"Thus did he retire; and I, relieved from apprehensions which, in the issue, seemed to be very like 'coming events casting their shadows before,' fell fast asleep on resuming my chair. Meanwhile, Mr. Constant came in and awoke me, to inquire after William. He told me that he had received his card, but had been prevented from being with us earlier, by a visit which he had received from Mr Elphinstone, the laird, who had spent the day with them, and was with them still; and he gave me the gratifying information that the letter which William had that day sent to his brother had removed every bad impression from his mind, that, instead of opposing his inclinations, he was anxious that his marriage with Mary might take place as soon as possible; and that he was impatient to see himself personally, that everything might be satisfactorily arranged for it, and that they might be reconciled after the unpleasant affair of yesterday, which, he said, was the only serious difference they had ever had.
"'I have just come down,' continued he, 'to bring you both to Sanditofts, for that purpose.'
"'In that case,' said I, 'every obstacle to my friend's happiness is completely removed;' and I assured him that William had just gone out, but that he would return immediately. He did not return, however, although, as one of the company observed, he must have intended to do so, his hat having been left behind him. After waiting for some minutes longer, I became very uneasy; a feeling of apprehension began to steal over my mind, and I hurried out to make inquiries, followed by Mr Constant. On reaching the foot of the stairs, we were informed that William had gone out by a back passage which led down to the sea-beach, and we turned our steps thither.
"The evening was pleasant. A gentle breeze was blowing off the land, and a yellow radiance faintly tinging the east, and sharply cutting far the black water in the offing, showed that the darkness was on the point of being lightened by the rising of an unclouded moon. We proceeded onward, my anxious friend and I, for a great way along the rocky margin of the sea, until we gained a commanding station, and the moon more than half-risen threw a clearer light upon our view. But no traces did we discover of the object of our search. As a last resource, raising our voices together, we shouted aloud the name of William. As we stood long and anxiously listening, we became aware of a sound which came booming over the water, and which after having been once heard, we could again distinguish as it ever and anon recurred, at irregular intervals. While looking toward the point from which these sounds seemed to come, we beheld for an instant the upper spars of a two-masted lugger distinctly pourtrayed on the face of the moon. She was so diminished by distance, as not to do more than fill the moon's disk, and she seemed to be crowding all sail. Shortly after the single mast of a fore-and-aft rigged vessel, also under a press of canvass, was beheld in the same way; and the smoke, curling in wreaths among her rigging, seemed to indicate that it was from the latter vessel that the sounds which we heard proceeded.
"'I wonder,' said my companion, 'if that can have any connection with the disappearance of Mr. William.'
"'It's merely a revenue cutter,' replied I, 'in chase of some smuggling vessel.'
"Having returned to the apartment in the inn, we found the company still assembled, and reported to them our want of success, my poor friend casting a long and wistful look at the hat of William, which was hanging, and which long continued to hang, on that very pin. On its being suggested that there was a chance that he might be found in some house in the town, all with one accord separated to make inquiries. The whole place was soon in commotion, and so was the whole country side. Every place in which it was possible for William to be, dead or alive, was searched in vain.
"'They sought him that night, and they sought him next day,
Oh! vainly they sought him, till a week past away:—
And years flew by, and their sorrow at last,
Was told as a mournful tale that is past.'
"If among the friends of him who had so strangely disappeared, his intended bride felt the most acutely, it was on his brother that the blow fell most heavily. Mary long refused to be comforted; and was only sustained by young health, and by hopes which we all laboured to infuse into her dejected heart; but the sickly frame of William's brother never recovered from the shook it received. He always reflected on himself for having parted from his brother in anger; the fate of Edward, which was ever before his eyes, seemed to afford too natural an explanation of the mystery of William's disappearance; and his exhausted frame yielded at last to death, after an interval of about three years, during which his chief solace was the society and the kind attentions of the amiable family of Sanditofts. His last words were—
"'Whither is he gone?—what accident
Hath rapt him from us?'