"And now," he continued, "it will not do for you to remain in Ernscliffe's house any longer than to-morrow. Let your maid pack your trunks for you to-night, and to-morrow I will take you away to some health resort—the mountains or the seashore—anywhere you like, so that I get you out of this city."
"And I shall never see my husband again," she said, clasping her hands with a gesture of despair. "Oh, how fleeting and evanescent was my dream of happiness! How can I live without him now, when I have been so happy with him?"
Uncle Robert took her tenderly in his arms, and kissed her white forehead.
"It is hard, dear," he said, "but we learn after awhile to do without the things that have been dearest to us on earth. I lost the darling of my heart many years ago. It was very hard to bear at first, but after awhile I learned patience and resignation."
"You have loved and lost?" she said, looking at him in great surprise.
"Yes, pet. Did you think I was a crusty, forlorn old bachelor from choice? No, no; I was betrothed to a sweet and lovely girl in my early youth, but she went away to live with the angels, and I have been true to her memory ever since."
"Poor uncle! I did not know you had so sad a secret in your life," she said, with the dew of sympathy shining in her beautiful blue eyes.
"Every heart knoweth its own bitterness," answered the kind, old man, sadly.
The next day he took her away to the seashore, hoping that the change of air and scene might divert her mind from its sorrows.
It was a vain hope. Her terrible trouble was too deeply graven on her mind. She became ill the day they took possession of their cottage, and for several weeks lay tossing with fever, closely attended by a skillful physician and two careful old nurses, while Mr. Lyle veered to and fro, his gentle heart nearly broken by this unexpected stroke of fate.