A WAITING-MAID'S ROMANCE.
"The music of thy voice I heard
Nor wish while it enslaved me;
I saw thine eyes, but nothing feared,
Till fears no more had saved me.
The unwary sailor thus aghast,
The wheeling torrent viewing,
'Mid circling horrors sinks at last,
In overwhelming ruin!"—Burns.
Hetty Wilkins was bitterly grieved at her dismissal from the service of Mrs. Winans, and her vanity was wounded by the suggestion that Lindsey Warwick had been courting her simply to keep up with the movements of the Winans family and further his own designs.
"Oh, no, madam, he cannot be the same man, I'm sure," she declared stubbornly.
"But, Hetty, there can be no mistake. My daughter recognized him, and he declared to my son that he was your lover. Now, my good girl, there is a reward of ten thousand dollars offered by Senator Winans for Lindsey Warwick's apprehension. Suppose you earn it by delivering this wretch up to justice," suggested Mrs. Winans, very much in earnest over the matter.
So Hetty departed, angry at her dismissal, and firm in the belief that her lover was innocent of the charges brought against him.
But when Watson Hunter came no more, and her letters to him elicited no reply, her loving confidence grew faint, and suspicion awakened in her mind.
"I will find him if I have to employ a detective," she vowed spitefully.
But for Hetty's strong faith in fortune-tellers, it is likely that her absconding lover might have eluded her forever, but when a month had passed in futile efforts she suddenly bethought herself of invoking the aid of a clairvoyant in her search for the truant.