lap to feed it. Even Hannah looked at it with a pity that was almost allied to contempt.

It was in fact the thinnest, palest, puniest little object that had ever come into this world prematurely, uncalled for, and unwelcome. It did not look at all likely to live. And as Hannah fed the ravenous little skeleton she could not help mentally calculating the number of its hours on earth, and wishing that she had thought to request Mr. Wynne, while he was in the house, to baptize the wretched baby, so little likely to live for another opportunity. Nor could Hannah desire that it should live. It had brought sorrow, death, and disgrace into the hut, and it had nothing but poverty, want, and shame for its portion in this world; and so the sooner it followed its mother the better, thought Hannah--short-sighted mortal.

Had Hannah been a discerner of spirits to recognize the soul in that miserable little baby-body!

Or had she been a seeress to foresee the future of that child of sorrow!

Reader, this boy is our hero; a real hero, too, who actually lived and suffered and toiled and triumphed in this land!

"Out of the depths" he came indeed! Out of the depths of poverty, sorrow, and degradation he rose, by God's blessing on his aspirations, to the very zenith of fame, honor, and glory!

He made his name, the only name he was legally entitled to bear--his poor wronged mother's maiden-name--illustrious in the annals of our nation!

But this is to anticipate.

No vision of future glory, however, arose before the poor weaver's imagination as she sat in that old hut holding the wee boy on her lap, and for his sake as well as for her own begrudging him every hour of the few days she supposed he had to live upon this earth. Yes! Hannah would have felt relieved and satisfied if that child had been by his mother's side in the coffin rather than been left on her lap.

Only think of that, my readers; think of the utter, utter destitution of a poor little sickly, helpless infant whose only relative would have been glad to see him dead! Our Ishmael had neither father, mother, name, nor place in the world. He had no legal right to be in it at all; no legal right to the air he breathed, or to the sunshine that warmed him into life; no right to love, or pity, or care; he had nothing--nothing but the eye of the Almighty Father regarding him. But Hannah Worth was a conscientious woman, and even while wishing the poor boy's death she did everything in her power to keep him alive, hoping all would be in vain.

Hannah, as you know, was very, very poor. And with this child upon her hands she expected to be much poorer. She was a weaver of domestic carpets and counterpanes and of those coarse cotton and woolen cloths of which the common clothing of the plantation negroes are made, and the most of her work came from Brudenell Hall. She used to have to go and fetch the yarn, and then carry home the web. She had a piece of cloth now ready to take home to Mrs. Brudenell's housekeeper; but she abhorred the very idea of carrying it there, or of asking for more work.

Nora had been ignominiously turned from the house, cruelly driven out into the midnight storm; that had partly caused her death. And should she, her sister, degrade her womanhood by going again to that house to solicit work, or even to carry back what she had finished, to meet, perhaps, the same insults that had maddened Nora?

No, never; she would starve and see the child starve first. The web of cloth should stay there until Jim Morris should come along, when she would get him to take it to Brudenell Hall. And she would seek work from other planters' wives.

She had four dollars and a half in the house--the money, you know, that old Mrs. Jones, with all her hardness, had yet refused to take from the poor woman. And then Mrs. Brudenell owed her five and a half for the weaving of this web of cloth. In all she had ten dollars, eight of which she owed to the Professor of Odd Jobs for his services at Nora's funeral. The remaining two she hoped would supply her simple wants until she found work. And in the meantime she need not be idle; she would employ her time in cutting up some of poor Nora's clothes to make an outfit for the baby--for if the little object lived but a week it must be clothed--now it was only wrapped up in a piece of flannel.

While Hannah meditated upon these things the baby went to sleep on her lap, and she took it up and laid it in Nora's vacated place in her bed.

And soon after Hannah took her solitary cup of tea, and shut up the hut and retired to bed. She had not had a good night's rest since that fatal night of Nora's flight through the snow storm to Brudenell Hall, and her subsequent illness and death. Now, therefore, Hannah slept the sleep of utter mental and physical prostration.

The babe did not disturb her repose. Indeed, it was a very patient little sufferer, if such a term may be applied to so young a child. But it was strange that an infant so pale, thin, and sickly, deprived of its mother's nursing care besides, should have made so little plaint and given so little trouble. Perhaps in the lack of human pity he had the love of heavenly spirits, who watched over him, soothed his pains, and stilled his cries. We cannot tell how that may have been, but it is certain that Ishmael was an angel from his very birth.

The next day, as Hannah was standing at the table, busy in cutting out small garments, and the baby-boy was lying upon the bed equally busy in sucking his thumb, the door was pushed open and the Professor of Odd Jobs stood in the doorway, with a hand upon either post, and sadness on his usually good-humored and festive countenance.

"Ah, Jim, is that you? Come in, your money is all ready for you," said Hannah on perceiving him.

It is not the poor who "grind the faces of the poor." Jim Morris would have scorned to have taken a dollar from Hannah Worth at this trying crisis of her life.

"Now, Miss Hannah," he answered, as he came in at her bidding, "please don't you say one word to me 'bout de filthy lucre, 'less you means to 'sult me an' hurt my feelin's. I don't 'quire of no money for doin' of a man's duty by a lone 'oman! Think Jim Morris is a man to 'pose upon a lone 'oman? Hopes not, indeed! No, Miss Hannah! I aint a wolf, nor likewise a bear! Our Heabenly Maker, he gib us our lives an' de earth an' all as is on it, for ourselves free! And what have we to render him in turn? Nothing! And what does he 'quire ob us? On'y lub him and lub each oder, like human beings and 'mortal souls made in his own image to live forever! and not to screw and 'press each oder, and devour an' prey on each oder like de wild beastesses dat perish! And I considers, Miss Hannah--"

And here, in fact, the professor, having secured a patient hearer, launched into an oration that, were I to report it word for word, would take up more room than we can spare him. He brought his discourse round in a circle, and ended where he had begun.

"And so, Miss Hannah, say no more to me 'bout de money, 'less you want to woun' my feelin's."

"Well, I will not, Morris; but I feel so grateful to you that I would like to repay you in something better than mere words," said Hannah.

"And so you shall, honey, so you shall, soon as eber I has de need and you has de power! But now don't you go and fall into de pop'lar error of misparagin' o' words. Words! why words is de most powerfullist engine of good or evil in dis worl'! Words is to idees what bodies is to souls! Wid words you may save a human from dispair, or you may drive him to perdition! Wid words you may confer happiness or misery! Wid words a great captain may rally his discomforted troops, an' lead 'em on to wictory! wid words a great congressman may change the laws of de land! Wid words a great lawyer may 'suade a jury to hang an innocent man, or to let a murderer go free. It's bery fashionable to misparage words, callin' of 'em 'mere words.' Mere words! mere fire! mere life! mere death! mere heaben! mere hell! as soon as mere words! What are all the grand books in de worl' filled with? words! What is the one great Book called? What is the Bible called? De Word!" said the professor, spreading out his arms in triumph at this peroration.

Hannah gazed in very sincere admiration upon this orator, and when he had finished, said:

"Oh, Morris, what a pity you had not been a white man, and been brought up at a learned profession!"

"Now aint it, though, Miss Hannah?" said Morris.

"You would have made such a splendid lawyer or parson!" continued the simple woman, in all sincerity.

"Now wouldn't I, though?" complained the professor. "Now aint it a shame I'm nyther one nor t'other? I have so many bright idees all of my own! I might have lighted de 'ciety an' made my fortin at de same time! Well!" he continued, with a sigh of resignation, "if I can't make my own fortin I can still lighten de 'ciety if only dey'd let me; an' I'm willin' to du it for nothin'! But people won't 'sent to be lighted by me; soon as ever I begins to preach or to lecture in season, an' out'n season, de white folks, dey shut up my mouf, short! It's trufe I'm a-tellin' of you, Miss Hannah! Dey aint no ways, like you. Dey can't 'preciate ge'nus. Now I mus' say as you can, in black or white! An' when I's so happy as to meet long of a lady like you who can 'preciate me, I'm willin' to do anything in the wide worl' for her! I'd make coffins an' dig graves for her an' her friends from one year's end to de t'other free, an' glad of de chance to do it!" concluded the professor, with enthusiastic good-will.

"I thank you very kindly, Jim Morris; but of course I would not like to give you so much trouble," replied Hannah, in perfect innocence of sarcasm.

"La. It wouldn't be no trouble, Miss Hannah! But then, ma'am, I didn't come over here to pass compliments, nor no sich! I come with a message from old madam up yonder at Brudenell Hall."

"Ah," said Hannah, in much surprise and more disgust, "what may have been her message to me?"

"Well, Miss Hannah, it may have been the words of comfort, such as would become a Christian lady to send to a sorrowing fellow-creatur'; only it wasn't," sighed Jim Morris.

"I want no such hypocritical words from her!" said Hannah indignantly.

"Well, honey, she didn't send none!"

"What did she send?"

"Well, chile, de madam, she 'quested of me to come over here an' hand you dis five dollar an' a half, which she says she owes it to you. An' also to ax you to send by the bearer, which is me, a certain piece of cloth, which she says how you've done wove for her. An' likewise to tell you as you needn't come to Brudenell Hall for more work, which there is no more to give you. Dere, Miss Hannah, dere's de message jes' as de madam give it to me, which I hopes you'll 'sider as I fotch it in de way of my perfession, an' not take no 'fense at me who never meant any towards you," said the professor deprecatingly.

"Of course not, Morris. So far from being angry with you, I am very thankful to you for coming. You have relieved me from a quandary. I didn't know how to return the work or to get the pay. For after what has happened, Morris, the cloth might have stayed here and the money there, forever, before I would have gone near Brudenell Hall!"

Morris slapped his knee with satisfaction, saying:

"Just what I thought, Miss Hannah! which made me the more willing to bring de message. So now if you'll jest take de money an' give me de cloth, I'll be off. I has got some clocks and umberell's to mend to-night. And dat minds me! if you'll give me dat broken coffee-mill o' yourn I'll fix it at de same time," said the professor.

Hannah complied with all his requests, and he took his departure.

He had scarcely got out of sight when Hannah had another visitor, Reuben Gray, who entered the hut with looks of deprecation and words of apology.

"Hannah, woman, I couldn't wait till Sunday! I couldn't rest! Knowing of your situation, I felt as if I must come to you and say what I had on my mind! Do you forgive me?"

"For what?" asked Hannah in surprise.

"For coming afore Sunday."

"Sit down, Reuben, and don't be silly. As well have it over now as any other time."

"Very well, then, Hannah," said the man, drawing a chair to the table at which she sat working, and seating himself.

"Now, then, what have you to say, Reuben?"

"Well, Hannah, my dear, you see I didn't want to make a disturbance while the body of that poor girl lay unburied in the house; but now I ask you right up and down who is the wretch as wronged Nora?" demanded the man with a look of sternness Hannah had never seen on his patient face before.

"Why do you wish to know, Reuben?" she inquired in a low voice.

"To kill him."

"Reuben Gray!"

"Well, what's the matter, girl?"

"Would you do murder?"

"Sartainly not, Hannah; but I will kill the villain as wronged Nora wherever I find him, as I would a mad dog."

"It would be the same thing! It would be murder!"

"No, it wouldn't, Hannah. It would be honest killing. For when a cussed villain hunts down and destroys an innocent girl, he ought to be counted an outlaw that any man may slay who finds him. And if so be he don't get his death from the first comer, he ought to be sure of getting it from the girl's nearest male relation or next friend. And if every such scoundrel knew he was sure to die for his crime, and the law would hold his slayer guiltless, there would be a deal less sin and misery in this world. As for me, Hannah, I feel it to be my solemn duty to Nora, to womankind, and to the world, to seek out the wretch as wronged her and kill him where I find him, just as I would a rattlesnake as had bit my child."

"They would hang you for it, Reuben!" shuddered Hannah.

"Then they'd do very wrong! But they'd not hang me, Hannah! Thank Heaven, in these here parts we all vally our women's innocence a deal higher than we do our lives, or even our honor. And if a man is right to kill another in defense of his own life, he is doubly right to do so in defense of woman's honor. And judges and juries know it, too, and feel it, as has been often proved. But anyways, whether or no," said Reuben Gray, with the dogged persistence for which men of his class are often noted, "I want to find that man to give him his dues."

"And be hung for it," said Hannah curtly.

"No, my dear, I don't want to be hung for the fellow. Indeed, to tell the truth, I shouldn't like it at all; I know I shouldn't beforehand; but at the same time I mustn't shrink from doing of my duty first, and suffering for it afterwards, if necessary! So now for the rascal's name, Hannah!"

"Reuben Gray, I couldn't tell you if I would, and I wouldn't tell you if I could! What! do you think that I, a Christian woman, am going to send you in your blind, brutal vengeance to commit the greatest crime you possibly could commit?"

"Crime, Hannah! why, it is a holy duty!"

"Duty, Reuben! Do you live in the middle of the nineteenth century, in a Christian land, and have you been going to church all your life, and hearing the gospel of peace preached to this end?"

"Yes! For the Lord himself is a God of vengeance. He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah by fire, and once He destroyed the whole world by water!"

"'The devil can quote Scripture for his purpose,' Reuben! and I think he is prompting you now! What! do you, a mortal, take upon yourself the divine right of punishing sin by death? Reuben, when from the dust of the earth you can make a man, and breathe into his nostrils the breath of life, then perhaps you may talk of punishing sin with death. You cannot even make the smallest gnat or worm live! How then could you dare to stop the sacred breath of life in a man!" said Hannah.

"I don't consider the life of a wretch who has destroyed an innocent girl sacred by any means," persisted Reuben.

"The more sinful the man, the more sacred his life!"

"Well, I'm blowed to thunder, Hannah, if that aint the rummest thing as ever I heard said! the more sinful a man, the more sacred his life! What will you tell me next!"

"Why, this: that if it is a great crime to kill a good man, it is the greatest of all crimes to kill a bad one!"

To this startling theory Reuben could not even attempt a reply. He could only stare at her in blank astonishment. His mental caliber could not be compared with Hannah's in capacity.

"Have patience, dear Reuben, and I will make it all clear to you! The more sinful the man, the more sacred his life should be considered, because in that lies the only chance of his repentance, redemption, and salvation. And is a greater crime to kill a bad man than to kill a good one, because if you kill a good man, you kill his body only; but if you kill a bad man, you kill both his body and his soul! Can't you understand that now, dear Reuben?"

Reuben rubbed his forehead, and answered sullenly, like one about to be convinced against his will:

"Oh, I know what you mean, well enough, for that matter."

"Then you must know, Reuben, why it is that the wicked are suffered to live so long on this earth! People often wonder at the mysterious ways of Providence, when they see a good man prematurely cut off and a wicked man left alive! Why, it isn't mysterious at all to me! The good man was ready to go, and the Lord took him; the bad man was left to his chance of repentance. Reuben, the Lord, who is the most of all offended by sin, spares the sinner a long time to afford him opportunity for repentance! If he wanted to punish the sinner with death in this world, he could strike the sinner dead! But he doesn't do it, and shall we dare to? No! we must bow in humble submission to his awful words--' Vengeance is mine!'"

"Hannah, you may be right; I dare say you are; yes, I'll speak plain--I know you are! but it's hard to put up with such! I feel baffled and disappointed, and ready to cry! A man feels ashamed to set down quiet under such mortification!"

"Then I'll give you a cure for that! It is the remembrance of the Divine Man and the dignified patience with which he bore the insults of the rabble crowd upon his day of trial! You know what those insults were, and how he bore them! Bow down before his majestic meekness, and pay him the homage of obedience to his command of returning good for evil!"

"You're right, Hannah!" said Gray, with a great struggle, in which he conquered his own spirit. "You're altogether right, my girl! So you needn't tell me the name of the wrong-doer! And, indeed, you'd better not; for the temptation to punish him might be too great for my strength, as soon as I am out of your sight and in his!"

"Why, Reuben, my lad, I could not tell you if I were inclined to do so. I am sworn to secrecy!"

"Sworn to secrecy! that's queer too! Who swore you?"

"Poor Nora, who died forgiving all her enemies and at peace with all the world!"

"With him too?"

"With him most of all! And now, Reuben, I want you to listen to me. I met your ideas of vengeance and argued them upon your own ground, for the sake of convincing you that vengeance is wrong even under the greatest possible provocation, such as you believed that we had all had. But, Reuben, you are much mistaken! We have had no provocation!" said Hannah gravely.

"What, no provocation! not in the wrong done to Nora!"

"There has been no intentional wrong done to Nora!"

"What! no wrong in all that villainy?"

"There has been no villainy, Reuben!"

"Then if that wasn't villainy, there's none in the world; and never was any in the world, that's all I have got to say!"

"Reuben, Nora was married to the father of her child. He loved her dearly, and meant her well. You must believe this, for it is as true as Heaven!" said Hannah solemnly.

Reuben pricked up his ears; perhaps he was not sorry to be entirely relieved from the temptation of killing and the danger of hanging.

And Hannah gave him as satisfactory an explanation of Nora's case as she could give, without breaking her promise and betraying Herman Brudenell as the partner of Nora's misfortunes.

At the close of her narrative Reuben Gray took her hand, and holding it, said gravely:

"Well, my dear girl, I suppose the affair must rest where it is for the present. But this makes one thing incumbent upon us." And having said this, Reuben hesitated so long that Hannah took up the word and asked:

"This makes what incumbent upon us, lad?"

"To get married right away!" blurted out the man.

"Pray, have you come into a fortune, Reuben?" inquired Hannah coolly.

"No, child, but--"

"Neither have I," interrupted Hannah.

"I was going to say," continued the man, "that I have my hands to work with--"

"For your large family of sisters and brothers--"

"And for you and that poor orphan boy as well! And I'm willing to do it for you all! And we really must be married right away, Hannah! I must have a lawful right to protect you against the slights as you'll be sure to receive after what's happened, if you don't have a husband to take care of you."

He paused and waited for her reply; but as she did not speak, he began again:

"Come, Hannah, my dear, what do you say to our being married o' Sunday?"

She did not answer, and he continued:

"I think as we better had get tied together arter morning service! And then, you know, I'll take you and the bit of a baby home long o' me, Hannah. And I'll be a loving husband to you, my girl; and I'll be a father to the little lad with as good a will as ever I was to my own orphan brothers and sisters. And I'll break every bone in the skin of any man that looks askance at him, too! Don't you fear for yourself or the child. The country side knows me for a peaceable-disposed man; but it had rather not provoke me for all that, because it knows when I have a just cause of quarrel, I don't leave my work half done! Come, Hannah, what do you say, my dear? Shall it be o' Sunday? You won't answer me? What, crying, my girl, crying! what's that for?"

The tears were streaming from Hannah's eyes. She took up her apron and buried her face in its folds.

"Now what's all that about?" continued Reuben, in distress; then suddenly brightening up, he said: "Oh, I know now! You're thinking of Nancy and Peggy! Don't be afeard, Hannah! They won't do, nor say, nor even so much as look anything to hurt your feelings! and they had better not, if they know which side their bread is buttered! I am the master of my own house, I reckon, poor as it is! And my wife will be the mistress; and my sisters must keep their proper places! Come, Hannah! come, my darling, what do you say to me?"' he whispered, putting his arm over her shoulders, while he tried to draw the apron from her face.

She dropped her apron, lifted her face, looked at him through her falling tears, and answered:

"This is what I have to say to you, dear, dearest, best loved Reuben! I feel your goodness in the very depths of my heart; I thank you with all my soul; I will love you--you only--in silence and in solitude all my life; I will pray for you daily and nightly; but--" She stopped and sobbed.

"But--" said Reuben breathlessly.

"I will never carry myself and my dishonor under your honest roof."

Reuben caught his suspended breath with a sharp gasp and gazed in blank dismay upon the sobbing woman for a few minutes, and then he said:

"Hannah--oh, my Lord! Hannah, you never mean to say that you won't marry me?"

"I mean just that, Reuben."

"Oh, Hannah, what have I done to offend you? I never meant to do it! I don't even know how I've done it! I'm such a blundering animal! But tell me what it is, and I will beg your pardon!"

"It is nothing, you good, true heart! nothing! But you have two sisters--"

"There, I knew it! It's Nancy and Peggy! They've been doing something to hurt your feelings! Well, Hannah, they shall come here and ask your forgiveness, or else they shall leave my home and go to earn their living in somebody's kitchen! I've been a father to them gals; but I won't suffer them to insult my own dear Hannah!" burst forth Reuben.

"Dear Reuben, you are totally mistaken! Your sisters no more than yourself have ever given me the least cause of offense. They could not, dear Reuben! They must be good girls, being your sisters."

"Well, if neither I nor my sisters have hurt your feelings, Hannah, what in the name of sense did you mean by saying--I hate even to repeat the words--that you won't marry me?"

"Reuben, reproach has fallen upon my name--undeserved, indeed, but not the less severe. You have young, unmarried sisters, with nothing but their good names to take them through the world. For their sakes, dear, you must not marry me and my reproach!"

"Is that all you mean, Hannah?"

"All."

"Then I will marry you!"

"Reuben, you must give me up."

"I won't, I say! So there, now."

"Dear Reuben, I value your affection more than I do anything in this world except duty; but I cannot permit you to sacrifice yourself to me," said Hannah, struggling hard to repress the sobs that were again rising in her bosom.

"Hannah, I begin to think you want to drive me crazy or break my heart! What sacrifice would it be for me to marry you and adopt that poor child? The only sacrifice I can think of would be to give you up! But I won't do it! no! I won't for nyther man nor mortal! You promised to marry me, Hannah, and I won't free your promise! but I will keep you to it, and marry you, if I die for it!" grimly persisted Reuben Gray.

And before she could reply they were interrupted by a knock at the door.

"Come in!" said Hannah, expecting to see Mrs. Jones or some other humble neighbor.

The door was pushed gently open, and a woman of exceeding beauty stood upon the threshold.

Her slender but elegant form was clothed in the deepest mourning; her pale, delicate face was shaded by the blackest ringlets; her large, dark eyes were fixed with the saddest interest upon the face of Hannah Worth.

Hannah arose in great surprise to meet her.

"You are Miss Worth, I suppose?" said the young stranger.

"Yes, miss; what is your will with me?"

"I am the Countess of Hurstmonceux. Will you let me rest here a little while?" she asked, with a sweet smile.

Hannah gazed at the speaker in the utmost astonishment, forgetting to answer her question, or offer a seat, or even to shut the door, through which the wind was blowing fiercely.

What! was this beautiful pale young creature the Countess of Hurstmonceux, the rival of Nora, the wife of Herman Brudenell, the "bad, artful woman" who had entrapped the young Oxonian into a discreditable marriage? Impossible!

While Hannah stood thus dumbfounded before the visitor, Reuben came forward with rude courtesy, closed the door, placed a chair before the fire, and invited the lady to be seated.

The countess, with a gentle bow of thanks, passed on, sank into a chair, and let her sable furs slip from her shoulders in a drift around her feet.

XVI. THE FORSAKEN WIFE

He prayeth best who loveth most All things both great and small, For the good God who loveth us, He made and loveth all.

--Coleridge.

To account for the strange visit of the countess to Hannah Worth we must change the scene to Brudenell Hall.

From the time of her sudden arrival at her husband's house, every hour had been fraught with suffering to Berenice.

In the first instance, where she had expected to give a joyful surprise, she had only given a painful shock; where she had looked for a cordial welcome, she had received a cold repulse; finally, where she had hoped her presence would confer happiness, it had brought misery!

On the very evening of her arrival her husband, after meeting her with reproaches, had fled from the house, leaving no clew to his destination, and giving no reason for his strange proceeding.

Berenice did not understand this. She cast her memory back through all the days of her short married life spent with Herman Brudenell, and she sought diligently for anything in her conduct that might have given him offense. She could find nothing. Neither in all their intercourse had he ever accused her of any wrong-doing. On the contrary, he had been profuse in words of admiration, protestations of love and fidelity. Now what had caused this fatal change in his feelings and conduct towards her? Berenice could not tell. Her mind was as thoroughly perplexed as her heart was deeply wounded. At first she did not know that he was gone forever. She thought that he would return in an hour or two and openly accuse her of some fault, or that he would in some manner betray the cause of offense which he must suppose she had given him. And then, feeling sure of her innocence, she knew she could exonerate herself from every shadow of blame--except from that of loving him too well, if he should consider that a fault.

Therefore she waited patiently for his return; but when the night passed and he had not come, she grew more and more uneasy, and when the next day had passed without his making his appearance her uneasiness rose to intolerable anxiety.

The visit of poor Nora at night had aroused at once her suspicions, her jealousy, and her compassion. She half believed that in this girl she saw her rival in her husband's affections, the cause of her own repudiation and--what was more bitter still to the childless Hebrew wife--the mother of his children! This had been very terrible! But to the Jewish woman the child of her husband, even if it is at the same time the child of her rival, is as sacred as her own. Berenice was loyal, conscientious, and compassionate. In the anguish of her own deeply wounded and bleeding heart she had pitied and pleaded for poor Nora--had even asserted her own authority as mistress of the house, for the sake of protecting Nora: her husband's other wife, as in the merciful construction of her gentle spirit she had termed the unhappy girl! But then, my readers, you must remember that Berenice was a Jewess. This poor unloved Leah would have sheltered the beloved Rachel. We all know how her generous intentions were carried out. A second and a third day passed, and still there came no news of Herman.

Berenice, prostrated with the heart-wasting sickness of hope deferred, kept her own room. Mrs. Brudenell was indignant at her son, not for his neglect of his lovely young wife, but for his indifference to a wealthy countess! She deferred her journey to Washington in consideration of her noble daughter-in-law, and in the hope of her son's speedy reappearance and reconciliation with his wife, when, she anticipated, they would all go to Washington together, where the Countess of Hurstmonceux would certainly be the lioness and the Misses Brudenell the belles of the season.

On the evening of the fourth day, while Berenice lay exhausted upon the sofa of her bedroom, her maid entered the chamber saying:

"Please, my lady, you remember the young woman that was here on Friday evening?"

"Yes!" Berenice was up on her elbow in an instant, looking eagerly into the girl's face.

"Your ladyship ordered me to make inquiries about her, but I could get no news except from the old man who took her home out of the snowstorm and who came back and said she was ill."

"I know! I know! You told me that before. But you have heard something else. What is it?"

"My lady, the old woman Dinah, who went to nurse her, never came back till to-day; that is the reason I couldn't hear any more news until to-night."

"Well, well, well? Your news! Out with it, girl!"

"My lady, she is dead and buried!"

"Who?"

"The young woman, my lady. She died on Saturday. She was buried to-day."

Berenice sank back on the sofa and covered her face with her hands. So! her dangerous rival was gone; the poor unhappy girl was dead! Berenice was jealous, but pitiful. And she experienced in the same moment a sense of infinite relief and a feeling of the deepest compassion.

Neither mistress nor maid spoke for several minutes. The latter was the first to break silence.

"My lady!"

"Well, Phoebe!"

"There was something else I had to tell you."

"What was it?"

"The young woman left a child, my lady."

"A child!" Again Berenice was up on her elbow, her eyes fixed upon the speaker and blazing with eager interest.

"It is a boy, my lady; but they don't think it will live!"

"A boy! He shall live! He is mine--my son! I will have him. Since his mother is dead, it is I who have the best right to him!" exclaimed the countess vehemently, rising to her feet.

The maid recoiled--she thought her mistress had suddenly gone mad.

"Phoebe," said the countess eagerly, "what is the hour?"

"Nearly eleven, my lady."

"Has it cleared off?"

"No, my lady; it has come on to rain hard; it is pouring."

The countess went to the windows of her room, but they were too closely shut and warmly curtained to give her any information as to the state of the weather without. Then she hurried impatiently into the passage where the one end window remained with its shutters still unclosed, and she looked out. The rain was lashing the glass with fury. She turned away and sought her own room again--complaining:

"Oh, I can never go to-night! It is too late and too stormy! Mrs. Brudenell would think me crazy, and the woman at the hut would never let me have my son. Yet, oh! what would I not give to have him on my bosom to-night," said Berenice, pacing feverishly about the room.

"My lady," said the maid uneasily, "I don't think you are well at all this evening. Won't you let me give you some salvolatile?"

"No, I don't want any!" replied the countess, without stopping in her restless walk.

"But, my lady, indeed you are not well!" persisted the affectionate creature.

"No, I am not well, Phoebe! My heart is sore, sore, Phoebe! But that child would be a balm to it! If I could press my son to my bosom, Phoebe, he would draw out all the fire and pain!"

"But, my lady, he is not your son!" said the maid, with tears of alarm starting in her eyes.

"He is, girl! Now that his mother is dead he is mine! Who has a better right to him than I, I wonder? His mother is gone! his father--" Here the countess suddenly recollected herself, and as she looked into her maid's astonished face she felt how far apart were the ideas of the Jewish matron and the Christian maiden. She controlled her emotion, took her seat, and said:

"Don't be alarmed, Phoebe. I am only a little nervous to-night, my girl. And I want something more satisfactory than a little dog to pet."

"I don't think, my lady, you could get anything in the world more grateful, or more faithful, or more easy to manage, than a little dog. Certainly not a baby. Babies is awful, my lady. They aint got a bit of gratitude or faithfulness in them; and after you have toted them about all day, you may tote them about all night. And then they are bawling from the first day of January until the thirty-first day of December. Take my advice, my lady, and stick to the little dogs, and let babies alone, if you love your peace."

The countess smiled faintly and kept silence. But--she kept her resolution also.

The last words that night spoken after she was in bed, and when she was about to dismiss her maid, were these:

"Phoebe, mind that you are not to say one word to any human being of the subject of our conversation to-night. But you are to call me at eight o'clock, have my breakfast brought to me here at half-past eight, and the carriage at the door at nine. Do you hear?"

"Yes, my lady," answered the girl, who immediately went to the small room adjoining her mistress' chamber, where she usually sat by day and slept by night.

The countess could only sleep in perfect darkness; so when Phoebe had put out all the lights she took advantage of that darkness to leave her door open, so that she could listen if her mistress was restless or wakeful. The maid soon discovered that her mistress was wakeful and restless.

The countess could not sleep for contemplating her project of the morning. According to her Jewish ideas, the motherless son of her husband was as much hers as though she had brought him into the world. And thus she, poor, unloved and childless wife, was delighted with the son that she thought had dropped from heaven into her arms.

That anyone should venture to raise the slightest objection to her taking possession of her own son never entered the mind of Berenice. She imagined that even Mrs. Brudenell, who had treated the mother with the utmost scorn and contumely, must turn to the son with satisfaction and desire.

In cautioning Phoebe to secrecy she had not done so in dread of opposition from any quarter, but with the design of giving Mrs. Brudenell a pleasant surprise.

She intended to go out in the morning as if for a drive, to go to the hut, take possession of the boy, bring him home and lay him in his grandmother's lap. And she anticipated for her reward her child's affection, her husband's love, and her mother's cordial approval.

Full of excitement from these thoughts, Berenice could not sleep; but tossed from side to side in her bed like one suffering from pain or fever.

Her faithful attendant, who had loved her mistress well enough to leave home and country and follow her across the seas to the Western World, lay awake anxiously listening to her restless motions until near morning, when, overcome by watching, she fell asleep.

The maid, who had been the first to close her eyes, was the first to open them. Remembering her mistress' order to be called at eight o'clock, she sprang out of bed and looked at her watch. To her consternation she found that it was half-past nine.

She flew to her mistress' room and threw open the blinds, letting in a flood of morning light.

And then she went to the bedside and drew back the curtains and looked upon the face of the sleeper. Such a pale, sad, worn-looking face! with the full lips closed, the long black lashes lying on the waxen cheeks, the slender black brows slightly contracted, and the long purplish black hair flowing down each side and resting upon the swelling bosom; her arms were thrown up over the pillow, and her hands clasped over her head. This attitude added to the utter sadness and weariness of her aspect.

Phoebe slowly shook her head, murmuring:

"I can't think why a lady having beauty and wealth and rank should break her heart about any scamp of a man! Why couldn't she have purchased an estate with her money and settled down in Old England? And if she must have married, why didn't she marry the marquis? Lack-a-daisy-me! I wish she had never seen this young scamp! She didn't sleep the whole night! I know it was after four o'clock in the morning that I dropped off, and the last thing I knew was trying to keep awake and listen to her tossing! Well, whatever her appointment was this morning, she has missed it by a good hour and a half; that she has, and I'm glad of it. Sleep is the best part of life, and there isn't anything in this world worth waking up for, as I've found out yet! Let her sleep on; she's dead for it, anyway. So let her sleep on, and I'll take the blame."

And with this the judicious Phoebe carefully drew the bed curtains again, closed the window shutters, and withdrew to her own room to complete her toilet.

After a little while Phoebe went below to get her breakfast, which she always took in the housekeeper's room.

Mrs. Spicer had breakfasted long before, and so she met the girl with a sharp rebuke for keeping late hours.

"Pray," she inquired mockingly, "is it the fashion in the country you came from for servants to be abed until ten o'clock in the morning?"

"That depends on circumstances," answered Phoebe, with assumed gravity; "the servants of noble families like the Countess of Hurstmonceux's lie late; but the servants of common folks like yours have to get up early."

"Like ours, you impudent minx! I'll have you to know that our family--the Brudenells--are as good as any other family in the world! But it is not the custom here for the maids to lie in bed until all hours of the morning, and that you'll find!" cried Mrs. Spicer in a passion.

"You'll find yourself discharged if you go on in this way! You seem to forget that my lady is the mistress of this house," said Phoebe, seating herself at the table, which was covered with the litter of the housekeeper's breakfast.

Before the housekeeper had time to reply, or the lady's maid had time to pour out her cold coffee, the drawing-room bell rang. And soon after Jovial entered to say that Mrs. Brudenell required the attendance of Phoebe. The girl rose at once and went up to the drawing room.

"How is the countess this morning?" was the first question of Mrs. Brudenell.

"My lady is sleeping; she has had a bad night; I thought it best not to awake her," answered Phoebe.

"You did right. Let me know when she is awake and ready to receive me. You may go now."

Phoebe returned to her cold and comfortless breakfast, and had but just finished it when a second bell rang. This time it was her mistress, and she hurried to answer it.

The countess was already in her dressing-gown and slippers, seated before her toilet-table, and holding a watch in her hand.

"Oh, Phoebe," she exclaimed, "how could you have disobeyed me so! It is after ten o'clock!"

"My lady, I will tell you the truth. You were so restless last night that you could not sleep, and I was so anxious for fear you were going to be ill, that indeed I could not. And so I lay awake listening at you till after four o'clock this morning, when I dropped off out of sheer exhaustion, and so I overslept myself until half-past nine; and then my lady, I thought, as you had had such a bad night, and as it was too late for you to keep your appointment with yourself, and as you were sleeping so finely, I had better not wake you. I beg your pardon, my lady, if I did wrong, and I hope no harm has been done."

"Not much harm, Phoebe; but something that should have been finished by this time is yet to begin--that is all. In future, Phoebe, try to obey me."

"Indeed I will, my lady."

"And now do my hair as quickly as possible."

Phoebe's nimble fingers soon accomplished their task.

"And now go order the carriage to come round directly; and then bring me a cup of coffee," said the lady, rising to adjust her own dress.

Phoebe hurried off to obey, and soon returned, bringing a delicate little breakfast served on a tray.

By the time the countess had drunk the coffee and tasted the rice waffles and broiled partridge, the carriage was announced.

Mrs. Brudenell met her in the lower hall.

"Ah, Berenice, my dear, I am glad to see that you are going for an airing at last. The morning is beautiful after the storm," she said.

"Yes, mamma," replied the countess, rather avoiding the interview.

"Which way will you drive, my dear?"

"I think through the valley; it is sheltered from the wind there. Good-morning!"

And the lady entered the carriage and gave her order.

The carriage road through the valley was necessarily much longer and more circuitous than the footpath with which we are so familiar. The footpath, we know, went straight down the steep precipice of Brudenell hill, across the bottom, and then straight up the equally steep ascent of Hut hill. Of course this route was impracticable for any wheeled vehicle. The carriage therefore turned off to the left into a road that wound gradually down the hillside and as gradually ascended the opposite heights. The carriage drew up at a short distance from the hut, and the countess alighted and walked to the door. We have seen what a surprise her arrival caused, and now we must return to the interview between the wife of Herman and the sister of Nora.

XVII. THE COUNTESS AND THE CHILD

With no misgiving thought or doubt Her fond arms clasped his child about In the full mantle of her love; For who so loves the darling flowers Must love the bloom of human bowers, The types of brightest things above. One day--one sunny winter day-- She pressed it to her tender breast; The sunshine of its head there lay As pillowed on its native rest.

--Thomas Buchanan Reed.

Lady Hurstmonceux and Hannah Worth sat opposite each other in silence. The lady with her eyes fixed thoughtfully on the floor--Hannah waiting for the visitor to disclose the object of her visit.

Reuben Gray had retired to the farthest end of the room, in delicate respect to the lady; but finding that she continued silent, it at last dawned upon his mind that his absence was desirable. So he came forward with awkward courtesy, saying:

"Hannah, I think the lady would like to be alone with you; so I will bid you good-day, and come again to-morrow."

"Very well, Reuben," was all that the woman could answer in the presence of a third person.

And after shaking Hannah's hand, and pulling his forelock to the visitor, the man went away.

As soon as he was clearly gone the countess turned to the weaver and said:

"Hannah--your name is Hannah, I think?"

"Yes, madam."

"Well, Hannah, I have come to thank you for your tender care of my son, and to relieve you of him!" said the countess.

"Madam!" exclaimed the amazed woman, staring point-blank at the visitor.

"Why, what is the matter, girl? What have I said that you should glare at me in that way?" petulantly demanded the lady.

"Madam, you astonish me! Your son is not here. I know nothing about your son; not even that you had a son," replied Hannah.

"Oh, I see," said the lady, with a faint smile; "you are angry because I have left him on your hands so many days. That is pardonable in you. But, you see, my girl, it was not my fault. I never even heard of the little fellow's existence until late last night. I could not sleep for thinking of him. And I came here as soon as I had had my breakfast."

"Madam, can a lady have a son and not know it?" exclaimed Hannah, her amazement fast rising to alarm, for she was beginning to suppose her visitor a maniac escaped from Bedlam.

"Nonsense, Hannah; do not be so hard to propitiate, my good woman! I have explained to you how it happened! I came as soon as I could! I am willing to reward you liberally for all the trouble you have had with him. So now show me my son, there's a good soul."

"Poor thing! poor, poor thing! so young and so perfectly crazy!" muttered Hannah, looking at the countess with blended pity and fear.

"Come, Hannah, show me my son, and have done with this!" said the visitor, rising.

"Don't, my lady; don't go on in this way; you know you have no son; be good, now, and tell me if you really are the Countess of Hurstmonceux; or if not, tell me who you are, and where you live, and let me take you back to your friends," pleaded Hannah, taking her visitor by the hands.

"Oh, there he is now!" exclaimed the countess, shaking Hannah off, and going towards the bed where she saw the babe lying.

Hannah sprang after her, clasped her around the waist, and holding her tightly, cried out in terror:

"Don't, my lady! for Heaven's sake, don't hurt the child! He is such a poor little mite; he cannot live many days; he must die, and it will be a great blessing that he does; but still, for all that, I mustn't see him killed before my very face. No, you shan't, my lady! you shan't go anigh him! You shan't, indeed!" exclaimed Hannah, as the countess struggled once to free herself.

"How dare you hold me?" exclaimed Berenice.

"Because I am strong enough to do so, my lady, without your leave! And because you are not yourself, my lady, and you might kill the child," said Hannah resolutely enough, though, to tell the truth, she was frightened almost out of her senses.

"Not myself? Are you crazy, woman?" indignantly demanded Berenice.

"No, my lady, but you are! Oh, do try to compose your mind, or you may do yourself a mischief!" pleaded Hannah.

Berenice suddenly ceased to struggle, and became perfectly quiet. Hannah was resolved not to be deceived, and held her firmly as ever.

"Hannah," said the countess, "I begin to see how it is that you think me mad. You, a Christian maid, and I, a Jewish matron, do not understand each other. We think, and look, and speak from different points of view. You think I mean to say that the child upon the bed is the son of my own bosom!"

"You said so, my lady."

"No, I said he was my son--I meant my son by marriage and by adoption."

"I do not understand you, madam."

"Well, I fear you don't. I will try to explain. He is"--the lady's voice faltered and broke down--"he is my husband's son, and so, his mother being dead, he becomes mine," breathed Berenice, in a faint voice.

"Madam!" exclaimed Hannah, drawing back and reddening to the very edge of her hair.

"He is the son of Herman Brudenell, and so--"

"My lady! how dare you say such a thing as that?" fiercely interrupted Hannah.

"Because, oh, Heaven! it is true," moaned Berenice; "it is true, Hannah! Would to the Lord it were not!"

"Lady Hurstmonceux--"

"Stop! listen to me first, Hannah! I do not blame your poor sister. Heaven knows I pitied her very much, and did all I could to protect her the night she came to Brudenell Hall."

"I know you did, madam," said Hannah, her heart softening at the recollection of what she had heard of the countess' share in the scene between Nora and Mrs. Brudenell.

"She knew nothing of me when she met my husband, and she could not help loving him any more than I could--any more than I could," she repeated lowly to herself; "and so, though it wrings my heart to think of it, I cannot blame her, Hannah--"

"My lady, you have no right to blame her," interrupted Nora's sister.

"I know it," meekly replied the wronged wife.

"You have no right to blame her, because she was perfectly blameless in the sight of Heaven."

Berenice looked up in surprise, sighed and continued:

"However that may be, Hannah, I am not her judge, and do not presume to arraign her. May she rest in peace! But her child! Herman's child! my child! It is of him I wish to speak! Oh, Hannah, give him to me! I want him so much! I long for him so intensely! My heart warms to him so ardently! He will be such a comfort, such a blessing, such a salvation to me, Hannah! I will love him so well, and rear him so carefully, and make him so happy! I will educate him, provide for all his wants, and give him a profession. And if I am never reconciled to my husband--" Here again her voice faltered and broke down; but after a dry sob, she resumed: "If I am never reconciled to my husband, I will make his son my heir; for I hold all my large property in my own right, Hannah! Say, will you give me my husband's son?"

"But, my lady--"

"Ah, do not refuse me!" interrupted the countess. "I am so unhappy! I am alone in the world, with no one for me to love, and no one to love me!"

"You have many blessings, madam."

"I have rank and wealth and good looks, if you mean them. But, ah! do you think they make a woman happy?"

"No, madam."

"Listen, Hannah! My poor father was an apostate to his faith. My nation cast me off for being his daughter and for marrying a Christian. My parents are dead. My people are estranged. My husband alienated. But still I have one comfort and one hope! My comfort is--the--the simple existence of my husband! Yes, Hannah! alienated as he is, it is a comfort to me to know that he lives. If it were not for that, I myself should die! Oh, Hannah! it is common enough to talk of being willing to die for one we love! It is easy to die--much easier sometimes than to live: the last is often very hard! I will do more than die for my love: I will live for him! live through long years of dreary loneliness, taking my consolation in rearing his son, if you will give me the boy, and hoping in some distant future for his return, when I can present his boy to him, and say to him: 'If you cannot love me for my own sake, try to love me a little for his!' Oh, Hannah! do not dash this last hope from me! give me the boy!"

Hannah bent her head in painful thought. To grant Lady Hurstmonceux's prayer would be to break her vow, by virtually acknowledging the parentage of Ishmael and betraying Herman Brudenell--and without effecting any real good to the lady or the child, since in all human probability the child's hours were already numbered.

"Hannah! will you speak to me?" pleaded Berenice.

"Yes, my lady. I was wishing to speak to you all along; but you would not give me a chance. If you had, my lady, you would not have been compelled to talk so much. I wished to ask you then what I wish to ask you now: What reason have you for thinking and speaking so ill of my sister as you do?"

"I do not blame her; I told you so."

"You cover her errors with a veil of charity; that is what you mean, my lady! She needs no such veil! My sister is as innocent as an angel. And you, my lady, are mistaken."

"Mistaken? as to--to--Oh, Hannah! how am I mistaken?" asked the countess, with sudden eagerness, perhaps with sudden hope.

"If you will compose yourself, my lady, and come and sit down, I will tell you the truth, as I have told it to everybody."

Lady Hurstmonceux went and dropped into her chair, and gazed at Hannah with breathless interest.

Hannah drew another forward and sat down opposite to the countess.

"Now then," said Berenice eagerly.

"My lady, what I have to tell is soon said. My sister was buried in her wedding-ring. Her son was born in wedlock."

The Countess of Hurstmonceux started to her feet, clasped her hands and gazed into Hannah's very soul! The light of an infinite joy irradiated her face.

"Is this true?" she exclaimed.

"It is true."

"Then I have been mistaken! Oh, how widely mistaken! Thank Heaven! Oh, thank Heaven!"

And the Countess of Hurstmonceux sank back in her chair, covered her face with her hands, and burst into tears.

Hannah felt very uncomfortable; her conscience reproached her; she was self-implicated in a deception; and this to one of her integrity of character was very painful. Literally, she had spoken the truth; but the countess had drawn false inferences and deceived herself; and she could not undeceive her without breaking her oath to Nora and betraying Herman Brudenell.

Then she pitied that beautiful, pale woman who was weeping so violently. And she arose and poured out the last of poor Nora's bottle of wine and brought it to her, saying:

"Drink this, my lady, and try and compose yourself."

Berenice drank the wine and thanked the woman, and then said:

"I was very wrong to take up such fancies as I did; but then, you do not know how strong the circumstances were that led me to such fancies. I am glad and sorry and ashamed, all at once, Hannah! Glad to find my own and my mother-in-law's suspicions all unfounded; sorry that I ever entertained them against my dear husband; and ashamed--oh, how much ashamed--that I ever betrayed them to anyone."

"You were seeking to do him a service, my lady, when you did so," said Hannah remorsefully and compassionately.

"Yes, indeed I was! And then I was not quite myself! Oh, I have suffered so much in my short life, Hannah! And I met such a cruel disappointment on my arrival here! But there! I am talking too much again! Hannah, I entreat you to forget all that I have said to you. And if you cannot forget it, I implore you most earnestly never to repeat it to anyone."

"I will not indeed, madam."

The Countess of Hurstmonceux arose and walked to the bed, turned down the shawl that covered the sleeping child, and gazed pitifully upon him. Hannah did not now seek to prevent her.

"Oh, poor little fellow, how feeble he looks! Hannah, it seems such a pity that all the plans I formed for his future welfare should be lost because he is not what I supposed him to be; it seems hard that the revelation which has made me happy should make him unfortunate; or, rather, that it should prevent his good fortune! And it shall not do so entirely. It is true, I cannot now adopt him,--the child of a stranger,--and take him home and rear him as my own, as I should have done had he been what I fancied him to be. Because it might not be right, you know, and my husband might not approve it. And, oh, Hannah, I have grown so timid lately that I dread, I dread more than you can imagine, to do anything that he might not like. Not that he is a domestic tyrant either. You have lived on his estate long enough to know that Herman Brudenell is all that is good and kind. But then you see I am all wrong--and always was so. Everything I do is ill done--and always so. It is all my own fault, and I must try to amend it, if ever I am to hope for happiness. So I must not do anything unless I am sure that it will not displease him, therefore I must not take this child of a stranger home, and rear him as my own. But I will do all that I can for him here. At present his little wants are all physical. Take this purse, dear woman, and make him as comfortable as you can. I think he ought to have medical attendance; procure it for him; get everything he needs; and when the purse is empty bring it to me to be replenished. So much for the present. If he lives I will pay for his schooling, and see that he is apprenticed to some good master to learn a trade."

And with these words the countess held out a well-filled purse to Hannah.

With a deep blush Hannah shook her head and put the offered bounty back, saying:

"No, my lady, no. Nora's child must not become the object of your charity. It will not do. My nephew's wants are few, and will not be felt long; I can supply them all while he lives, I thank you all the same, madam."

Berenice looked seriously disappointed. Again she pressed her bounty upon Hannah, saying:

"I do not really think you are right to refuse assistance that is proffered to this poor child."

But Hannah was firm as she replied:

"I know that I am right, madam. And so long as I am able and willing to supply all his wants myself, and so long as I do supply them, I do him no injury in refusing for him the help of others."

"But do you have to supply all his wants? I suppose that his father must be a poor man, but is he so poor as not to be able to render you some assistance?"

Hannah paused a moment in thought before answering this question, then she said:

"His father is dead, my lady." (Dead to him was her mental reservation.)

"Poor orphan," sighed the countess, with the tears springing to her eyes; "and you will not let me do anything for him?"

"I prefer to take care of him myself, madam, for the short time that he will need care," replied Hannah.

"Well, then," sighed the lady, as she restored her purse to her pocket, "remember this--if from any circumstances whatever you should change your mind, and be willing to accept my protection for this child, come to me frankly, and you will find that I have not changed my mind. I shall always be glad to do anything in my power for this poor babe."

"I thank you, my lady; I thank you very much," said Hannah, without committing herself to any promise.

What instinct was it that impelled the countess to stoop and kiss the brow of the sleeping babe, and then to catch him up and press him fondly to her heart? Who can tell?

The action awoke the infant, who opened his large blue eyes to the gaze of the lady.

"Hannah, you need not think this boy is going to die. He is only a skeleton; but in his strong, bright eyes there is no sign of death--but certainty of life! Take the word of one who has the blood of a Hebrew prophetess in her veins for that!" said Berenice, with solemnity.

"It will be as the Lord wills, my lady," Hannah reverently replied.

The countess laid the infant back upon the bed and then drew her sable cloak around her shoulders, shook hands with Hannah, and departed.

Hannah Worth stood looking after the lady for some little space of time. Hannah was an accurate reader of character, and she had seen at the first glance that this pale, sad, but most beautiful woman could not be the bad, artful, deceitful creature that her husband had been led to believe and to represent her. And she wondered what mistake it could possibly have been that had estranged Herman Brudenell from his lovely wife and left his heart vacant for the reception of another and a most fatal passion.

"Whatever it may have been, I have nothing to do with it. I pity the gentle lady, but I cannot accept her bounty for Nora's child," said Hannah, dismissing the subject from her thoughts and returning to her work.

In this manner, from one plausible motive or another, was all help rejected for the orphan boy.

It seemed as if Providence were resolved to cast the infant helpless upon life, to show the world what a poor boy might make of himself, by God's blessing on his own unaided efforts!

XVIII. BERENICE

Her cheeks grew pale and dim her eye, Her voice was low, her mirth was stay'd; Upon her heart there seemed to lie The darkness of a nameless shade; She paced the house from room to room, Her form became a walking gloom.

--Read.

It was yet early in the afternoon when Berenice reached Brudenell Hall.

Before going to her own apartments she looked into the drawing room, and seeing Mrs. Brudenell, inquired:

"Any news of Herman yet, mamma, dear?"

"No, love, not yet. You've had a pleasant drive, Berenice?"

"Very pleasant."

"I thought so; you have more color than when you went. You should go out every morning, my dear."

"Yes, mamma," said the young lady, hurrying away.

Mrs. Brudenell recalled her.

"Come in here, if you please, my love; I want to have a little conversation with you."

Berenice threw her bonnet, cloak, and muff upon the hall table and entered the drawing room.

Mrs. Brudenell was alone; her daughters had not yet come down; she beckoned her son's wife to take the seat on the sofa by her side.

And when Berenice had complied she said:

"It is of yourself and Herman that I wish to speak to you, my dear."

"Yes, mamma."

The lady hesitated, and then suddenly said:

"It is now nearly a week since my son disappeared; he left his home abruptly, without explanation, in the dead of night, at the very hour of your arrival! That was very strange."

"Very strange," echoed the unloved wife.

"What was the meaning of it, Berenice?"

"Indeed, mamma, I do not know."

"What, then, is the cause of his absence?"

"Indeed, indeed, I do not know."

"Berenice! he fled from your presence. There is evidently some misunderstanding or estrangement between yourself and your husband. I cannot ask him for an explanation. Hitherto I have forborne to ask you. But now that a week has passed without any tidings of my son, I have a right to demand the explanation. Give it to me."

"Mamma, I cannot; for I know no more than yourself," answered Berenice, in a tone of distress.

"You do not know; but you must suspect. Now what do you suspect to be the cause of his going?"

"I do not even suspect, mamma."

"What do you conjecture, then?" persisted the lady.

"I cannot conjecture; I am all lost in amazement, mamma; but I feel--I feel--that it must be some fault in myself," faltered Berenice.

"What fault?"

"Ah, there again I am lost in perplexity; faults I have enough, Heaven knows; but what particular one is strong enough to estrange my husband I do not know, I cannot guess."

"Has he never accused you?"

"Never, mamma."

"Nor quarreled with you?"

"Never!"

"Nor complained of you at all?"

"No, mamma! The first intimation that I had of his displeasure was given me the night of my arrival, when he betrayed some annoyance at my coming upon him suddenly without having previously written. I gave him what I supposed to be sufficient reasons for my act--the same reasons that I afterwards gave you."

"They were perfectly satisfactory. And even if they had not been so, it was no just cause for his behavior. Did he find fault with any part of your conduct previous to your arrival?"

"No, mamma; certainly not. I have told you so before."

"And this is true?"

"As true as Heaven, mamma."

"Then it is easy to fix upon the cause of his bad conduct. That girl. It is a good thing she is dead," hissed the elder lady between her teeth.

She spoke in a tone too low to reach the ears of Berenice, who sat with her weeping face buried in her handkerchief.

There was silence for a little while between the ladies. Berenice was the first to break it, by asking:

"Mamma, can you imagine where he is?"

"No, my love! And if I do not feel so anxious about him as you feel, it is because I know him better than you do. And I know that it is some unjustifiable caprice that is keeping him from his home. When he comes to his senses he will return. In the meanwhile, we must not, by any show of anxiety, give the servants or the neighbors any cause to gossip of his disappearance. And I must not have my plans upset by his whims. I have already delayed my departure for Washington longer than I like; and my daughters have missed the great ball of the season. I am not willing to remain here any longer at all. And I think, also, that we shall be more likely to meet Herman by going to town than by staying here. Washington is the great center of attraction at this season of the year. Everyone goes there. I have a pleasant furnished house on Lafayette Square. It has been quite ready for our reception for the last fortnight. Some of our servants have already gone up. So, my love, I have fixed our departure for Saturday morning, if you think you can be ready by that time. If not, I can wait a day or two."

"I thank you, mamma; I thank you very much; but pray do not inconvenience yourself on my account. I cannot go to town. I must stay here and wait my husband's return--if he ever returns," murmured Berenice to herself.

"But suppose he is in Washington?"

"Still, mamma, as he has not invited me to follow him, I prefer to stay here."

"But surely, child, you need no invitation to follow your husband, wherever he may be."

"Indeed I do, mamma. I came to him from Europe here, and my doing so displeased him and drove him away from his home. And I myself would return to my native country, only, now that I am in my husband's house, I feel that to leave it would be to abandon my post of duty and expose myself to just censure. But I cannot follow him farther, mamma. I cannot! I must not obtrude myself upon his presence. I must remain here and pray and hope for his return," sighed the poor young wife.

"Berenice, this is all wrong; you are morbid; not fit, in your present state of mind, to guide yourself. Be guided by me. Come with me to Washington. You will really enjoy yourself there--you cannot help it. Your beauty will make you the reigning belle; your taste will make you the leader of fashion; and your title will constitute you the lioness of the season; for, mark you, Berenice, there is nothing, not even the 'almighty dollar,' that our consistent republicans fall down and worship with a sincerer homage than a title! All your combined attractions will make you whatever you please to be."

"Except the beloved of my husband," murmured Berenice, in a low voice.

"That also! for, believe me, my dear, many men admire and love through other men's eyes. My son is one of the many. Nothing in this world would bring him to your side so quickly as to see you the center of attraction in the first circles of the capital."

"Ah, madam, the situation would lack the charm of novelty to him; he has been accustomed to seeing me fill similar ones in London and in Paris," said the countess, with a proud though mournful smile.

Mrs. Brudenell's face flushed as she became conscious of having made a blunder--a thing she abhorred, so she hastened to say:

"Oh, of course, my dear, I know, after the European courts, our republican capital must seem an anti-climax! Still, it is the best thing I can offer you, and I counsel you to accept it."

"I feel deeply grateful for your kindness, mamma; but you know I could not enter society, except under the auspices of my husband," replied Berenice.

"You can enter society under the auspices of your husband's mother, the very best chaperone you could possibly have," said the lady coldly.

"I know that, mamma."

"Then you will come with us?"

"Excuse me, madam; indeed I am not thankless of your thought of me. But I cannot go; for even if I had the spirits to sustain the role of a woman of fashion in the gay capital this winter, I feel that in doing so I should still further displease and alienate my husband. No, I must remain here in retirement, doing what good I can, and hoping and praying for his return," sighed Berenice.

Mrs. Brudenell hastily rose from her seat. She was not accustomed to opposition; she was too proud to plead further; and she was very much displeased with Berenice for disappointing her cherished plan of introducing her daughter, the Countess of Hurstmonceux, to the circles of Washington.

"The first dinner bell has rung some time ago, my dear. I will not detain you longer. Myself and daughters leave for town on Saturday."

Berenice bowed gently, and went upstairs to change her dress for dinner.

On Saturday, according to programme, Mrs. Brudenell and her daughters went to town, traveling in their capacious family carriage, and Berenice was left alone. Yes, she was left alone to a solitude of heart and home difficult to be understood by beloved and happy wives and mothers. The strange, wild country, the large, empty house, the grotesque black servants, were enough in themselves to depress the spirits and sadden the heart of the young English lady. Added to these were the deep wounds her affections had received by the contemptuous desertion of her husband; there was uncertainty of his fate, and keen anxiety for his safety; and the slow, wasting soul-sickness of that fruitless hope which is worse than despair.

Every morning, on rising from her restless bed, she would say to herself:

"Herman will return or I shall get a letter from him to-day."

Every night, on sinking upon her sleepless pillow, she would sigh:

"Another dreary day has gone and no news of Herman!"

Thus in feverish expectation the days crept into weeks. And with the extension of time hope grew more strained, tense, and painful.

On Monday morning she would murmur:

"This week I shall surely hear from Herman, if I do not see him."

And every Saturday night she would groan:

"Another miserable week, and no tidings of my husband."

And thus the weeks slowly crept into months.

Mrs. Brudenell wrote occasionally to say that Herman was not in Washington, and to ask if he was at Brudenell. That was all. The answer was always, "Not yet."

Berenice could not go out among the poor, as she had designed; for in that wilderness of hill and valley, wood and water, the roads even in the best weather were bad enough--but in mid-winter they were nearly impassable except by the hardiest pedestrians, the roughest horses, and the strongest wagons. Very early in January there came a deep snow, followed by a sharp frost, and then by a warm rain and thaw, that converted the hills into seamed and guttered precipices; the valleys into pools and quagmires; and the roads into ravines and rivers--quite impracticable for ordinary passengers.

Berenice could not get out to do her deeds of charity among the suffering poor; nor could the landed gentry of the neighborhood make calls upon the young stranger. And thus the unloved wife had nothing to divert her thoughts from the one all-absorbing subject of her husband's unexplained abandonment. The fire, that was consuming her life--the fire of "restless, unsatisfied longing"--burned fiercely in her cavernous dark eyes and the hollow crimson cheeks, lending wildness to the beauty of that face which it was slowly burning away.

As spring advanced the ground improved. The hills dried first. And every day the poor young stranger would wander up the narrow footpath that led over the summit of the hill at the back of the house and down to a stile at a point on the turnpike that commanded a wide sweep of the road. And there, leaning on the rotary cross, she would watch morbidly for the form of him who never came back.

Gossip was busy with her name, asking, Who this strange wife of Mr. Brudenell really was? Why he had abandoned her? And why Mrs. Brudenell had left the house for good, taking her daughters with her? There were some uneducated women among the wives and daughters of the wealthy planters, and these wished to know, if the strange young woman was really the wife of Herman Brudenell, why she was called Lady Hurstmonceux? and they thought that looked very black indeed; until they were laughed at and enlightened by their better informed friends, who instructed them that a woman once a peeress is always by courtesy a peeress, and retains her own title even though married to a commoner.

Upon the whole the planters' wives decided to call upon the countess, once at least, to satisfy their curiosity. Afterwards they could visit or drop her as might seem expedient.

Thus, as soon as the roads became passable, scarcely a day went by in which a large, lumbering family coach, driven by a negro coachman and attended by a negro groom on horseback, did not arrive at Brudenell.

To one and all of these callers the same answer was returned:

"The Countess of Hurstmonceux is engaged, and cannot receive visitors."

The tables were turned. The country ladies, who had been debating with themselves whether to "take up" or "drop" this very questionable stranger, received their congee from the countess herself from the threshold of her own door. The planters' wives were stunned! Each was a native queen, in her own little domain, over her own black subjects, and to meet with a repulse from a foreign countess was an incomprehensible thing!

The reverence for titled foreigners, for which we republicans have been justly laughed at, is confined exclusively to those large cities corrupted by European intercourse. It does not exist in the interior of the country. For instance, in Maryland and Virginia the owner of a large plantation had a domain greater in territorial extent, and a power over his subjects more absolute, than that of any reigning grand-duke or sovereign prince in Germany or Italy. The planter was an absolute monarch, his wife was his queen-consort; they saw no equals and knew no contradiction in their own realm. Their neighbors were as powerful as themselves. When they met, they met as peers on equal terms, the only precedence being that given by courtesy. How, then, could the planter's wife appreciate the dignity of a countess, who, on state occasions, must walk behind a marchioness, who must walk behind a duchess, who must walk behind a queen? Thus you see how it was that the sovereign ladies of Maryland thought they were doing a very condescending thing in calling upon the young stranger whose husband had deserted her, and whose mother and sisters-in-law had left her alone; and that her ladyship had committed a great act of ill-breeding and impertinence in declining their visits.

At the close of the Washington season Mrs. Brudenell and her daughters returned to the Hall. She told her friends that her son was traveling in Europe; but she told her daughter-in-law that she only hoped he was doing so; that she really had not heard a word from him, and did not know anything whatever of his whereabouts.

Mrs. Brudenell and her daughters received and paid visits; gave and attended parties, and made the house and the neighborhood very gay in the pleasant summer time.

Berenice did not enter into any of these amusements. She never accepted an invitation to go out. And even when company was entertained at the house she kept her own suite of rooms and had her meals brought to her there. Mrs. Brudenell was excessively displeased at a course of conduct in her daughter-in-law that would naturally give rise to a great deal of conjecture. She expostulated with Lady Hurstmonceux; but to no good purpose: for Berenice shrunk from company, replying to all arguments that could be urged upon her:

"I cannot--I cannot see visitors, mamma! It is quite--quite impossible."

And then Mrs. Brudenell made a resolution, which she also kept--never to come to Brudenell Hall for another summer until Herman should return to his home and Berenice to her senses. And having so decided, she abridged her stay and went away with her daughters to spend the remainder of the summer at some pleasant watering-place in the North.

And Berenice was once more left to solitude.

Now, Lady Hurstmonceux was not naturally cold, or proud, or unsocial; but as surely as brains can turn, and hearts break, and women die of grief, she was crazy, heart-broken, and dying.

She turned sick at the sight of every human face, because the one dear face she loved and longed for was not near. The pastor of the parish, with the benevolent perseverence of a true Christian, continued to call at the Hall long after every other human creature had ceased to visit the place. But Lady Hurstmonceux steadily refused to receive him.

She never went to church. Her cherished sorrow grew morbid; her hopeless hope became a monomania; her life narrowed down to one mournful routine. She went nowhere but to the turnstile on the turnpike, where she leaned upon the rotary cross, and watched the road.

Even to this day the pale, despairing, but most beautiful face of that young watcher is remembered in that neighborhood.

Only very recently a lady who had lived in that vicinity said to me, in speaking of this young forsaken wife--this stranger in our land:

"Yes, every day she walked slowly up that narrow path to the turnstile, and stood leaning on the cross and gazing up the road, to watch for him--every day, rain or shine; in all weathers and seasons; for months and years."

XIX. NOBODY'S SON

Not blest? not saved? Who dares to doubt all well With holy innocence? We scorn the creed And tell thee truer than the bigots tell,-- That infants all are Jesu's lambs indeed.

--Martin F. Tupper.

But thou wilt burst this transient sleep, And thou wilt wake my babe to weep; The tenant of a frail abode, Thy tears must flow as mine have flowed: And thou may'st live perchance to prove The pang of unrequited love.

--Byron.

Ishmael lived. Poor, thin, pale, sick; sent too soon into the world; deprived of all that could nurture healthy infant life; fed on uncongenial food; exposed in that bleak hut to the piercing cold of that severe winter; tended only by a poor old maid who honestly wished his death as the best good that could happen to him--Ishmael lived.

One day it occurred to Hannah that he was created to live. This being so, and Hannah being a good churchwoman, she thought she would have him baptized. He had no legal name; but that was no reason why he should not receive a Christian one. The cruel human law discarded him as nobody's child; the merciful Christian law claimed him as one "of the kingdom of Heaven." The human law denied him a name; the Christian law offered him one.

The next time the pastor in going his charitable rounds among his poor parishioners, called at the hut, the weaver mentioned the subject and begged him to baptize the boy then and there.

But the reverend gentleman, who was a high churchman, replied:

"I will cheerfully administer the rites of baptism to the child; but you must bring him to the altar to receive them. Nothing but imminent danger of death can justify the performance of those sacred rites at any other place. Bring the boy to church next Sabbath afternoon."

"What! bring this child to church!--before all the congregation! I should die of mortification!" said Hannah.

"Why? Are you to blame for what has happened? Or is he? Even if the boy were what he is supposed to be,--the child of sin,--it would not be his fault. Do you think in all the congregation there is a soul whiter than that of this child? Has not the Saviour said, 'Suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven?' Bring the boy to church, Hannah! bring the boy to church," said the pastor, as he took up his hat and departed.

Accordingly the next Sabbath afternoon Hannah Worth took Ishmael to the church, which was, as usual, well filled.

Poor Hannah! Poor, gentle-hearted, pure-spirited old maid! She sat there in a remote corner pew, hiding her child under her shawl and hushing him with gentle caresses during the whole of the afternoon service. And when after the last lesson had been read the minister came down to the font and said: "Any persons present having children to offer for baptism will now bring them forward," Hannah felt as if she would faint. But summoning all her resolution, she arose and came out of her pew, carrying the child. Every eye in the church turned full upon her. There was no harm meant in this; people will gaze at every such a little spectacle; a baby going to be baptized, if nothing else is to be had. But to Hannah's humbled spirit and sinking heart, to carry that child up that aisle under the fire of those eyes seemed like running a blockade of righteous indignation that appeared to surround the altar. But she did it. With downcast looks and hesitating steps she approached and stood at the font--alone--the target of every pair of eyes in the congregation. Only a moment she stood thus, when a countryman, with a start, left one of the side benches and came and stood by her side.

It was Reuben Gray, who, standing by her, whispered:

"Hannah, woman, why didn't you let me know? I would have come and sat in the pew with you and carried the child."

"Oh, Reuben, why will you mix yourself up with me and my miseries?" sighed Hannah.

"'Cause we are one, my dear woman, and so I can't help it," murmured the man.

There was no time for more words. The minister began the services. Reuben Gray offered himself as sponsor with Hannah, who had no right to refuse this sort of copartnership.

The child was christened Ishmael Worth, thus receiving both given and surname at the altar.

When the afternoon worship was concluded and they left the church, Reuben Gray walked beside Hannah, begging for the privilege of carrying the child--a privilege Hannah grimly refused.

Reuben, undismayed, walked by her side all the way from Baymouth church to the hut on the hill, a distance of three miles. And taking advantage of that long walk, he pleaded with Hannah to reconsider her refusal and to become his wife.

"After a bit, we can go away and take the boy with us and bring him up as our'n. And nobody need to know any better," he pleaded.

But this also Hannah grimly refused.

When they reached the hut she turned upon him and said:

"Reuben Gray, I will bear my miseries and reproaches myself! I will bear them alone! Your duty is to your sisters. Go to them and forget me." And so saying she actually shut the door in his face!

Reuben went away crestfallen.

But Hannah! poor Hannah! she never anticipated the full amount of misery and reproach she would have to bear alone!

A few weeks passed and the money she had saved was all spent. No more work was brought to her to do. A miserable consciousness of lost caste prevented her from going to seek it. She did not dream of the extent of her misfortune; she did not know that even if she had sought work from her old employers, it would have been refused her.

One day when the Professor of Odd Jobs happened to be making a professional tour in her way, and called at the hut to see if his services might be required there, she gave him a commission to seek work for her among the neighboring farmers and planters--a duty that the professor cheerfully undertook.

But when she saw him again, about ten days after, and inquired about his success in procuring employment for her, he shook his head, saying:

"There's a plenty of weaving waiting to be done everywhere, Miss Hannah--which it stands to reason there would be at this season of the year. There's all the cotton cloth for the negroes' summer clothes to be wove; but, Miss Hannah, to tell you the truth, the ladies as I've mentioned it to refuses to give the work to you."

"But why?" inquired the poor woman, in alarm.

"Well, Miss Hannah, because of what has happened, you know. The world is very unjust, Miss Hannah! And women are more unjust than men. If 'man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn,' I'm sure women's cruelty to women makes angels weep!" And here the professor, having lighted upon a high-toned subject and a helpless hearer, launched into a long oration I have not space to report. He ended by saying:

"And now, Miss Hannah, if I were you I would not expose myself to affronts by going to seek work."

"But what can I do, Morris? Must I starve, and let the child starve?" asked the weaver, in despair.

"Well, no, Miss Hannah; me and my ole 'oman must see what we can do for you. She aint as young as she used to be, and she mustn't work so hard. She must part with some of her own spinning and weaving to you. And I must work a little harder to pay for it. Which I am very willing to do; for I say, Hannah, when an able-bodied man is not willing to shift the burden off his wife's shoulders on to his own, he is unworthy to be--"

Here the professor launched into a second oration, longer than the first. In conclusion, he said:

"And so, Miss Hannah, we will give you what work we have to put out. And you must try and knock along and do as well as you can this season. And before the next the poor child will die, and the people will forget all about it, and employ you again."

"But the child is not a-going to die!" burst forth Hannah, in exasperation. "If he was the son of rich parents, whose hearts lay in him, and who piled comforts and luxuries and elegances upon him, and fell down and worshiped him, and had a big fortune and a great name to leave him, and so did everything they possibly could to keep him alive, he'd die! But being what he is, a misery and shame to himself and all connected with him, he'll live! Yes, half-perished as he is with cold and famine, he'll live! Look at him now!"

The professor did turn and look at the little, thin, wizen-faced boy who lay upon the bed, contentedly sucking his skinny thumb, and regarding the speaker with big, bright, knowing eyes, that seemed to say:

"Yes, I mean to suck my thumb and live!"

"To tell you the truth, I think so, too," said the professor, scarcely certain whether he was replying to the words of Hannah or to the looks of the child.

It is certain that the dread of death and the desire of life is the very earliest instinct of every animate creature. Perhaps this child was endowed with excessive vitality. Certainly, the babe's persistence in living on "under difficulties" might have been the germ of that enormous strength and power of will for which the man was afterwards so noted.

The professor kept his word with Hannah, and brought her some work. But the little that he could afford to pay for it was not sufficient to supply one-fourth of Hannah's necessities.

At last came a day when her provisions were all gone. And Hannah locked the child up alone in the hut and set off to walk to Baymouth, to try to get some meal and bacon on credit from the country shop where she had dealt all her life.

Baymouth was a small port, at the mouth of a small bay making up from the Chesapeake. It had one church, in charge of the Episcopal minister who had baptized Nora's child. And it had one large, country store, kept by a general dealer named Nutt, who had for sale everything to eat, drink, wear, or wield, from sugar and tea to meat and fish; from linen cambric to linsey-woolsey; from bonnets and hats to boots and shoes; from new milk to old whisky; from fresh eggs to stale cheese; and from needles and thimbles to plows and harrows.

Hannah, as I said, had been in the habit of dealing at this shop all her life, and paying cash for everything she got. So now, indeed, she might reasonably ask for a little credit, a little indulgence until she could procure work. Yet, for all that, she blushed and hesitated at having to ask the unusual favor. She entered the store and found the dealer alone. She was glad of that, as she rather shrank from preferring her humble request before witnesses. Mr. Nutt hurried forward to wait on her. Hannah explained her wants, and then added:

"If you will please credit me for the things, Mr. Nutt, I will be sure to pay you the first of the month."

The dealer looked at the customer and then looked down at the counter, but made no reply.

Hannah, seeing his hesitation, hastened to say that she had been out of work all the winter and spring, but that she hoped soon to get some more, when she would be sure to pay her creditor.

"Yes, I know you have lost your employment, poor girl, and I fear that you will not get it again," said the dealer, with a look of compassion.

"But why, oh! why should I not be allowed to work, when I do my work so willingly and so well?" exclaimed Hannah, in, despair.

"Well, my dear girl, if you do not know the reason, I cannot be the man to tell you."

"But if I cannot get work, what shall I do? Oh! what shall I do? I cannot starve! And I cannot see the child starve!" exclaimed Hannah, clasping her hands and raising her eyes in earnest appeal to the judgment of the man who had known her from infancy: who was old enough to be her father, and who had a wife and grown daughter of his own:

"What shall I do? Oh! what shall I do?" she repeated.

Mr. Nutt still seemed to hesitate and reflect, stealing furtive glances at the anxious face of the woman. At last he bent across the counter, took her hand, and, bending his head close to her face, whispered:

"I'll tell you what, Hannah. I will let you have the articles you have asked for, and anything else in my store that you want, and I will never charge you anything for them--"

"Oh, sir, I couldn't think of imposing on your goodness so: The Lord reward you, sir! but I only want a little credit for a short time," broke out Hannah, in the warmth of her gratitude.

"But stop, hear me out, my dear girl! I was about to say you might come to my store and get whatever you want, at any time, without payment, if you will let me drop in and see you sometimes of evenings," whispered the dealer.

"Sir!" said Hannah, looking up in innocent perplexity.

The man repeated his proposal with a look that taught even Hannah's simplicity that she had received the deepest insult a woman could suffer. Hannah was a rude, honest, high-spirited old maid. And she immediately obeyed her natural impulses, which were to raise her strong hands and soundly box the villain's ears right and left, until he saw more stars in the firmament than had ever been created. And before he could recover from the shock of the assault she picked up her basket and strode from the shop. Indignation lent her strength and speed, and she walked home in double-quick time. But once in the shelter of her own hut she sat down, threw her apron over her head, and burst into passionate tears and sobs, crying:

"It's all along of poor Nora and that child, as I'm thought ill on by the women and insulted by the men! Yes, it is, you miserable little wretch!" she added, speaking to the baby, who had opened his big eyes to see the cause of the uproar. "It's all on her account and yourn, as I'm treated so! Why do you keep on living, you poor little shrimp? Why don't you die? Why can't both of us die? Many people die who want to live! Why should we live who want to die? Tell me that, little miserable!" But the baby defiantly sucked his thumb, as if it held the elixir of life, and looked indestructible vitality from his great, bright eyes.

Hannah never ventured to ask another favor from mortal man, except the very few in whom she could place entire confidence, such as the pastor of the parish, the Professor of Odd Jobs, and old Jovial. Especially she shunned Nutt's shop as she would have shunned a pesthouse; although this course obliged her to go two miles farther to another village to procure necessaries whenever she had money to pay for them.

Nutt, on his part, did not think it prudent to prosecute Hannah for assault. But he did a base thing more fatal to her reputation. He told his wife how that worthless creature, whose sister turned out so badly, had come running after him, wanting to get goods from his shop, and teasing him to come to see her; but that he had promptly ordered her out of the shop and threatened her with a constable if ever she dared to show her face there again.

False, absurd, and cruel as this story was, Mrs. Nutt believed it, and told all her acquaintances what an abandoned wretch that woman was. And thus poor Hannah Worth lost all that she possessed in the world--her good name. She had been very poor. But it would be too dreadful now to tell in detail of the depths of destitution and misery into which she and the child fell, and in which they suffered and struggled to keep soul and body together for years and years.

It is wonderful how long life may be sustained under the severest privations. Ishmael suffered the extremes of hunger and cold; yet he did not starve or freeze to death; he lived and grew in that mountain hut as pertinaciously as if he had been the pampered pet of some royal nursery.

At first Hannah did not love him. Ah, you know, such unwelcome children are seldom loved, even by their parents. But this child was so patient and affectionate, that it must have been an unnatural heart that would not have been won by his artless efforts to please. He bore hunger and cold and weariness with baby heroism. And if you doubt whether there is any such a thing in the world as "baby heroism", just visit the nursery hospitals of New York, and look at the cheerfulness of infant sufferers from disease.

Ishmael was content to sit upon the floor all day long, with his big eyes watching Hannah knit, sew, spin, or weave, as the case might be. And if she happened to drop her thimble, scissors, spool of cotton, or ball of yarn, Ishmael would crawl after it as fast as his feeble little limbs would take him, and bring it back and hold it up to her with a smile of pleasure, or, if the feat had been a fine one, a little laugh of triumph. Thus, even before he could walk, he tried to make himself useful. It was his occupation to love Hannah, and watch her, and crawl after anything she dropped and restore it to her. Was this such a small service? No; for it saved the poor woman the trouble of getting up and deranging her work to chase rolling balls of yarn around the room. Or was it a small pleasure to the lonely old maid to see the child smile lovingly up in her face as he tendered her these baby services? I think not. Hannah grew to love little Ishmael. Who, indeed, could have received all his innocent overtures of affection and not loved him a little in return? Not honest Hannah Worth. It was thus, you see, by his own artless efforts that he won his grim aunt's heart. This was our boy's first success. And the truth may as well be told of him now, that in the whole course of his eventful life he gained no earthly good which he did not earn by his own merits. But I must hurry over this part of my story.

When Ishmael was about four years old he began to take pleasure in the quaint pictures of the old family Bible, that I have mentioned as the only book and sole literary possession of Hannah Worth. A rare old copy it was, bearing the date of London, 1720, and containing the strangest of all old old-fashioned engravings. But to the keenly appreciating mind of the child these pictures were a gallery of art. And on Sunday afternoons, when Hannah had leisure to exhibit them, Ishmael never wearied of standing by her side, and gazing at the illustrations of "Cain and Abel," "Joseph Sold by his Brethren," "Moses in the Bulrushes," "Samuel Called by the Lord," "John the Baptist and the Infant Jesus," "Christ and the Doctors in the Temple," and so forth.

"Read me about it," he would say of each picture.

And Hannah would have to read these beautiful Bible stories. One day, when he was about five years old, he astonished his aunt by saying:

"And now I want to read about them for myself!"

But Hannah found no leisure to teach him. And besides she thought it would be time enough some years to come for Ishmael to learn to read. So thought not our boy, however, as a few days proved.

One night Hannah had taken home a dress to one of the plantation negroes, who were now her only customers, and it was late when she returned to the hut. When she opened the door a strange sight met her eyes. The Professor of Odd Jobs occupied the seat of honor in the arm chair in the chimney corner. On his knees lay the open Bible; while by his side stood little Ishmael, holding an end of candle in his hand, and diligently conning the large letters on the title page. The little fellow looked up with his face full of triumph, exclaiming:

"Oh, aunty, I know all the letters on this page now! And the professor is going to teach me to read! And I am going to help him gather his herbs and roots every day to pay him for his trouble!"

The professor looked up and smiled apologetically, saying:

"I just happened in, Miss Hannah, to see if there was anything wanting to be done, and I found this boy lying on the floor with the Bible open before him trying to puzzle out the letters for himself. And as soon as he saw me he up and struck a bargain with me to teach him to read. And I'll tell you what, Miss Hannah, he's going to make a man one of these days! You know I've been a colored schoolmaster, among my other professions, and I tell you I never came across such a quick little fellow as he is, bless his big head! There now, my little man, that's learning enough for one sitting. And besides the candle is going out," concluded the professor, as he arose and closed the book and departed.

But again Ishmael held a different opinion from his elders; and lying down before the fire-lit hearth, with the book open before him, he went over and over his lesson, grafting it firmly in his memory lest it should escape him. In this way our boy took his first step in knowledge. Two or three times in the course of the week the professor would come to give him another lesson. And Ishmael paid for his tuition by doing the least of the little odd jobs for the professor of that useful art.

"You see I can feel for the boy like a father, Miss Hannah," said the professor, after giving his lesson one evening; "because, you know, I am in a manner self-educated myself. I had to pick up reading, writing, and 'rithmetick any way I could from the white children. So I can feel for this boy as I once felt for myself. All my children are girls; but if I had a son I couldn't feel more pride in him than I do in this boy. And I tell you again, he is going to make a man one of these days."

Ishmael thought so too. He had previsions of future success, as every very intelligent lad must have; but at present his ambition took no very lofty flights. The greatest man of his acquaintance was the Professor of Odd Jobs. And to attain the glorious eminence occupied by the learned and eloquent dignitary was the highest aspiration of our boy's early genius.

"Aunty," he said one day, after remaining in deep thought for a long time, "do you think if I was to study very hard indeed, night and day, for years and years, I should ever be able to get as much knowledge and make as fine speeches as the professor?"

"How do I know, Ishmael? You ask such stupid questions. All I can say is, if it aint in you it will never come out of you," answered the unappreciating aunt.

"Oh, if that's all, it is in me; there's a deal more in me than I can talk about; and so I believe I shall be able to make fine speeches like the professor some day."

Morris certainly took great pains with his pupil; and Ishmael repaid his teacher's zeal by the utmost devotion to his service.

By the time our boy had attained his seventh year he could read fluently, write legibly, and work the first four rules in arithmetic. Besides this, he had glided into a sort of apprenticeship to the odd-job line of business, and was very useful to his principal. The manner in which he helped his master was something like this: If the odd job on hand happened to be in the tinkering line, Ishmael could heat the irons and prepare the solder; if it were in the carpentering and joining branch, he could melt the glue; if in the brick-laying, he could mix the mortar; if in the painting and glazing, he could roll the putty.

When he was eight years old he commenced the study of grammar, geography, and history, from old books lent him by his patron; and he also took a higher degree in his art, and began to assist his master by doing the duties of clerk and making the responses, whenever the professor assumed the office of parson and conducted the church services to a barn full of colored brethren; by performing the part of mourner whenever the professor undertook to superintend a funeral; and by playing the tambourine in accompaniment to the professor's violin whenever the latter became master of ceremonies for a colored ball!

In this manner he not only paid for his own tuition, but earned a very small stipend, which it was his pride to carry to Hannah, promising her that some day soon he should be able to earn enough to support her in comfort.

Thus our boy was rapidly progressing in the art of odd jobs and bidding fair to emulate the fame and usefulness of the eminent professor himself, when an event occurred in the neighborhood that was destined to change the direction of his genius.

XX. NEWS FROM HERMAN

But that which keepeth us apart is not Distance, nor depth of wave, nor space of earth, But the distractions of a various lot, As various as the climates of our birth.

My blood is all meridian--were it not I had not left my clime, nor should I be, In spite of tortures, ne'er to be forgot, A slave again of love, at least of thee!

--Byron.

The life of Berenice was lonely enough. She had perseveringly rejected the visits of her neighbors, until at length they had taken her at her word and kept away from her house.

She had persistently declined the invitations of Mrs. Brudenell to join the family circle at Washington every winter, until at last that lady had ceased to repeat them and had also discontinued her visits to Brudenell Hall.

Berenice passed her time in hoping and praying for her husband's return, and in preparing and adorning her home for his reception; in training and improving the negroes; in visiting and relieving the poor; and in walking to the turnstile and watching the high-road.

Surely a more harmless and beneficent life could not be led by woman; yet the poisonous alchemy of detraction turned all her good deeds into evil ones.

Poor Berenice--poor in love, was rich in gold, and she lavished it with an unsparing hand on the improvement of Brudenell. She did not feel at liberty to pull down and build up, else had the time-worn old mansion house disappeared from sight and a new and elegant villa had reared its walls upon Brudenell Heights. But she did everything else she could to enhance the beauty and value of the estate.

The house was thoroughly repaired, refurnished, and decorated with great luxury, richness, and splendor. The grounds were laid out, planted, and adorned with all the beauty that taste, wealth, and skill could produce. Orchards and vineyards were set out. Conservatories and pineries were erected. The negroes' squalid log-huts were replaced with neat stone cottages, and the shabby wooden fences by substantial stone walls.

And all this was done, not for herself, but for her husband, and her constant mental inquiry was:

"After all, will Herman be pleased?"

Yet when the neighbors saw this general renovation, of the estate, which could not have been accomplished without considerable expenditure of time, money, and labor, they shook their heads in strong disapprobation, and predicted that that woman's extravagance would bring Herman Brudenell to beggary yet.

She sought to raise the condition of the negroes, not only by giving them neat cottages, but by comfortably furnishing their rooms, and encouraging them to keep their little houses and gardens in order, rewarding them for neatness and industry, and established a school for their children to learn to read and write. But the negroes--hereditary servants of the Brudenells--looked upon this stranger with jealous distrust, as an interloping foreigner who had, by some means or other, managed to dispossess and drive away the rightful family from the old place. And so they regarded all her favors as a species of bribery, and thanked her for none of them. And this was really not ingratitude, but fidelity. The neighbors denounced these well-meant efforts of the mistress as dangerous innovations, incendiarisms, and so forth, and thanked Heaven that the Brudenell negroes were too faithful to be led away by her!

She went out among the poor of her neighborhood and relieved their wants with such indiscriminate and munificent generosity as to draw down upon herself the rebuke of the clergy for encouraging habits of improvidence and dependence in the laboring classes. As for the subjects of her benevolence, they received her bounty with the most extravagant expressions of gratitude and the most fulsome flattery. This was so distasteful to Berenice that she oftened turned her face away, blushing with embarrassment at having listened to it. Yet such was the gentleness of her spirit, that she never wounded their feelings by letting them see that she distrusted the sincerity of these hyperbolical phrases.

"Poor souls," she said to herself, "it is the best they have to offer me, and I will take it as if it were genuine."

Berenice was right in her estimate of their flattery. Astonished at her lavish generosity, and ignorant of her great wealth, which made alms-giving easy, her poor neighbors put their old heads together to find out the solution of the problem. And they came to the conclusion that this lady must have been a great sinner, whose husband had abandoned her for some very good reason, and who was now endeavoring to atone for her sins by a life of self-denial and benevolence. This conclusion seemed too probable to be questioned. This verdict was brought to the knowledge of Berenice in a curious way. Among the recipients of her bounty was Mrs. Jones, the ladies' nurse. The old woman had fallen into a long illness, and consequently into extreme want. Her case came to the knowledge of Berenice, who hastened to relieve her. When the lady had made the invalid comfortable and was about to take leave, the latter said:

"Ah, 'charity covers a multitude of sins,' ma'am! Let us hope that all yours may be so covered."

Berenice stared in surprise. It was not the words so much as the manner that shocked her. And Phoebe, who had attended her mistress, scarcely got well out of the house before her indignation burst forth in the expletives:

"Old brute! Whatever did she mean by her insolence? My lady, I hope you will do nothing more for the old wretch."

Berenice walked on in silence until they reached the spot where they had left their carriage, and when they had re-entered it, she said:

"Something like this has vaguely met me before; but never so plainly and bluntly as to-day; it is unpleasant; but I must not punish one poor old woman for a misapprehension shared by the whole community."

So calmly and dispassionately had the countess answered her attendant's indignant exclamation. But as soon as Berenice reached her own chamber she dismissed her maid, locked her door, and gave herself up to a passion of grief.

It was but a trifle--that coarse speech of a thoughtless old woman--a mere trifle; but it overwhelmed her, coming, as it did, after all that had gone before. It was but the last feather, you know, only a single feather laid on the pack that broke the camel's back. It was but a drop of water, a single drop, that made the full cup overflow!

Added to bereavement, desertion, loneliness, slander, ingratitude, had come this little bit of insolence to overthrow the firmness that had stood all the rest. And Berenice wept.

She had left home, friends, and country for one who repaid the sacrifice by leaving her. She had lavished her wealth upon those who received her bounty with suspicion and repaid her kindness with ingratitude. She had lived a life as blameless and as beneficent as that of any old time saint or martyr, and had won by it nothing but detraction and calumny. Her parents were dead, her husband gone, her native land far away, her hopes were crushed. No wonder she wept. And then the countess was out of her sphere; as much out of her sphere in the woods of Maryland as Hans Christian Andersen's cygnet was in the barnyard full of fowls. She was a swan, and they took her for a deformed duck. And at last she herself began to be vaguely conscious of this.

"Why do I remain here?" she moaned; "what strange magnetic power is it that holds my very will, fettered here, against my reason and judgment? That has so held me for long years? Yes, for long, weary years have I been bound to this cross, and I am not dead yet! Heavenly Powers! what are my nerves and brain and heart made of that I am not dead, or mad, or criminal before this? Steel, and rock, and gutta percha, I think! Not mere flesh and blood and bone like other women's? Oh, why do I stay here? Why do I not go home? I have lost everything else; but I have still a home and country left! Oh, that I could break loose! Oh, that I could free myself! Oh, that I had the wings of a dove, for then I would fly away and be at rest!'" she exclaimed, breaking into the pathetic language of the Psalmist.

A voice softly stole upon her ear, a low, plaintive voice singing a homely Scotch song:

"'Oh, it's hame, hame, hame, Hame fain would I be; But the wearie never win back To their ain countrie.'"

Tears sprang again to the eyes of the countess as she caught up and murmured the last two lines:

"'But the wearie never win back To their ain countrie.'"

Phoebe, for it was she who was singing, hushed her song as she reached her lady's door, and knocked softly. The countess unlocked the door to admit her.

"It is only the mail bag, my lady, that old Jovial has just brought from the post office," said the girl.

Lady Hurstmonceux listlessly looked over its contents. Several years of disappointment had worn out all expectation of hearing from the only one of whom she cared to receive news. There were home and foreign newspapers that she threw carelessly out. And there was one letter at the bottom of all the rest that she lifted up and looked at with languid curiosity. But as soon as her eyes fell upon the handwriting of the superscription the letter dropped from her hand and she sank back in her chair and quietly fainted away.

Phoebe hastened to apply restoratives, and after a few minutes the lady recovered consciousness and rallied her faculties.

"The letter! the letter, girl! give me the letter!" she gasped in eager tones.

Phoebe picked it up from the carpet, upon which it had fallen, and handed it to her mistress.

Berenice, with trembling fingers, broke the seal and read the letter. It was from Herman Brudenell, and ran as follows:

"London, December 1, 18--

"Lady Hurstmonceux: If there is one element of saving comfort in my lost, unhappy life, it is the reflection that, though in an evil hour I made you my wife, you are not called by my name; but that the courtesy of custom continues to you the title won by your first marriage with the late Earl of Hurstmonceux; and that you cannot therefore so deeply dishonor my family.

"Madam, it would give me great pain to write to any other woman, however guilty, as I am forced to write to you; because on any woman I should feel that I was inflicting suffering, which you know too well I have not--never had the nerve to do; but you, I know, cannot be hurt; you are callous. If your early youth had not shown you to be so, the last few years of your life would have proved it. If you had not been so insensible to shame as you are to remorse, how could you, after your great crime, take possession of my house and, by so doing, turn my mother and sisters from their home and banish me from my country? For well you know that, while you live at Brudenell Hall, my family cannot re-enter its walls! Nay, more--while you choose to reside in America, I must remain an exile in Europe. The same hemisphere is not broad enough to contain the Countess of Hurstmonceux and Herman Brudenell.

"I have given you a long time to come to your senses and leave my house. Now my patience is exhausted, and I require you to depart. You are not embarrassed for a home or a support: if you were I should afford you both, on condition of your departure from America. But my whole patrimony would be but a mite added to your treasures.

"You have country-seats in England, Scotland, and Ireland, as well as a town house in London, a marine villa at Boulougne, and a Swiss cottage on Lake Leman. All these are your own; and you shall never be molested by me in your exclusive possession of them. Choose your residence from among them, and leave me in peaceable possession of the one modest countryhouse I have inherited in my native land. I wish to sell it.

"But you doubtless have informed yourself before this time, that by the laws of the State in which my property is situated, a man cannot sell his homestead without the consent of his wife. Your co-operation is therefore necessary in the sale of Brudenell Hall. I wish you to put yourself in immediate communication with my solicitors, Messrs. Kage & Kage, Monument Street, Baltimore, who are in possession of my instructions. Do this promptly, and win from me the only return you have left it in my power to make you--oblivion of your crimes and of yourself.

"Herman Brudenell."

With the calmness of despair Berenice read this cruel letter through to the end, and dropped it on her lap, and sat staring at it in silence. Then, as if incredulous of its contents, or doubtful of its meaning, she took it up and read it again, and again let it fall. And yet a third time--after rapidly passing her hand to and fro across her forehead, as if that action would clear her vision--she raised, re-perused, and laid aside the letter. Then she firmly set her teeth, and slowly nodded her head, while for an instant a startling light gleamed from her deep black eyes.

Her faithful attendant, while seeming to be busy arranging the flasks on the dressing-table, furtively and anxiously watched her mistress, who at last spoke:

"Phoebe!"

"Yes, my lady."

"Bring me a glass of wine."

The girl brought the required stimulant, and in handing it to her mistress noticed how deadly white her face had become. And as the countess took the glass from the little silver waiter her hand came in contact with that of Phoebe, and the girl felt as if an icicle had touched her, so cold it was.

"Now wheel my writing-desk forward," said the countess, as she sipped her wine.

The order was obeyed.

"And now," continued the lady, as she replaced the glass and opened her desk, "pack up my wardrobe and jewels, and your own clothes. Order the carriage to be at the door at eight o'clock, to take us to Baymouth. We leave Baymouth for New York to-morrow morning, and New York for Liverpool next Saturday."

"Now, glory be to Heaven for that, my lady; and I wish it had been years ago instead of to-day!" joyfully exclaimed the girl, as she went about her business.

"And so do I! And so do I, with all my heart and soul!" thought Berenice, as she arranged her papers and took up a pen to write. In an instant she laid it down again, and arose and walked restlessly up and down the floor, wringing her hands, and muttering to herself:

"And this is the man for whose sake I sacrificed home, friends, country, and the most splendid prospects that ever dazzled the imagination of woman! This is the man whom I have loved and watched and prayed for, all these long years, hoping against hope, and believing against knowledge. If he had ceased to love me, grown tired of me, and wished to be rid of me, could he not have told me so, frankly, from the first? It would have been less cruel than to have inflicted on me this long anguish of suspense! less cowardly than to have attempted to justify his desertion of me by a charge of crime! What crime--he knows no more than I do! Oh, Herman! Herman! how could you fall so low? But I will not reproach you even in my thoughts. But I must, I must forget you!"

She returned to her desk, sat down and took up her pen; but again she dropped it, bowed her head upon her desk, and wept:

"Oh, Herman! Herman! must I never hope to meet you again? never look into your dark eyes, never clasp your hand, or hear your voice again? never more? never more! Must mine be the hand that writes our sentence of separation? I cannot! oh! I cannot do it, Herman! And yet!--it is you who require it!"

After a few minutes she took up his letter and read it over for the fourth time. Its ruthless implacability seemed to give her the strength necessary to obey its behests. As if fearing another failure of her resolution, she wrote at once:

"Brudenell Hall, December 30, 18--

"Mr. Brudenell: Your letter has relieved me from an embarrassing position. I beg your pardon for having been for so long a period an unconscious usurper of your premises. I had mistaken this place for my husband's house and my proper home. My mistake, however, has not extended to the appropriation of the revenues of the estate. You will find every dollar of those placed to your credit in the Planters' Bank of Baymouth. My mistake has been limited to the occupancy of the house. For that wrong I shall make what reparation remains in my power. I shall leave this place this Friday evening; see your solicitors on Monday; place in their hands a sum equivalent to the full value of Brudenell Hall, as a compensation to you for my long use of the house; and then sign whatever documents may be necessary to renounce all claim upon yourself and your estate, and to free you forever from

"Berenice, Countess of Hurstmonceux."

She finished the letter and threw down the pen. What it had cost her to write thus, only her own loving and outraged woman's heart knew.

By the time she had sealed her letter Phoebe entered to say that the dinner was served--that solitary meal at which she had sat down, heart-broken, for so many weary years.

She answered, "Very well," but never stirred from her seat.

Phoebe fidgeted about the room for a while, and then, with the freedom of a favorite attendant, she came to the side of the countess and, smiling archly, said:

"My lady."

"Well, Phoebe?"

"People needn't starve, need they, because they are going back to their 'ain countrie'?"

Lady Hurstmonceux smiled faintly, roused herself, and went down to dinner.

On her return to her room she found her maid locking the last trunks.

"Is everything packed, Phoebe?"

"Except the dress you have on, my lady; and I can lay that on the top of this trunk after you put on your traveling dress."

"And you are glad we are going home, my girl?"

"Oh, my lady, I feel as if I could just spread out my arms and fly for joy."

"Then I am, also, for your sake. What time is it now?"

"Five o'clock, my lady."

"Three hours yet. Tell Mrs. Spicer to come here."

Phoebe locked the trunk she had under her hand and went out to obey. When Mrs. Spicer came in she was startled by the intelligence that her lady was going away immediately, and that the house was to be shut up until the arrival of Mr. Brudenell or his agents, who would arrange for its future disposition.

When Lady Hurstmonceux had finished these instructions she placed a liberal sum of money in the housekeeper's hands, with orders to divide it among the house-servants.

Next she sent for Grainger, the overseer, and having given him the same information, and put a similar sum of money in his hands for distribution among the negroes, she dismissed both the housekeeper and the overseer. Then she enclosed a note for a large amount in a letter addressed to the pastor of the parish, with a request that he would appropriate it for the relief of the suffering poor in that neighborhood. Finally, having completed all her preparations, she took a cup of tea, bade farewell to her dependents, and, attended by Phoebe, entered the carriage and was driven to Baymouth, where she posted her two letters in time for the evening mail, and where the next morning she took the boat for Baltimore, en route for the North. She stopped in Baltimore only long enough to arrange business with Mr. Brudenell's solicitors, and then proceeded to New York, whence, at the end of the same week, she sailed for Liverpool. Thus the beautiful young English Jewess, who had dropped for a while like some rich exotic flower transplanted to our wild Maryland woods, returned to her native land, where, let us hope, she found in an appreciating circle of friends some consolation for the loss of that domestic happiness that had been so cruelly torn from her.

We shall meet with Berenice, Countess of Hurstmonceux, again; but it will be in another sphere, and under other circumstances.

It was in the spring succeeding her departure that the house-agents and attorneys came down to appraise and sell Brudenell Hall. Since the improvements bestowed upon the estate by Lady Hurstmonceux, the property had increased its value, so that a purchaser could not at once be found. When this fact was communicated to Mr. Brudenell, in London, he wrote and authorized his agent to let the property to a responsible tenant, and if possible to hire the plantation negroes to the same party who should take the house.

All this after a while was successfully accomplished. A gentleman from a neighboring State took the house, all furnished as it was, and hired all the servants of the premises.

He came early in June, but who or what he was, or whence he came, none of the neighbors knew. The arrival of any stranger in a remote country district is always the occasion of much curiosity, speculation, and gossip. But when such a one brings the purse of Fortunatus in his pocket, and takes possession of the finest establishment in the country--house, furniture, servants, carriages, horses, stock and all, he becomes the subject of the wildest conjecture.

It does not require long to get comfortably to housekeeping in a ready-made home; so it was soon understood in the neighborhood that the strangers were settled in their new residence, and might be supposed to be ready to receive calls.

But the neighbors, though tormented with curiosity, cautiously held aloof, and waited until the Sabbath, when they might expect to see the newcomers, and judge of their appearance and hear their pastor's opinion of them.

So, on the first Sunday after the stranger's settlement at Brudenell Hall the Baymouth Church was crowded to excess. But those of the congregation who went there with other motives than to worship their Creator were sadly disappointed. The crimson-lined Brudenell pew remained vacant, as it had remained for several years.

"Humph! not church-going people, perhaps! We had an English Jewess before, perhaps we shall have a Turkish Mohammedan next!" was the speculation of one of the disappointed.

The conjecture proved false.

The next Sunday the Brudenell pew was filled. There was a gentleman and lady, and half-a-dozen girls and boys, all dressed in half-mourning, except one little lady of about ten years old, whose form was enveloped in black bombazine and crape, and whose face, what could be seen of it, was drowned in tears. It needed no seer to tell that she was just left motherless, and placed in charge of her relations.

After undergoing the scrutiny of the congregation, this family was unanimously, though silently, voted to be perfectly respectable.