Transcriber’s Note:

The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

THE CHANGED BRIDES.

BY

MRS. EMMA D. E. N. SOUTHWORTH.

AUTHOR OF “HOW HE WON HER,” “FAIR PLAY,” “THE BRIDES’ FATE,” “THE DISCARDED DAUGHTER,” “HAUNTED HOMESTEAD,” “RETRIBUTION,” “THE LOST HEIRESS,” “THE FORTUNE SEEKER,” “ALLWORTH ABBEY,” “THE FATAL MARRIAGE,” “THE MISSING BRIDE,” “THE TWO SISTERS,” “THE BRIDAL EVE,” “LADY OF THE ISLE,” “GIPSY’S PROPHECY,” “VIVIA,” “WIFE’S VICTORY,” “MOTHER-IN-LAW,” “INDIA,” “THE THREE BEAUTIES,” “THE CURSE OF CLIFTON,” “THE DESERTED WIFE,” “LOVE’S LABOR WON,” “FALLEN PRIDE,” “THE BRIDE OF LLEWELLYN,” “THE WIDOW’S SON,” “PRINCE OF DARKNESS.”

’Tis an old tale, and often told—

A maiden true, betrayed for gold.—Scott.

PHILADELPHIA:

T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS;

306 CHESTNUT STREET.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by

T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS,

In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

MRS. EMMA D. E. N. SOUTHWORTH’S WORKS.

Each Work is complete in one large duodecimo volume.

FAIR PLAY, OR, THE TEST OF THE LONE ISLE.

HOW HE WON HER, A SEQUEL TO FAIR PLAY.

THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS.

THE MOTHER-IN-LAW.

THE THREE BEAUTIES.

THE WIFE’S VICTORY.

THE CHANGED BRIDES.

THE BRIDES’ FATE. SEQUEL TO CHANGED BRIDES.

THE BRIDE OF LLEWELLYN.

THE GIPSY’S PROPHECY.

THE FORTUNE SEEKER.

THE DESERTED WIFE.

THE LOST HEIRESS.

RETRIBUTION.

FALLEN PRIDE; OR, THE MOUNTAIN GIRL’S LOVE.

THE FATAL MARRIAGE.

THE HAUNTED HOMESTEAD.

LOVE’S LABOR WON.

THE MISSING BRIDE.

LADY OF THE ISLE.

THE TWO SISTERS.

INDIA; OR, THE PEARL OF PEARL RIVER.

VIVIA; OR, THE SECRET OF POWER.

THE CURSE OF CLIFTON.

THE DISCARDED DAUGHTER.

THE WIDOW’S SON.

ALLWORTH ABBEY.

THE BRIDAL EVE.

Price of each, $1.75 in Cloth; or $1.50 in Paper Cover.

Above books are for sale by all Booksellers. Copies of any or all of the above books will be sent to any one, to any place, postage pre-paid, on receipt of their price by the Publishers,

T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS,

306 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, Pa.

TO

MISS EDITH HENSHAW,

OF WASHINGTON CITY;

THIS

WORK IS INSCRIBED,

WITH

THE LOVE OF HER SISTER.

Prospect Cottage,

Georgetown, D. C.

May, 1869.

CONTENTS.

THE CHANGED BRIDES.

CHAPTER I.
ON THE EYE OF A GRAND WEDDING.

Blow, blow, thou wintry wind!

Thou art not so unkind

As man’s ingratitude;

Thy tooth is not so keen,

Because thou art not seen,

Altho’ thy breath be rude.

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky!

Thou dost not bite so nigh

As benefits forgot;

Tho’ thou the waters warp,

Thy sting is not so sharp

As friend remembered not.—Shakspeare.

A wild and wintry night, in a wild and wintry scene! The old turnpike road running through the mountain pass, lonely at the best times, seemed quite deserted now.

The old Scotch toll-gate keeper sat shivering over his blazing hickory wood fire, and listening to the dashing rain and beating wind that seemed to threaten the destruction of his rude dwelling.

His old wife sat near him, spinning yarn from a small wheel that she turned with the united action of hand and foot.

“Ugh!” shuddered the old man, as a blast fiercer than ever shook the house, “it ’ill ding down the old dwelling next, and no harm done! An it were once blown away, the company would behoove to build us anither strong enough to stand the storms o’ these parts. Hech! but it’s awfu’ cold.”

“Pit anither log on the fire, gudeman. Wood’s plenty enough, that’s a blessing,” said the old woman, without ceasing to turn her wheel.

“Wha’s the use, Jenny? Ye’ll no warm sic an old place as this. Eh, woman, but whiles my knees are roasting, my back is freezing.”

“Aweel, then gae away to bed wid ye, Andy, and I’ll tuck ye up warm, and bring ye your hot toddy.”

“Nay, Jenny, worse luck, I maun sit up to let the bridegroom through the gate.”

“The bridegroom? Hoot, man! He’ll no pass the road on sic a wild night as this.”

“Will he no, and his bonny bride waiting? Jenny, woman, what like o’ wind or weather would ha’ stopt me the day we were gaun to be married? So ye maun gie me my pipe, gudewife, for I bide here to open the gate for the blithe bridegroom to pass through.”

“But he maun see that no tender lassie can take the road in sic a storm as this, and they were to be married by special license at nine, and gae away in a grand travelling carriage at ten, to meet the steamboat at eleven. But that can no be now, for the rain is comin’ down like Noah’s flood, and the wind blowing a hurricane, to say naething o’ the roads all being turned into rinning rivers,” argued Jenny.

“It will be for her to decide whether it can or canna be. It will be for him to take the road in the worst weather that ever fell from heaven, if it be to keep his tryst with his troth-plighted bride. So gie me my pipe, Jenny, for I’se stop up to let the bridegroom gae by.”

“He willna come now, and so ye’ll see, gudeman,” said the wife, as she filled his pipe, and pressed the tobacco well down into the bowl with her big fore finger.

“An he does na come through wind or rain or snow, or ony ither like o’ weather the Lord please to send this night, and I were Miss Anna Lyon, I’d cast him off in the morn like old shoes,” nodded Andy, as he took the pipe from his wife and put it into his mouth.

“But don’t ye see, gudeman, that it’ll be nae use. She canna travel on sic a night as this.”

“I’m no that sure she will be called upon to travel the night. I heard a rumor they had changed all that. And there was to be a grand wedding at the old Hall, and a hall and a supper, and that the bonny bride and bridegroom wouldna gae away till the morn. And I’se believe it,” said Andy, taking the big tongs, picking up a live coal, and beginning to light his pipe.

“Hoot, man, that will be no decent. She’ll behoove to marry and gae away like ither brides, but she’ll no be married and gae away the night. The wedding maun be pit off,” said Jenny, resuming her place at the wheel.

“Pit off! It hae been pit off twice a’ready, once when the old Judge Lyon died, then when the old lady died. An it be pit off a third time, it ’ill never take place. But it will no be put off. He’ll keep his tryst, and she’ll keep her word. Worse luck that I hae to bide up to let him through.”

“An he maun come, pity he could na ha’ come sooner.”

“Hoot, gudewife, how could he? The steamer does na stop at the Stormy Petrel Landing until nigh noon, and it will be a good fifty miles from here. And he travelling in his ain carriage without a change of horses all the way over sic roads, and in sic weather as this? How will he come sooner?”

“Eh! but I wish he were here!” cried the old woman.

“There he’ll be now!” exclaimed the old man, rising and listening, as in a temporary lull of the tempest the sound of carriage wheels was heard dashing, rumbling and tumbling along the road.

“Take your big shawl about you,” said Jenny, rising and reaching down a heavy gray “maud” from its peg, and throwing it over Andy’s shoulders, as, with a lighted candle in his hand, he went to open the door.

“Hech, sirs! what a night to take the road in! Naething but a waiting bride should fetch a man forth in sic weather!” exclaimed the old toll-taker, as a blast of wind and rain blew out his candle, and whirled his shawl up over his head.

“Shut the door, gudeman, or we’ll both be drowned in our ain house, and bide a we till I bring ye the lantern. Ye’ll no be able to take a lighted candle out there,” said Jenny, as she ran to a corner cupboard and brought forth an old horn machine big enough for a lighthouse or a watch tower. She lit the candle end that was in it, and handed it to Andy.

He having meanwhile, fastened his great shawl with several strong pins and skewers, once more opened the door, and went forth into the pitch dark night and raging storm.

A spacious travelling carriage stood at the toll-gate, with two crimson lamps glowing luridly through the dark, driving tempest.

Holding down his hat with one hand and carrying the lantern with the other, old Andy pushed on towards the carriage, and saw that its door stood open, and a young man in a heavy travelling cloak was leaning out.

“Be gude to us, sir! is it yoursel’, sure enough? Troth, I said ye would come,” said Andy, with a welcoming smile.

“Come! why, to be sure I would come. Did you think that any sort of weather would have stopped me on such an occasion as this? Why, Birney, I would have come if it had rained pitchforks, points downward, or wild cats and mad dogs,” laughed the young man.

“Sae I said, sir; sae I said!”

“But, Birney, my friend, I must get out and stretch my limbs a little. I want to be able to stand when I get to the Hall; but really, I have been cramped up in this close carriage so many hours, riding over this beast of a country so many miles, without seeing a single place where I could stop for refreshment, that—that—in short, Birney, you must let me out and let me in,” said the traveller.

“Surely, Mr. Alexander! surely, sir! and much honor to my humble home,” said the old toll-taker, smiling, and bowing respectfully.

The young man, notwithstanding his “cramped” condition, leaped lightly from his carriage, drew his travelling cloak closely around him, hoisted a large umbrella, and unceremoniously preceded his host to the house, where he burst suddenly in upon Jenny, who was in the act of taking a kettle of boiling water from the fire.

“Gude save us! Mr. Alick, is it yoursel’? I could hardly believe ony gentleman in his sober sinses would take the road on sic a night!”

“It is myself, Mistress Birney—that I know; but as to being in my sober senses, I am not quite so sure. I see you’ve got some hot water there. I hope you have also got a sample of that fine old Scotch whiskey your husband used to drink in remembrance of your old country. If so, Mistress Birney, I’ll thank you to make me a tumbler of hot toddy. It would be very acceptable in such weather as this,” said “Mr. Alick,” as he threw off his cloak and his cap, and dropped himself down into old Andy’s own arm-chair, in the warm chimney corner.

“Surely, sir! surely, Mr. Alick! I’se make it directly. I’se e’en now just gaun to mix the gude man’s night drink for himsel’,” smiled Jenny, hospitably.

“All right! mix mine at the same time,” said the young man, stretching out his feet to the fire, and indulging in a great yawn.

“And mix it in the big stone pitcher with the zinc cover, so it will keep hot while we sit and drink the bonny bride, Miss Anna Lyon’s health,” said old Andy as he came in and closed the door to keep out the driving rain.

“Oh, look here! You know I’ve no time for health-drinking; I’m due at the Hall these three hours; only this horrid weather, and these beastly roads have delayed me,” exclaimed Mr. Alick, rising impatiently and standing before the blazing fire.

He was a very good-looking young fellow, as he stood there. He had a tall, well-proportioned form, fine regular features, a fair, roseate complexion, light yellow hair, and bright blue eyes—smiling eyes that seemed to love all they looked upon.

Quickly and skilfully Jenny Birney made the toddy and poured it into large tumblers that she had previously heated by scalding them out with boiling water.

Once more Mr. Alick dropped himself into old Andy’s chair, while he received one of the glasses from his host.

“Eh, there sir; it’s as hot as love!” said the old man, as he passed the pitcher that his guest might replenish his glass at his pleasure.

“It is very good,” admitted the young man when he had finished his second tumbler. “Many thanks to you, Mistress Birney for the aid and comfort you have given me. I feel as if you had saved my life. I can now do the distance between this and the Hall without breaking down. And now I must be off. Good evening to you, Mistress Birney.”

And the traveller put on his cloak and cap, took up his umbrella, and escorted by Andy, left the cottage.

“Oh, by the way, Birney, you may bring out some of that hot stuff to my coachman. Poor devil! it will do him no harm after he has been perched up there so long in the rain. But hark ye, Birney! don’t let it be too stiff; I don’t want the fellow to see more mists before his eyes than the night and the storm make,” said Mr. Alick as he got into the carriage.

Old Andy toddled back to his house, and after a few minutes reappeared at the carriage with a mug of the same restorative for the man as he had lately administered to the master.

The chilled and wearied coachman turned it down his throat almost at a gulp, returned the mug, and thanked the donor.

Then he gathered up his reins, cracked his whip, and started his horses at as brisk a trot as might be deemed safe on that dark night over that rough road.

The old turnpike-keeper hurried out of the storm into the shelter of his own cottage.

“Hech! it’s an awfu’ night! I’m glad he’s come and gone. We may pit up the shutters now, gudewife; we’ll no be troubled wi’ ony more travellers the night,” said old Andy, as he shook his shawl free from the clinging rain drops, and hung it up in its place.

“Now sit ye down in your own comfortable chair, gudeman, and I’ll brew ye a bowl o’ hot punch. Eh, hinney, ye’ll be needing it after sic’ an exposure to the elements,” said Jenny, as she replaced the kettle over the blaze, and drew Andy’s old arm-chair before the fire.

With a sigh of infinite relief, he let himself sink into the inviting seat, kicked off his heavy shoes, and stretched his stockinged feet to the genial warmth of the hearth. Andy did not rejoice in the luxury of a pair of slippers.

“Eh, Jenny, woman, it’s good to feel oneself at ease at one’s own fireside at last,” said the old man, as he took from the hand of his wife a smoking tumbler of punch.

“‘It’s hot as love,’ as you say,” she nodded.

“Eh, so it is; what’s the hour, gudewife?”

“It’s gone weel on to ten,” she answered, glancing at the tall old clock that stood in the corner, and reached from floor to ceiling.

“And I’se gaun to bed immediately, no to be bothered wi’ any more travellers the night,” said Andy, blowing and sipping his punch.

But Andy reckoned without his host, as many of his betters do.

Just at that moment there came a rap at the door, so low, however, that it could scarcely be heard amid the roaring of the storm.

Yet both husband and wife turned and listened.

It was repeated.

“What’s that?” asked Andy.

“There’s some one outside,” said Jenny.

The rap was reiterated.

“Who the de’il can it be, at this unlawful hour o’ the night? Gae see, Jenny, woman. And if it’s ony vagrants bang the door in their faces. I’se no be troubled wi’ ony more callers the night!” cried the old man, impatiently.

Before he had well done grumbling, the old woman had gone to the door and opened it, letting in a furious blast of wind and rain.

“Gude guide us!” she exclaimed, starting back, aghast, at what she saw without.

“What the de’il is it then, gude wife?” nervously demanded Andy, starting up and seizing his old musket from its hooks above the chimney-piece. Andy was thinking only of thieves, as is usual with many who have little to lose.

“Pit up your gun, gude man, it’s no what ye think,” said Jenny, once more approaching the door to peep out at the wretch that stood dripping and shivering outside.

“For the love of Heaven, let me in a little while. I will not stay many minutes,” pleaded a plaintive voice from the darkness.

“Who is it?” inquired Andy, coming cautiously forward in his stocking feet.

“It’s some poor lassie, as far as I can make out. Come in wi’ ye then,” said Jenny, stretching the door wide open, though the wind and the rain rushed in, flooding the floor where they stood.

“Ay, come in, and ye maun, and dinna stand there like a lunatic keeping the door open and letting in the weather,” growled Andy, as he toddled back to his comfortable chair and dropped into it.

Before he had half uttered his churlish invitation, the stranger had entered, and now stood in the room, with the rain running from her dark raiment, while Jenny shut and bolted the door.

“Now then, who are ye? and what brings ye tramping on sic a night as this?” sternly demanded Andy, as he turned and stared at the stranger.

She wore a long dark gray cloak with a hood; the cloak completely concealed her form and its hood overshadowed her face. That was all that Andy could make of her appearance then.

“Who are ye, I ask, and where are ye gaun the night,” he angrily repeated.

The stranger did not answer except by dropping her face upon her open hands.

“Andy, dinna ye see she canna speak? For the sake of our own poor lost Katie, we maun have pity. Come away to the fire, my poor lass, and dry your clothes, whiles I get ye something warm to take the chill out o’ your poor shivering body,” said Jenny, kindly placing her hand upon the girl’s shoulder and gently urging her towards the fire-place.

“I’m of opinion that ye’d better find out who she is, and where she came from, and where she’s gaun, before ye press upon her the hospitalities of an honest house,” grumbled Mr. Birney.

“Whist, gude man! I might speer a dizzen questions, but dinna ye see for yoursel’ that she’s in na condition to answer ane?” said Jenny, in a low voice.

Andy growled something in which the words “tramping hizzy” were the only ones audible.

“Come, let me hae your cloak, hinny, to hang it up to dry. See, it’s wringing wet. Nay, nay, dinna resist gude offices,” said Mrs. Birney, with kind persistence, as she saw that the girl made some little, mute, pathetic resistance to the removal of her outer garment.

Jenny gently took it off her and hung it on the back of a chair to dry by the fire.

And the young stranger stood revealed in all her loveliness and sorrow.

She was a young, slight, graceful creature, with a thin, pale face, dark hair and dark eyebrows, long, black eye-lashes, and large, soft, gray eyes, so full of pleading sadness that their glances went straight to the heart of Jenny Birney. It was a child’s face; but ah, woe! it was a matron’s form revealed there.

“Wae-sooks!” exclaimed the good wife in consternation, as she gazed upon the young thing, and saw that, child-like as she looked, she had been married, or——ought to have been.

Again the little, pale hands went up and covered the little, woe-forn face.

“Sit ye down,” said Mrs. Birney, kindly. “Ye are no able to stand.”

And she drew her own low, cushioned chair to the chimney corner, and with gentle force pushed the poor child into it. And then she took down her little black tea-pot from the corner cupboard and began to make tea.

Mr. Birney watched the process in strong disapprobation.

His wife raised a deprecating glance to his face, murmuring, in a low tone:

“We maun be pitiful, Andy! for our poor lost Katy’s sake, we maun be pitiful.”

He answered that appeal by growling forth the words:

“Aweel, aweel, Jenny woman, hae your ain way! hae your ain way! Eh! but ye’ve had it these forty years and mair! And it’s no likely that ye’ll gie it up now!”

And so saying, the old man put his pipe in his mouth and resigned himself to circumstances.

Mrs. Birney made a cup of tea and a round of toast, and set them on a little stand beside her guest.

“Now eat and drink and ye’ll be better. Nay, nay, dinna shake your poor little head! do as I bid ye. I had a child o’ my ain once. She has been in heaven, I hope, these twenty years. Sae ye see I hae a soft place in my heart for children, especially for lassies; sae eat and drink, and be comforted and strengthened, and then maybe ye’ll tell me how ye came to be out in the weather, and what I can do for ye besides giving you a bit and sup and a bed to lie on,” coaxed the good woman.

“Thanks, thanks,” murmured the girl, as she raised the cup, and with a feverish thirst eagerly drank the tea.

“Try some of the toast. It is done with milk; it will nourish ye,” hospitably urged Jenny.

“Please—I cannot eat a morsel, and—I must go now,” answered the young stranger, rising.

“Go now! Are ye daft?” exclaimed Mrs. Birney, in dismay; while Mr. Birney took the pipe from his mouth and stared.

“No, I am not ‘daft,’ though I know how mad my purpose must seem,” calmly answered the girl, taking her cloak from the chair upon which it was drying by the fire.

“But—I thought ye came here for a night’s lodging, and——”

“Oh, no; I had no such design,” sighed the girl.

“But—an ye didna come for a night’s lodging, what did ye come for?”

“I was nearly spent with struggling on in the face of the tempest. I was so beaten by the wind and the rain that I thought I should have dropped and died; I almost wish I had. But I saw the light in your window and I tried to reach it, and I did. I came in only to rest and breathe a little while, and get strength to go on again.”

“But where did ye come from, my poor child?” inquired the pitying woman.

“I came from Washington by the stage-coach. It put me down at the Cross Roads, ten miles from this place.”

“Gude save us! and ye walked all that way through the storm?”

“Yes, and was nearly exhausted; but now, thanks to your charity, I feel refreshed, and able to pursue my journey,” said the young girl, as she tied her cloak, and drew its hood over her head.

“Indeed, then, and ye’ll no do onything o’ the sort. Eh, sirs, are we heathen to let a wee bit lassie gae forth alane on sic a stormy winter-night as this, when we wouldna turn an enemy’s dog from the door? Sit ye down, my lass, and dinna ye mind the gudeman’s growling. His bark is aye worse than his bite,” said Mrs. Birney.

And here Mr. Birney took his pipe from his mouth, and spoke these gracious words:

“Bide ye here for the present, an’ ye will. I dinna like tramps as a permanent institution in the house, but I’ll no turn ye out into the storm, sae bide where ye be.”

And having uttered this oracle, old Andy replaced his pipe between his lips, and smoked vigorously to make up for lost time.

“Ye hear what the gudeman says? Hark ye now to the wisdom of age, and bide ye quiet till I make ye a bed, and I’ll wrap ye weel and pit ye warm to sleep the night, and in the morn ye may gae where ye like.”

“Thanks—a thousand thanks for your dear mercy! but in the morning it will be too late. Ah, heaven, yes!” exclaimed the girl, as a sudden terror wildly dilated her large gray eyes. “I must go on to-night, or fail, where failure would be despair and death!”

“Gae on to-night! Gude save us! gae on where?” exclaimed the wondering woman.

“To Old Lyon Hall,” answered the stranger, moving towards the door.

“Stay—come back! Ye are stark daft! To the Hall?” cried Jenny, following her guest.

“Yes, to the old Hall,” said the stranger, pausing courteously.

“Why, that’s where the grand wedding will be the night.”

“I know it,” said the girl.

“But—ye’ll surely no be one o’ the invited guests?” exclaimed Jenny in bewilderment.

“Oh, no,” replied the girl, with a strange smile.

“Look ye, lass. Who be ye? What be your name, an ye have no objection to tell it?” gravely inquired Mrs. Birney.

“I have no objection to tell my name; it has never been sullied by dishonor; it is Anna Lyon,” replied the girl, with her hand upon the door-latch.

“Anna Lyon! Sign us, and save us! that is the name of the bride that is to be married to-night!” cried Jenny Birney, aghast.

“I know it is,” quietly replied the girl.

“And ye hae the same name?”

“The very same,” said the stranger.

“Gude save us! then ye’ll be kin to the family?”

“No, no kin,” answered the girl, calmly. Then to herself she murmured, “I—‘a little more than kin,’ he ‘a little less than kind.’”

“What are ye muttering to yoursel’? Ye say ye’re no kin to the family, and if ye are no, what will be taking you to the old Hall the night?”

“Something more than a matter of life and death! And oh, I must be gone!” said the girl, with the same look of terror that she had shown once before, now smiting all the remaining color from her pale face, and leaving it white as marble.

“Good-bye—good-bye, and a thousand heart-felt thanks for all your kindness,” she added.

While she spoke she deftly slid the bolts of the door, and as she ceased she quickly slipped through it, and ran away like one who feared to be hindered or pursued.

“Stop! stop!” screamed Jenny, rushing after her, and looking out into the night.

But her strange visitor had vanished in the darkness.

“Hech! she’s clean daft, and she’ll perish in the storm!” cried Jenny in consternation, as she drew in her head.

“Come away, gudewife, and shut the door!” bawled old Andy, provoked past his patience.

“Eh, gude man, rin—rin after her. Ye may catch her an ye start now,” prayed Jenny, pulling down her husband’s shawl from its peg, and throwing it over his shoulders—“rin, rin for your life, Andy!”

“De’il be in my legs, then, if I budge a foot from the fire! I’m in a condition to rin, am I no? wi’ both my shoes off and mysel’ soaking wi’ sweat! I’ll no rin for ony daft lass or lad in Christendom!” grumbled the old man.

“But for the Lord’s sake, Andy!” pleaded the woman.

“I would do onything in reason for the Lord’s sake, an’ He distinctly called me, but I’m no conscious of any special call to pit myself forward in this work. Sae just shut up the house, Jenny, woman, and come away to bed. And I’ll no open again this night to man or woman, saint or devil, so there, now!” growled old Andy.

“I’se shut the door, but I’se nae shut the window. And I’se no gaun to bed this night, I’se sit up and show a light, if the poor wandering lassie behooves to come back,” said Mrs. Birney, firmly, as she fastened the door, and sat the lantern on the little stand under the window, with the light turned towards the road.

“The more fool you,” observed Mr. Birney, as he began to draw off his stockings, and prepare himself for his bed, that stood conveniently near, in a recess curtained off from the other portion of the room.

Mrs. Birney drew her spinning wheel to the chimney corner nearest the window, where she had placed the light, and she sat down and began to spin.

“Ye’ll no be whirling that machine and keeping me awake, Jenny, woman!” expostulated the old man as he got into bed.

“But if I maun sit up, I maun na lose my time.”

“Then knit or sew.”

She good-humoredly put aside her wheel and took from the top of the corner cupboard her work-basket half filled with woolen socks, which she sat down to darn.

Old Andy was soon snoring under his blankets.

Jenny sat darning and sighing, and occasionally peering through the window into the darkness without. The violence of the storm seemed to be subsiding, though still it rained heavily.

“It’s like murder,” she murmured. “And, if she be found cold and dead in the morn I shall never forgi’e mysel’. I shall never be able to sleep again. Eh! but I wish I had rin out after her mysel.’ But then the gudeman would na hae let me. Hech! but they get hard and selfish wi’ age and infirmities, these men. Eh! how he sleeps and snores, as if there was no misery in the world,” she added, glancing at the bed.

But the old curmudgeon’s rest was destined to be broken.

There came the sound of horse’s hoofs dashing along the flooded road. The toll-gate bar was cleared at a bound. Jenny heard the spring and splash, and she started to her feet, dropping her work-basket.

The next moment there came a loud rapping at the door. It aroused the old man from his sleep.

“What the de’il is that?” he exclaimed, angrily.

“There’s ane without,” whispered Jenny, in a scared tone, trembling in spite of herself.

“Worse luck! Is it a Witch’s Sabbath and are all the warlocks and witches riding to it by this road the night?” he growled.

The knocking grew louder.

“Who is it, Jenny?” he cried.

“I dinna know,” whispered the woman.

“Canna ye gae and see?”

The knocking became vociferous, the horseman seemed to be hammering at the door with the loaded end of his riding-whip.

“Haud your noise out there, will you then!” bawled the old man, bouncing out of bed, throwing a blanket around him and seizing his blunderbus, while Jenny crept to the door and cautiously opened it, keeping herself behind it.

The rain had nearly ceased and the sky was clearing.

A tall, stout, dark man, in a dark riding-coat, stood outside. With one hand he held the bridle of his horse, and with the other the handle of his riding-whip, with which he had just rapped.

So much Jenny, cautiously peeping around the edge of the door, could make out.

The old toll-taker came forward, wrapped in his blanket like a North American Indian, and carrying his musket in his hand, and growling:

“Am I no to have ony peace or quiet the night? I’d as weel be keeper o’ one o’ these new-fangled railway stations where the trains are aye coming and going day and night, instead o’ this once quiet toll-gate. Who be ye, sir, and what’s your will?” he growled at this second stranger.

“I am a traveller going to Old Lyon Hall; and I wish to know the nearest road,” answered the horseman. But a sudden parting blast of wind drowned half his words.

“And by the way, how came ye on this side of the road, when the great bar is up for the night?” angrily demanded the toll-taker.

“Oh, my horse took it at a bound.”

“An he had broken your neck it might hae been a gude job and saved the hangman trouble,” growled old Andy.

“Thanks,” laughed the stranger, “but there was not a chance of it; my horse is a famous hunter. Will you direct me on my road?”

“Where did you say you were going?”

“To Old Lyon Hall.”

“To Old Lyon Hall!—Jenny, woman, here is anither one! It’s there they are holding the witches’ dance and no wedding, for the warlocks and witches that flit by this way are no wedding guests,” said the old man, turning to his wife.

“Will you be so good as to direct me to the Hall?” courteously persisted the traveller.

“Oh, ay, I’ll direct ye fast enough; but be ye’ one o’ the wedding guests?”

“No, not exactly,” laughed the man.

“Hark to him Jenny! how much he talks like the ither one! Then what’s your business at the Hall the night? It’s unco late to make a visit, and varry oncivil to go oninvited where they’re handing a bridal. Wouldna the morn serve your turn just as weel?” mockingly inquired Andy.

“No; the morning would be too late for my purpose. It is of the utmost importance that I should reach the Hall to-night!” said the horseman, beginning to grow restive under the influence of some hidden anxiety that he could not entirely conceal.

“Is it an affair of ‘life and death?’” inquired Andy, with a touch of sarcasm in his tone, as he repeated the words that had been used by the unhappy girl who had preceded this stranger on this road.

“More—much more than life and death is involved,” muttered the traveller, in a voice vibrating with the agitation that he could no longer control.

“Hark to him again, Jenny!” grinned the old man. “Just the way the ither one talked. The de’il maun be holding a levee at the Hall!”

“I beg you will not detain me; pray put me on my road,” impatiently urged the stranger.

“Oh, ay! ye see the road before ye. Ye’ll just face it and follow your nose, and it will lead to the old Hall. Ye canna miss it. It stands off about a quarter mile from the road, on the right. There’s woods before it, and the Porcupine Mountains behind it. It will be the first grand like mansion ye’ll come to, and the only one, an’ ye were to ride a hunder miles in that direction.”

“Thanks,” said the stranger, lifting his cap and remounting his horse.

“And oh, kind gentleman,” said Jenny, coming forward, “an’ ye should meet wi’ a poor daft lassie who gaed before on the same road, ye’ll no let her perish for the want of a helping hand. For the love of the Lord, ye’ll get her under shelter or bring her back here.”

“‘A poor daft lassie,’” repeated the stranger, bewildered by the woman’s words and manner.

“Ay, sir; a poor bit child wha canna guide hersel’ to ony gude end.”

“A young tramp, sir,” explained the old man. “A young tramp who passed this way an hour ago; and ye should get her pit into a House of Correction, ye might be doing her good service.”

“I have no time to stop, but if I should see the young woman I will do what I can for her. Good night,” said the traveller, putting spurs to his horse, and galloping away as if determined not to be detained another moment.

“I’ll tell you what, Jenny, there’s something unco wrong up at the old Hall! And now shut up the house and come away to bed,” said old Andy, turning from the door, and dragging his blanket behind him like a court train.

“I couldna sleep a wink wi’out hearing what becomes o’ that poor houseless child. I’ll sit up and sew, and show a light i’ the window, in case she behooves to come back again,” replied Mrs. Birney, replacing the lantern on the stand before the window, resuming her seat on her low chair in the chimney corner, and taking up her work, while the old man, for the last time that night, shut up the house and went to bed.

CHAPTER II.
AT THE OLD HALL.

Yes, there thou art below the hill,

By evergreens encircled still,

Old hall that time hath deigned to spare,

Mid rugged rocks and forests fair,

And nightshade o’er the casement creeping,

And owlet in the crevice sleeping,

And antique chairs and broidered bed,

By housewife’s patient needle spread.—Anon.

Old Lyon Hall lay at the foot of the Porcupine, an offshoot of the Alleghanies, in one of the wildest and most picturesque counties in Virginia.

It was built in the Tudor style of domestic architecture, very irregularly, with many gable ends, gothic windows and twisted chimneys. Its walls of old red sandstone contrasted gloomily with the dark hue of the evergreen trees that bristled up above it, and gave the mountain its descriptive name.

Heavy woods, bare, gray crags, and tumbling torrents surrounded it, and gave a savage and sombre aspect to the scene. Below the Hall a turbulent little river, spanned by a rustic bridge, rushed and roared along its rocky bed.

The Hall was very old. It had been built nearly two hundred years ago by a Scotchman named Saul Sauvage Lyon, who had received a grant of the land from James the First. It had remained ever since in the family of the founder, whose descendants had frequently distinguished themselves, as soldiers, or statesmen, in every epoch of the country’s history, either as a colony or a commonwealth.

Some few years since, being the date of this story, the master of the Old Lyon Hall and Manor was General Leonard Lyon, a retired army officer, and a veteran of the war of eighteen hundred and twelve.

General Lyon had married very early in his youth, and had enjoyed many years of calm domestic happiness. But now his wife and children were all dead, and his only living descendant was his grandchild, the beautiful Anna Lyon, “sole daughter of ‘his’ house.”

Added to the great sorrow of bereavement was vexation, that, for the want of male heirs, his old family estate must at last “fall to the distaff.”

But there might be found a remedy to this lesser evil.

General Lyon had a younger brother, Chief Justice Lyon, of Richmond. And the chief justice had an only son.

Young Alexander Lyon was a bright, handsome, attractive lad, a few years older than his cousin Anna.

Under all the circumstances, if it was not perfectly proper, it was at least natural and pardonable that old General Lyon should wish his grand-daughter to become the wife of his nephew, so that while she inherited his estate, she might perpetuate his name.

Quite early in the childhood of the boy and girl, the general proposed their betrothal to the chief justice, who eagerly acceded to the plan. And so the affair was settled—by the parents. It was not considered necessary to consult the children.

Alexander was sent to Yale College, where, for a few years, he led rather a fast life for a student.

And Anna was placed at a fashionable boarding school in New York, where she had a great deal more liberty than was good for her.

Twice a year the young persons were permitted to meet—when they spent the midsummer vacation at old Lyon Hall, where the chief justice and his wife also came on a visit to the general, and when they kept the Christmas holidays at the splendid town house of the chief justice at Richmond, where the general also went to pay back his brother’s visit. This arrangement was of course very agreeable to all parties.

But as the boy and girl grew towards manhood and womanhood, it was thought well to change this routine. And so, sometimes in the midsummer vacation, the whole party, consisting of both families, would go for a tour through the most attractive places of summer resort. And at Christmas they would keep the holidays in Washington.

On all these occasions the young lady and gentleman, under the auspices of their elders, entered very freely into the fashionable amusements of the season, with the understanding, however, that they were not to fall in love, or even to flirt with any one but each other.

Miss Lyon and Mr. Alexander seemed at first to have no particular objection to this arrangement. They had always been fond of each other, much fonder than of any one else. But ah! theirs was not the love that would excuse, much less justify marriage.

It has been said that when two persons of like complexion and temperament intermarry, wise nature and sacred love have had nothing to do with the union. And the truth spoken to-day is as old as the creation of man.

Anna and Alexander were of the same complexion and the same temperament; both were plump, fair, blue-eyed and yellow-haired, both lively and fond of pleasure, and both, on the surface, and in matters of little moment, were amiable and yielding, but below the surface, and in affairs of importance, resolute and determined as destiny and death. In person and in character they were as much alike as twin brother and sister.

This similarity, while it made their association as relatives very agreeable, utterly precluded the possibility of their becoming lovers, in the common sense of the word. They did not know this, when their hearts were entirely free from any other attachment that might have awakened their consciousness.

There was no immediate hurry about the projected marriage. It was certain to take place, the parents concluded, and so they neither worried themselves nor their children prematurely.

Alexander had to finish his college course, to graduate and to make the “grand tour,” as was usual with young gentlemen of his position.

When he should have accomplished all this, he would be about twenty-three years of age and his bride elect would be about eighteen—both quite young enough to marry, the old folks argued.

The plan was partly carried out.

Alexander Lyon graduated with honors and embarked for Europe. He travelled over quite a considerable portion of the Eastern Continent. He was gone two years, at the end of which he returned to claim his promised bride.

Active preparations were made for the marriage. But fate seemed to be against it. A few days before the one set apart for the ceremony, while the whole of both families were assembled at Old Lyon Hall to do honor to the occasion, Chief Justice Lyon was suddenly struck dead by apoplexy. Instead of a wedding there was a funeral, and the family went into mourning for a year.

At the end of that time preparations were again made for the marriage, which was again arrested by the hand of death.

A malignant fever was prevailing, and Mrs. Lyon, the widow of the chief justice, was one of its first victims.

At length, at the close of this second term of mourning and seclusion, the household awoke as from a nightmare dream and busied itself with blithe bridal affairs.

The splendid city mansion and the fine old country house of the late chief justice were both renovated and refurnished in costly style for the reception of the new mistress.

It was settled that the marriage should take place early in November. In accordance with the old-time prejudices of General Lyon, it was to be solemnized, in the evening, in the great drawing-room of Old Lyon Hall, in the presence of a large party of friends, who were afterwards to be entertained with a ball and supper. The bride and groom were to leave the next morning for a short tour, after which they were to go to Richmond and settle down for the winter in their town house, where they were to be joined by the general.

Such was the arrangement. But “man proposes and”—you know the rest.

The autumn weather that had been glorious with the “excess of glory” in a genial, refulgent and prolonged Indian Summer, suddenly changed. The wedding-day dawned threateningly. No sun shone on it. Heavy black clouds darkened the sky; wild, mournful winds wailed through the woods; violent gusts of rain dashed suddenly down at intervals and as suddenly ceased.

The inmates of the old Hall watched the weather in hope and fear. Would it clear up? Or would it grow worse? they asked themselves and each other. Certainly there was no sign of its clearing; quite the contrary, for as the day declined the storm thickened.

Fires were kindled in every room of the old house.

In the great drawing-room the two broad fire-places, one at each end, were piled high with huge hickory logs, that were burning and blazing and filling the long room with glowing light and genial warmth, all the more comfortable and delightful in contrast to the tempestuous weather without—shining on the tall brass andirons and fender; shining on the polished oak floor, with its rich Turkey rugs laid before each fire-place and sofa; shining on the wainscotted walls with their time-honored family portraits; shining on the bright black walnut furniture; and on every surface and point that could reflect a ray of light.

This fine old-fashioned drawing-room was as yet vacant, waiting for the evening crowd of wedding guests, if indeed the state of the weather and the roads should permit them to assemble.

Fires were kindled in the long dining-room, where a sumptuous supper was laid out for the expected company; and in all the bed-chambers which had been opened and aired, cleaned and decorated for such of the guests as should come from a distance, and need to change their dress and perhaps to lie down and rest.

In one of the most spacious and comfortable of these upper-chambers, late in the afternoon of this day, sat the bride elect.

She reclined in an easy chair, with her feet upon the fender and her eyes fixed moodily, dreamily upon the glowing fire before her, and listened to the beating storm without.

Here in this room, also, the ruddy blaze shone on dark wainscotted walls, relieved by crimson damask window curtains, and on a polished oaken floor, bare of carpets, except for the rugs that lay upon the hearth before the dressing-table and beside the bed.

This was indeed a lonely, silent, sombre scene in which to find a maiden on her bridal evening. The tempest raged without, and the wind and rain beat against the walls and windows as if they would batter them down. In the pauses of the storm she could hear the rushing of the swollen torrents and the roaring of the rising river. She knew that the roads must be almost impassable and the streams unfordable. In truth, no one had bargained for such weather on the wedding-day.

Of the hundred and fifty guests who had been invited, not one had yet appeared; not one of her bridesmaids; not the minister who was to perform the marriage ceremony; not even her bridegroom! And yet all these had been expected at an early hour of the afternoon.

Everything was ready for their reception and for the rites and festivals of the evening. Every nook and corner of the genial old home smiled its welcome in anticipation of the arrival of these expected guests; and yet not one of them came.

Nor, when she listened to the howling of the tempest without, could the young bride elect wonder at their absence.

Her rich and varied wardrobe and her rare and costly jewels were all packed in half a dozen large travelling-trunks that stood ready for removal outside her chamber door in the upper hall.

Her wedding-dress of rich white velvet, her large veil of fine lace, her wreath of orange-flowers, and all the accessories of her bridal costume lay out upon the bed. Yet she doubted that she should be called to wear them that night: and she sat still gazing into the fire, listening to the storm, and making no motion towards her toilet.

She looked a beautiful young creature as she sat there, with her graceful form, her perfect features, her pure complexion, her soft blue eyes and pale yellow hair.

Of what was she dreaming as she sat gazing into the fire, and heaving deep, heavy sighs? Surely not only of the storm and the trifling delay of her marriage, for she must have known that it could only be a question of a few hours, and that whoever might stay away, her bridegroom would certainly keep his appointment. What serious subject of thought had she? what possible subject of grief? Idlest with youth, health and beauty, with high birth, great wealth and many accomplishments, about to form the most brilliant marriage of the year, with a gentleman who seemed her equal in all respects, if not her superior in some, about to preside over the most splendid establishment in the city and the grandest old house in the country, and to reign everywhere a queen in society, what imaginable cause of discontent could she have?

Ah, friends! did ever any of these things, in themselves alone, satisfy the hunger of any human heart—make any living creature happy?

The darling daughter, the rich heiress, the beautiful bride elect, sat and sighed and gazed, and gazed and sighed as if her heart would break.

There were secrets in the life of this motherless girl unknown to her nearest relatives, unsuspected by her appointed bridegroom. Of that more hereafter.

She sat there without moving until dark afternoon deepened into black night, and the raging of the storm became terrific. How long she would have sat thus I do not know, for just as the little toy of a clock upon her mantle-piece chimed nine her door opened, and her own maid, Matty, entered the room.

“I told you not to bring lights until I should ring for them,” said Miss Lyon, impatiently turning her head.

“I know, Miss Anna; I didn’t bring no lights. I come to tell you how Marse Alesander has jus’ arroved.”

“He has come—and through all this storm?” exclaimed Anna in a startled voice.

“Yes, Miss, which Old Marse as’ed if you was ready, and sent me up to ’quire.”

“I can be ready soon, Matty. But—has any one else come?”

“No, Miss.”

“Not the minister?”

“The which, Miss?”

“The Reverend Doctor Barbar.”

“No, Miss.”

“Then I don’t see the use of my disturbing myself yet awhile. There can be no marriage without a minister,” said the bride elect, with something very much like a sigh of relief.

“You may go, Matilda,” she added to the girl, who still lingered at the door.

Matty vanished, and Miss Lyon resigned herself to her reverie.

A few minutes passed, and Matty reappeared.

“What now?” demanded the young lady.

“Please, Miss, ole Marse have sent Jacob, with the close carriage, to fetch the min’s’er, and say he will be here in half an hour if you will get ready.”

“Matty, where is your master?”

“In his study, Miss.”

“Alone?”

“Yes, Miss.”

“Where is Mr. Alexander?”

“He’s gone up to his own room, Miss, to fix hisself.”

“Very well,” said the young lady, as she arose and left her chamber.

She passed up the broad upper hall that was now ruddy and cheerful with the light of many fires, that shone through the open doors of the waiting bedrooms, and she went straight to the little room with the bay window, at the front end, over the main entrance.

She opened the door and found her grandfather seated in his big arm-chair by his writing table, on which lay books, papers, pens, and so forth.

But the old gentleman was neither reading nor writing. He was simply sitting and waiting.

He was a very fine-looking old man, tall and stout, with a full face, noble features, fair complexion, and snow white hair and beard. He wore an evening dress of black broadcloth, with a white vest and white cravat. His white gloves lay beside him, ready for use.

“All alone, gran’pa?” inquired Anna, smiling.

“Yes, my pet—yes, my darling,” said the old gentleman, rising and handing his grand-daughter to a seat with as much courtesy as if she were a princess. “But why are you not dressed, Anna? It is late, very late.”

“Oh, gran’pa, what an awful night for a wedding! And there is no one here, and no one likely to come.”

“Yes, my dear, but it is the night appointed, and your bridegroom is in the house, and the minister will soon be here.”

“Gran’pa,” pleaded Anna, leaving her seat and coming and sitting on his knee, and putting her arm caressingly around his neck—“dear gran’pa, I cannot bear to be married under these evil auspices, without witnesses, without bridesmaids, and on a dark night and in a heavy storm. Why cannot the marriage be deferred until to-morrow morning? What difference can a few hours make? At least, what difference that is not very desirable? By to-morrow the storm will be over. The ceremony can be performed early in the morning. I can be married in my travelling dress. The supper will do for a breakfast. And we can start immediately upon our wedding tour. Say, gran’pa, may not the marriage be deferred until the morning? It is awful to be married in solitude, on a dark, stormy night. Say, dear gran’pa! May not the marriage be put off until the morning?”

“My dear, no; it cannot be.”

“But—why not?”

“For many reasons. For one—Anna, I confess, old soldier as I am, to a little superstition on some subjects. This marriage has been already put off twice. If it should be put off a third time, it will never take place. A marriage thrice deferred never comes to pass. There, my child, go and dress. It is nine o’clock. You are two hours behind time. Alexander is nearly ready, and the minister will be here in a few minutes,” said the old gentleman, rising and gently leading his favorite out of the room.

“‘A marriage thrice deferred never comes to pass.’ I wish I was sure of that, and could defer mine just once more,” mused Anna, as she went back to her room. “And yet,” she added, compunctiously, “that is unjust and ungrateful to Alexander. Poor Alick! I dare say, in all these years, he has never even dreamed of any other girl but me, while I—while I—Ah, Heaven have pity on us! Well, well, I will bury the past deep in forgetfulness, and I will try to make him a good wife.”

When she reached her room she found Matty and Matty’s mother, Marcy, who was her own old nurse, in attendance. The fire was mended, the hearth swept and the lamps lighted. The two on her dressing-table shone down upon an open casket of jewels that blazed with blinding radiance.

Anna went wearily up to look at them.

“Mars’ Alic sent them in by his man, honey,” said Aunt Jenny in explanation.

It was a splendid set of diamonds, consisting of ear-rings, breastpin, necklace and bracelets.

“You will wear them, honey, dough dere ain’t anybody to see them?”

“Except the giver! Yes, auntie, I will wear them. Poor Alick!” sighed Anna, sitting down on her dressing-stool, and resigning herself into the hands of her attendants.

They went willingly to work. The task of arranging their mistress for her bridal was with them a labor of love.

Old Marcy standing behind the chair brushed and braided the beautiful hair. Young Matty on the floor, encased the dainty feet in silken hose and satin slippers. And then the beauty stood up and let them remove her wrapper and put on her robes and her wreath, and her veil. But with her own hands she clasped the diamond necklace around her throat and the diamond bracelets on her wrists, and put ear-rings in her ears, and the brooch upon her bosom.

And when her toilet was completed she looked, if looks were all, a very royal bride, fit to share a young monarch’s throne.

She sat down again and said:

“Matty, you may go and tell your master that I am ready.”

The girl left the room to take the message, but in the hall she ran against some one who seemed on his way to speak to the bride. And so she turned back to say.

“Miss Anna, here’s Jake asking if he can have a word with you.”

“Certainly. Tell the boy to come in,” said the young lady.

The son of the coachman, one of the younger grooms, entered, hat in hand, bowing low.

“Well, my boy, what is it?” inquired his mistress.

“If you please, Miss, I telled her as she couldn’t, and she said as she must, and I telled her as she shouldn’t, and she said she would,” replied Jake, rather incoherently.

“‘Would?’ what?—who? I don’t understand you, boy.”

“Her, Miss. I telled her she couldn’t, nohow, but she ’lowed she must, anyhow. And I telled her she shouldn’t then, there! and she ’lowed she would, so there!”

“Would what, Jake?”

“See you immediate, Miss.”

“Who would see me?”

“Her, Miss.”

“Who is she?”

“The young woman, which I think she is crazy, Miss, and not safe to be seed.”

“Oh, dear! dear me, Jake, what young woman are you talking of?” said Miss Lyon, impatiently.

“Her as runned in out’n the storm, Miss, and said how she must see you; and I telled her she wasn’t fit to be seed herself, being drippen’ wet, nor safe to be seed, being sort o’ cracked, and—oh my laws! there she is now, a followed of me!” exclaimed the boy, breaking off in dismay, to stare with wide mouth and eyes at the opening door.

Miss Lyon turned her head in that direction, and saw standing there a slight, pale young creature, enveloped in a long gray cloak, with its hood drawn over her head and shading her face.

CHAPTER III.
THE HOUSELESS WANDERER AND THE BRIDE ELECT.

They whispered—sin a shade had cast,

Upon her youthful frame,

And scornful murmurs as she past

Were mingled with her name.

“She is not beautiful,” they said,

I saw that she was more;

One of those women, women dread,

Men fatally adore.—Anon.

And the homeless wanderer through the wild winter-night, she who had called herself Anna Lyon, stood in the presence of the bride elect.

“Drusilla! Drusilla Sterling! Is it you? Is it really you! Oh, my poor child, how happy I am to see you!” exclaimed Miss Lyon, in the utmost surprise and delight, as she advanced with extended hands to welcome her unexpected guest.

Drusilla suffered her cold fingers to be clasped, and she raised her soft, appealing eyes to the young lady’s face; but she spoke no word in reply.

“Oh, my dear child, how sorrowful we have been for you! Why did you leave your home? Where have you been? What have you been doing? Where did you come from last? And how came you out on such an awful night? And oh, poor girl! in what a state you have come back? Don’t try to answer any of my questions yet! You must be warmed and fed first,” said Miss Lyon, who in her excitement had hurried question upon question to the exhausted girl, and seeing that she could not answer, repented her own thoughtless vehemence, and turning to her servants, said:

“Marcy, take off her cloak and hang it up, and sit her down in that arm-chair before the fire, and remove her wet shoes. And, Jacob, go down stairs and ask Mrs. Dill to send up a glass of hot port wine negus, and some warm, dry toast. And be quick about it!”

Jake hurried away to do his errand.

And the young wanderer permitted the old nurse to remove her cloak, and seat her in the chair before the fire, and take off her wet boots.

Marcy had not failed to see the fact that had also been apparent to the old woman at the toll-gate. And as she was passing out of the room with the wet cloak over her arm, and the wet shoes in her hand, she stopped and whispered to her young mistress:

“Lord pity her, poor thing, I’m right down sorry for her; but she is not fit to be in your presence, Miss Anna.”

For an instant the pure and high-born maiden recoiled with a look of pain and horror; but then quickly recovering herself, she murmured:

“Hush, no more of that. Take those damp things from the room and hang them before one of the spare fires, Marcy.”

And when the woman had gone, Miss Lyon walked up to the poor wanderer and laid her hand tenderly on her shoulder.

The little pale face turned itself around to hers. The soft pleading eyes were raised:

“Yes, Miss Lyon, that is well. Send all your women from the room, for I must speak with you alone,” she murmured, in a voice vibrating with suppressed anguish.

“Speak to me, then, my child; and speak freely. No mother could listen to your story with more sympathy than I shall,” said the heiress, drawing a chair to the fire and sitting down near the girl.

“You are not yet married? the ceremony has not yet been performed?” the wanderer inquired, looking wistfully at the bride.

“No, certainly not, or I should not be here; we are waiting for the minister. Did you want to see the pageantry, my child? If so, you can do so,” said the bride elect, smiling, as if to encourage her desponding protegée.

“I want to see it! No, Miss Lyon, I came here to-night to put a stop to it,” exclaimed the girl.

“To put a stop to it! Drusilla, are you mad, my dear?” said Miss Lyon, in amazement.

“I wish I was! I should have no duties to do then! Oh, Miss Lyon!”

“Explain yourself, my dear Drusilla; for indeed I fear some great grief has distracted your mind.”

“No, no; but oh, Miss Lyon, I am about to give you great pain! as great almost as I suffer myself. Would I could suffer alone! Would I could suffer for both!” moaned Drusilla, in a voice full of woe, as she bowed her head upon her hands.

“Speak out; speak freely,” said Miss Lyon, gravely.

“If I alone were concerned, I could be silent. If it were not to save one from crime and another from misery I could be silent.”

“Nay now, nay now, you do alarm me, Drusilla! To the point, dear child! to the point!” urged Miss Lyon.

“You are thinking ill of me?” asked the girl, raising those meek prayerful eyes to the face of the young lady.

“No, Drusilla! No one can judge you with more leniency than I shall, my poor, dear child. Do not fear to open your heart to me,” said Miss Lyon.

“I have no cause to fear on my own account, lady. You said that you would judge me with leniency. You meant that you would judge me with charity. But I am not a subject of charity, Miss Lyon, I am a subject for justice,” answered the girl, with gentle dignity.

“I am waiting to hear your communication, Drusilla, whenever you please to tell it to me,” said Miss Lyon.

But at that moment the door was opened, and Matilda entered with a tray in her hand.

“If you please, Miss, ole Marse say how the carriage hasn’t come back long o’ the min’ser yet, and when he comes he will send and let you know,” the maid announced.

“Very well, Matilda; what have you got covered up on that tray?” inquired Miss Lyon.

“Please, I overtook Jake, awkward fellow, tumbling up stairs with this in his hands, which he said he was ordered to fetch it up for some one as was with you, and took it away from him to fetch it myself, because if I hadn’t, he’d have fallen down and broken all the glass and spilt all the wine,” answered the girl, turning a wistful glance upon the stranger.

“Quite right! Put the tray on that little table, and set the table here by the fire, and leave the room,” said Miss Lyon.

The maid obeyed orders.

When she was gone Miss Lyon uncovered the tray, and pressed the refreshments upon her visitor.

Drusilla eagerly drank the warm wine and water, but declined the dry toast.

“I have so much thirst all the time, but I cannot swallow a morsel of food, for it always chokes me!” she said, in explanation.

When the girl had emptied the glass, she seemed somewhat revived in strength, and Miss Lyon again suggested that she should make the communication she promised.

With a deep sigh, with her head bowed upon her bosom and her hands clasped upon her knees, the girl began the story of her short life and long sorrow.

But perhaps we had better tell it for her, because, for one reason, she suppressed much that would have vindicated herself; since to have related it would have criminated another. We will, with even-handed justice deal fairly by both.

CHAPTER IV.
A CHILD’S LOVE.

It is an olden story,

Yet, yet ’tis ever new,

And whensoe’er it happens,

It breaks the heart in two.

—From the German of Unger.

The late Mrs. Chief Justice Lyon had been a notable manager. She had looked well to her household, utterly scorning the idea of entrusting her domestic affairs to the hands of any hired housekeeper, until the infirmities of age came upon her, and she could no longer rise early and sit up late, or go up and down stairs a dozen times a day, as she had been accustomed to do.

Then she advertised for a housekeeper, who was required to be the nonpareil of matrons and managers, and to furnish the most unquestionable of references.

She received, in reply, just thirty-three letters from applicants for the place. Thirty-two were read, and cast into the waste paper basket, without even the honor of an answer.

The thirty-third was read and considered.

It came from a highly respectable woman, the widow of a poor Baptist minister. Her age, her character, her competency and her references were all unexceptionable—so much so that old Mrs. Lyon seemed to think that the Lord had created the Baptist minister’s widow for the especial purpose of providing her with a housekeeper.

But there was a drawback.

The widow, Mrs. Sterling, had an “encumbrance,” as a child is cruelly called—a little girl, aged six years, from whom she was unwilling to part. In mentioning this “item,” Mrs. Sterling had said that, if allowed to bring her child, she would consent to come at half the salary offered by Mrs. Lyon.

The old lady pondered over the letter. She was very anxious to have the housekeeper, but she did not want the “encumbrance.”

Finally, as she could not come to any decision unaided, she took up the letter and waddled off to the old judge’s “study,” where he kept his law books and documents, and where he read the newspapers, and smoked or dozed the greater part of the day, but where he never “studied” for an hour.

She sat down and read the letter to him, and then said:

“You see she is just exactly the sort of woman that I want—and a clergyman’s widow, too—so respectable. If I were to advertise, and keep on advertising for a year, I might not meet with another so suitable.”

“Well, then, engage her at once,” said the Chief Justice with more promptness of decision than he had often brought to bear upon his law cases.

“Yes, but there’s a difficulty.”

“In what? Doesn’t she like the terms?—Give her her own; you can afford it, if she suits you.”

“She likes the terms well enough. Don’t you see she offers to come at half what I give, if permitted to bring her child.”

“Then where on earth is the difficulty? I don’t see it.”

“Why, about the child, Judge.”

“Oh, the little girl. Well, let the woman bring her child; what possible objection can there be to that?”

“Yes, but she would be an encumbrance.”

“On whom, I would like to know? Not on you, not on me, and certainly not on her mother. Nonsense, my dear, let the child come; never make a difficulty about that.”

“But children are so troublesome—”

“Especially when they are not our own. Tut, tut, if you don’t want the woman, don’t take her; but if you do want her, take her, and let her bring her little one. Bless my soul alive, haven’t we got five or six dogs, and seven or eight cats, and half a score of birds? and if one child can make a hundredth part of the noise that they do, I’m greatly mistaken.”

“Yes, but children are not like them; children are always eating cake, or sucking toffy, and toddling about with nasty, sticky hands, laying hold of your skirts—”

“My dear, don’t say mine; I don’t wear any. Nonsense, Sukey, take the woman and risk the child. Or stay—I see light at last. Take her on trial with the child, and then, if it should prove a nuisance, get rid of it, or of both.”

“That’s just what I can do. Thank you, Judge, you were always a wise counsellor,” said Mrs. Lyon, turning to leave the room.

“Don’t know. But hark ye, Sukey, my dear. No cutting down of the poor woman’s salary on account of her ‘encumbrance.’ That is a reason for raising it, not for reducing it,” called the judge after his retreating wife.

“Oh, I never intended to give her less than full pay,” replied Mrs. Lyon, as she went to her room to answer her letter.

The result was the engagement of Mrs. Sterling, with her “encumbrance.”

The widow and her child arrived one cold day in December, soon after the family were settled in their town house for the winter. She was the least in the world like the “poor widow” of poetry and fiction.

She was a little, wiry, muscular looking body, with no encumbrance of flesh, whatever she might have of family, for she was rather thin in form and face. She had a high color, black hair and black eyes. She was cheerful, active and enterprising. She wore no widow’s weeds, because, she explained, it had been three years since she had lost her husband, and black was a bore, always catching dirt and showing all it caught, and making everybody gloomy. She wore serviceable browns and grays, or dark crimsons.

She entered upon her duties with great energy, and soon had the house in perfect order, and the domestic machinery moving like magic. It is needless to say that she gave great satisfaction to her employers.

“I do not know how I ever got along without her. I know I could not now,” said Mrs. Lyon, adding, “I would rather have her, even with two children instead of one, than any body else without any. And indeed the child is not a nuisance, after all.”

No, the child was not a nuisance. And neither did she bear the slightest resemblance to her mother. She was a delicate little creature, with a pure, pale face; large, soft, gray eyes, and bright, silky, brown hair. She was very quiet, thoughtful and industrious for such a mere infant. Her mother ruled her with the same rigid discipline with which she governed all the servants of the household committed to her charge.

The little one was never allowed to go out of doors except on Sunday, when she was taken by her mother to church, or sent by herself to Sunday school. On all other days she was confined strictly to the housekeeper’s room, where, after learning one lesson, doing one sum, and writing one copy, she was kept stitching patch-work quilts from morning till night.

The Chief Justice, who was an awful myth to the little girl, had never once set eyes on her.

But old Mrs. Lyon, coming occasionally to the housekeeper’s room to give some orders, would see the demure little creature sitting on her low stool in the corner of the hearth, and stitching soberly at her patch-work, and she would say to the mother:

“Mrs. Sterling, why don’t you let that child run out into the garden and play in this fine, clear, frosty weather? The air would do her good.”

“Well, I don’t know, madam. You see how delicate she is; she might take cold.”

“Delicate, and no wonder, Mrs. Sterling; kept mewed up in this close room at needle-work all the time, as if she was sewing for her living—a babe of six years old! If you are afraid to let her go into the garden, let her run about the house; don’t keep her here always.”

“Thank you, madam; but I cannot let her do so. She might grow troublesome; and, besides, she will have to sew for a living some day or other if she doesn’t do it now. She can’t have me always to look to; she will have to take care of herself, and so she must learn to be patient and industrious by times.”

“Poor little thing,” murmured the old lady.

“Don’t pity her, if you please, madam, or put into her head that she is ill-used, for she isn’t. I do everything for her good, and it’s not likely that I would do any thing else, for I am her own mother,” said the housekeeper, respectfully but firmly.

“I don’t believe you know what is for her good, and if you are her own mother you treat her worse than any stepmother would,” the old lady thought and would have said, only that she was a little afraid of Mrs. Sterling.

“She isn’t the least like you. Who is she like?” inquired Miss Lyon.

“Her father. See, here is his miniature,” said the widow, drawing from her pocket a morocco case, and handing it to the old lady.

“Yes, she is like her father. What a very interesting face he has. Has he been dead long?”

“Three years last March; he died of consumption. I suppose she will go the same way,” said the widow, indicating her child.

“You should not let her hear you say so; if she gets the impression that she is to die of consumption because her father did she will probably do so,” whispered Mrs. Lyon. Then aloud she spoke this truth: “Nobody need die of consumption or of anything else except old age, unless they have a mind to. Plenty of good food and proper clothing, and out-door exercise will prevent consumption.”

And with a parting glance of pity at the pale child, the old lady left the room.

“You mustn’t mind what Mrs. Lyon says; she is not like us. She is a great lady, and thinks of nothing but taking her ease and indulging herself, and she fancies that we can do the same; but you know we can’t,” said the widow, applying the antidote to what she considered the poison that had been dropped into the child’s mind. “We must deny ourselves, and bear our burden, and after all it is easy enough to do.”

“Yes,” said the mite in the corner, repeating her Sunday school Scripture text, for our Saviour said, ‘Whosoever will come after me let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me.’

“Yes, and if you don’t do it you know you will be eternally lost,” said the clergyman’s widow.

“Oh, but our Saviour will never let me be lost, no never; I know that much.”

“How do you know that? If you disobey him you will be lost.”

“Oh, no! He will not let me be—no, never, not even if I was to steal away from my work and go and play in the garden. He would forgive me like he did Peter; and then I should feel sorry, and cry, and then he would make it all right again,” said the quaint little infant Theologian with an air of positive conviction.

“Child! where did you learn such bad doctrines? Not at Sunday school, I know,” said the widow, in dismay.

“Yes, I did, in the Sunday school, in the Bible texts, and they are good. Our Saviour was good and all that he did was good. Don’t he say that he was sent to seek and to save them that were lost? And I know he will never let me be lost, no nor the old lady neither, even if she does take her ease, because she is so good-hearted.”

“Miss! don’t you know it is wrong to contradict your mother? And you have contradicted me several times.”

“Yes, I know—but—I must say what is true about Our Saviour when we talk of him.”

“Well, you shall sew one hour longer this evening, as a punishment for your disrespect to me.”

“Well, mamma, I will sew all day and all night, if that will do you any good, so you will let me say what is true about Our Saviour. Sewing is easy enough, the dear knows—easier than being scourged and stoned, and all that, like some of his poor friends were for his sake,” said the child, as she carefully fitted the little squares of her patch-work together.

“Only six years old and to talk like that! She is one of the children who are doomed to die early,” thought Mrs. Sterling.

And indeed any one looking at that child, with her delicate frame, large brain and active intellect, must have come to the same conclusion. But they would every one have been mistaken. There was a wonderful vitality and power of endurance in that little slight nervous frame. No one is faultless. And if this little atom had a fault, it was that of being just a “wee bit” self-opinionated. She was a very promising pupil in a very orthodox Sunday school; yet from the very texts they had taught her she had received impressions that the teachers certainly never had intended to give her, and these impressions had become convictions in defence of which she was willing at six years to suffer the baby martyrdom of—“sewing all day and all night.”

Meanwhile the Christmas Holidays were approaching, and the young son of the house was coming home to spend them. And his uncle and cousin were invited to meet him. Great preparations were made to entertain the party. Old Mrs. Lyon’s visits to the housekeeper’s room became more and more frequent as the time for the arrival of the visitors drew near.

And whenever the old lady came, she inevitably found the quiet child sitting on her stool in the corner of the hearth sewing for dear life.

But old Mrs. Lyon took no farther notice of the infant. Partly because she was too full of her own affairs and partly because she was displeased by the housekeeper’s disregard of her advice.

But the demure child, listening to every word that passed, with the interest only a recluse could feel, heard a great deal about “Mr. Alexander.” Whoever else might be coming, it was for this darling only son that his mother planned. It was of his comfort and pleasure only that she thought and talked.

And the little listening child grew to look upon “Mr. Alexander” as some young king of Israel—some splendid and magnificent Saul, or Solomon, who was to be the glory of the house. And because hero-worshipping was a necessity of her deep, earnest, reverent soul, she began to worship him.

At length, two or three days before Christmas, the expected visitors began to arrive.

First came General Lyon, the fine, martial-looking old man with his commanding form and snow white hair and beard; and his grand-daughter, the beautiful Anna Lyon, then a fair, blooming, blue-eyed and golden-haired hoyden of twelve years of age; both attended by their servants. And next came Mr. Alexander, then a rollicking young man of eighteen.

The whole party was assembled in the drawing-room, and Mrs. Sterling happened to be with them when Mr. Alexander was announced and entered, in a great noisy bustle of joy.

He shook hands heartily with his father and then with his uncle; and he embraced his mother and his cousin, and then, before he knew what he was about, he threw his arms around the housekeeper and hugged and kissed her.

“Oh, see here! you know I didn’t mean it, I didn’t indeed, ma’am; I beg ten thousand pardons! but I am so much in the habit of kissing everybody I meet here that—that—I kissed you by mistake. But if you don’t mind it, I don’t; or if you feel aggrieved, why, you may kiss and hug me, and that will make it all square between us,” laughed the boy, when he discovered his error.

The clergyman’s widow curtsied very stiffly without moving a muscle of her face.

“This is Mrs. Sterling, who manages our house, Alick,” said his mother, gravely.

“Mrs. Sterling, I am very happy to have the honor of knowing you, and I am persuaded that the house is managed to perfection,” said the young man, bowing.

The widow curtsied more stiffly than before, and then withdrew from the room.

“I say, Anna, I wouldn’t kiss her again for the best hunter in your father’s stables; my lips got frost-bitten by that first encounter,” whispered the young man, with a smile, to his cousin.

“Served you right, Alick. You should look before you leap,” laughed Anna.

“That mightn’t always prevent my leaping, especially if the feat seemed a dangerous one, though it would have done so in this case, I admit.”

They were interrupted by the arrival of another guest—an uninvited and unexpected, if not an unwelcome one.

The door was opened by a servant, who grimly announced:

“Mr. Richard Hammond.”

And “Poor Dick,” the black sheep of the flock, entered the room, looking rather sheepish, it must be confessed.

And yet he was a very handsome and gentlemanly youth, tall, slender, with a fine Grecian profile, with a clear brown complexion, black curling hair and dark changing eyes—with a frank countenance and an engaging smile that few, or none, could resist.

But well he might look sheepish, poor outlawed fellow, for his entrance cast an instantaneous chill over the family circle.

General Lyon drew himself up haughtily. The chief justice looked grave, his wife sad, and their son angry. Only Anna seemed pleased. And not only pleased, but delighted. For the instant she saw him she bounced up, overturning two or three chairs in her hurry and rushed to meet him, exclaiming:

“Cousin Dick! Oh, dear Cousin Dick, I am so glad you’ve come! It would have been such a dull Christmas, indeed no Christmas at all, without you!”

And she gave him both her hands and pressed and shook his, and drew him towards the group, and first instinctively presented him to the kind-hearted old lady:

“Aunt Lyon, here is Cousin Dick. Are you not very glad to see him?”

“How do you do, Richard?” said the old lady, offering her hand.

And the black sheep stooped and kissed her.

“Uncle, here’s Dick. Isn’t it a pleasant surprise?” asked Anna.

And uncle had to come and shake the scape-grace by the hand.

“Grandpa, look here; you don’t see Dick. Here’s Dick waiting to speak to you!” she persisted.

And General Lyon had to turn and meet the engaging smile of the handsome boy.

“Alick,” said Anna, in a low whisper, giving her betrothed a sharp dig in the ribs with her elbow, and a very vicious look from her angry blue eyes, “if you don’t stop glowering, and come and speak to Dick, I’ll never speak to you again.”

“Anything to keep peace in the family,” laughed Mr. Alexander, as he cleared up his brow, and went and welcomed the new comer.

And in two minutes more Dick was seated in the circle around the fire, the life of the little company talking and laughing, telling jokes and singing songs, and keeping everybody pleased and amused, so that they forgot they did not want him, and almost fancied that they could not do without him.

There was nothing very wrong about Dick Hammond. It is true that he was a very unpromising law student, being rather idle and extravagant—fonder of play than of work, and loving his “friends” better than himself. You know the sort of man—one of that sort of whom it is always said that he is “nobody’s enemy but his own.”

Dick had a neat little patrimony, but his relations said that he was in a fair way of making “ducks and drakes” of it, and they discountenanced and disapproved of him accordingly.

His one fast friend was his cousin Anna, and every year she was growing to be a stronger and more important one.

At ten o’clock that night, Mr. Richard Hammond made a motion to go, but the chief justice said:

“Stay all night, Dick.” And old Mrs. Lyon added:

“Stay and spend the Christmas holidays with us, Dick.”

So Mr. Richard stayed, and sent for his portmanteau from the hotel where he had stopped on his first coming to the city.

And having the freedom of the house, he took more liberties in it than any one else would dare to do—going into any part of it, and at any hour he pleased; popping in and out of the chief justice’s secluded study, and breaking up his naps; popping in and out of the old lady’s sacred dressing-room, and startling her in the midst of the mysterious rites of the toilet; and bouncing in and out of the housekeeper’s room, the pantry or the kitchen, to the serious discomfiture of the manager, the butler and the cook.

Yet everybody loved Dick, so long as the influence of his frank manners, sunny smile, and sweet voice was upon them. But when that was withdrawn, and they were left to their sober reason, they strongly disapproved of him.

“Little pitchers have long ears and wide mouths,” says the proverb. And the little pitcher in Mrs. Sterling’s private apartment was no exception to the general rule. Sitting stitching at her patch-work, she often heard Mr. Richard’s shortcomings discussed, and she pitied him, for she thought that he had wandered away very far from the fold, and was in a very bad way indeed.

One day when poor Dick popped into the housekeeper’s room, to ask for some brandy and salt to dip the wick of his candles in, to make “corpse lights” for ghosts to carry, and scare the maids with, he found no one there but the child, sitting in the corner and stitching patch-work as usual.

She looked up at him solemnly, and nearly annihilated him with the following appalling question:

“Young man, are you one of the lost sheep of the House of Israel?”

“Eh?” exclaimed Dick, starting.

“I ask you, are you a lost sheep? They say you are a black sheep, and I believe it is the black sheep that go astray,” she said, gravely, and folding her hands and contemplating him.

Dick burst out laughing, but when he recovered himself he answered very gravely:

“Indeed, I fear I am a lost sheep, little girl.”

“Well, that is bad, but don’t be frightened. Our Saviour knows where you are, and He will be sure to find you, and fetch you into the fold. Because, you know, He came to seek and to save those that are lost. And what he came to do He will do, and nothing in this world can prevent him.”

“I’ll be shot if that isn’t an encouraging doctrine if it is a true one, little girl. I sometimes wish somebody would find me and fetch me into a place of safety; but I fear I shouldn’t be worth keeping when found, for I am a sad, foolish, naughty sheep, child,” said the young man, with a self-mocking laugh.

“Never mind, don’t make game of yourself. If our Saviour thinks you worth looking for you are too good to be laughed at; and when He does find you and fetch you into the fold, He will make as good a sheep of you as—as—as—” The child seemed at a loss for a comparison, until her face suddenly lighted up, and she said: “As Mr. Alexander himself!”

“As Mr. Alexander himself! Oh, my eye! catch me, somebody! Only there’s nobody to do it!” said Dick, rolling up against the wall and holding his sides.

“What’s the matter? Have you got the stomach-ache? There’s some rum and molasses in the cupboard,” said the child.

“No, oh no!” cried Dick, bursting into vociferous laughter. “You are the solemnest little quiz! To hold up Mr. Alexander as a model for me! Well! I’m bad enough, goodness knows, but—! Why, little one, Mr. Alexander isn’t a sheep at all, either good or bad! He’s a goat, a rank black goat, and never has been in the fold, and never would be let into it!”

“Sir, it is very wrong in you to speak ill of a gentleman so in his absence,” gravely asserted the little monitor.

“So it is; you are right there, little girl,” admitted the scape-grace.

And the timely entrance of Mrs. Sterling put an end to this strange interview, and possibly saved the young man a serious lecture from the little child.

Dick got his candles, brandy and salt, and whatever else he wanted of the housekeeper; for that strong-minded woman, no more than her weaker sisters and brethren, could resist Dick’s irresistible smile.

CHAPTER V
THE CHILD MEETS HER FATE.

“The sun himself is coming up this way.”

That night “a most horrid spectre,” wrapped in a long winding sheet, and bearing a corpse candle that cast a cadaverous color over his countenance, stalked through the lower regions of the house, frightening the maids, and the men too, for that matter, from their propriety, and raising such a row in the dignified residence of the chief justice as might have brought the police down upon any house of a less assured standing.

And upon an investigation of the matter next morning, Mr. Richard was discovered to be at the bottom of the business.

And the quiet little girl in the housekeeper’s room heard again of his delinquencies and pitied him and wished that he was more like Mr. Alexander, that splendid paragon of youth whom his mother was always praising. The child, closely confined to her mother’s chamber, had never seen the hero of her admiration. But the hour was near at hand when she was to meet him in an interview destined to determine the whole course of her future life.

It was on Christmas Eve. All the preparations for the Christmas festival were made. The turkeys were already killed and dressed for the roaster; the hams were in soak; the plum pudding was mixed; the pies and cakes baked; and all the materials for the egg-nogg and apple-toddy laid out on the pantry table; and the notable housekeeper might have taken her ease but for one thing.

There was to be a pantomime at the city theatres that evening. And the three young people were to go. And as there were no reserved seats, they were to go very early in order to secure good places, for it was foreseen that the house would be very much crowded. And thus dinner was ordered two hours earlier than usual, so that they might get off in time.

Mrs. Sterling, having finished her morning’s work, was putting off her working gown of brown alpacca to put on a nice dress of black silk in honor of Christmas Eve, when old Mrs. Lyon came in to give the instructions about the dinner, and having given them, immediately left the room.

The housekeeper was in no plight to go all the way down to the kitchen, so she sent the child to tell the cook to come up to her for orders.

The little one went and delivered her message faithfully; and was returning to her mother’s room, when, in passing through the back hall, she suddenly met the god of her infant idolatry face to face. She knew him at once, either by instinct or because there was no other young man beside Mr. Richard (whom she knew by sight) in the house. She backed up into a corner to let him pass.

“Heyday! Who have we here? A child in the house? I haven’t seen such a thing here for years! Or are you a fairy changling?” inquired Mr. Alexander, in surprise.

The child did not reply, but—I am sorry to say—put her finger in her mouth, dropped her chin and rolled up her eyes in a shy glance at the splendid youth.

“Ah bah! that’s very nasty! Don’t stick your finger in your mouth and stare, but hold up your head and answer when you are spoken to. Tell me who you are, little girl!” said Mr. Alexander.

Prince Solomon had condescended to issue orders and they were immediately obeyed by his loyal subject. Down went the little finger; up went the little face, and she answered:

“I am Mrs. Sterling’s little girl.”

“And a very nice little girl, too, to do as you are bid. Always do so, do you hear?”

“Yes sir.”

“And so you are the housekeeper’s daughter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How is it that I haven’t seen anything of you before?”

“Because mother never lets me go out of her room.”

“Never lets you go out of her room?”

“No, sir.”

“Why?”

“Because she is afraid that the——” Here the child lowered her voice to a tone of mysterious awe—“chief justice would be angry if he saw me about.”

“Bosh about his being angry! He is not a King Herod to hate the sight of a child, or desire the death of the innocents. You don’t mean to tell me that you are cooped up in the housekeeper’s room all the time?”

“Oh no, sir, I am not cooped up anywhere any of the time; only the poultry for Christmas was cooped up, and that was in the back yard; I saw them through the window. But I sit on a nice little stool in mother’s room and sew pretty quilt pieces.”

“All day long?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And every day?”

“Oh, no, sir, not every day. I go to Sunday school on Sundays.”

“But on all other days you are kept confined to that room all day long?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, you look just as if you were, you poor little pale thing, and that is the truth. It is horrid. I’ll speak to my mother about it. Why, you ought to be romping all over the house, you know, and going to pantomimes o’ Christmas, like other children. Say, little a—a—What is your name?”

“Anna Drusilla Sterling, sir,” said the child, beginning to grow restive under all this questioning, and to swing her shoulders from side to side, after the manner of some children when saying their lessons.

“There—don’t do that; it’s ugly,” said Mr. Alexander.

And the swinging instantly ceased.

“‘Anna Drusilla Sterling?’ Well, I have one Anna already, so I shall call you Drusilla,” said the young man.

“But my mother calls me Anny.”

“Never mind what your mother calls you—I shall call you Drusilla. Well, little Drusilla, wouldn’t you like to go to the pantomime with us to-night?”

“I don’t know, sir. Please, what is it?”

“It is something got up to amuse little children like you, though big children like myself find it equally diverting. Wouldn’t you like to go? I should like to take you, and to see it through your great staring eyes, as well as through my own. It would be a ‘new sensation.’ Come, what do you say?”

“Thank you, sir. Is it pretty?”

“Beautiful!”

“And good!”

“It is heavenly!”

“Then I think I should like to go, sir, if mother will let me.”

“Oh, she will let you fast enough, for I shall make a point of it.”

“What did you call it, sir, please?”

“A pantomime.”

“Oh, I know now,” said the child, with a sudden look of bright intelligence; “it is something about Moses and the children of Israel, isn’t it, sir?”

“Eh? ‘Moses and the children of Israel?’ What put that into your little noddle?” laughed the young man.

“Why, sir, you know the books of Moses are called the panta—panta—something; it’s a very hard word, sir.”

“Oh, you are talking of the pentateuch?”

“Yes, sir, a very hard word. I always miss it at the class, it is so very hard.”

“Very,” laughed the young man.

And now, as the voice of the housekeeper was heard calling her child, the little girl made her Sunday school curtsey, and ran away from her new friend to join her mother.

Mr. Alexander gazed after her as he might if she had been sixteen instead of six, for he was fond of children, as well as of kittens and puppies, and all small creatures. They amused him. He was now determined that this quaint little child should go to the pantomime with himself and his friends, for he knew perfectly well that to watch her, and witness her wonder and delight, would be as diverting as to see the play itself—it would, in that way double his own entertainment.

Mr. Alick was benevolent, but not very scrupulous, I regret to confess. So, when he went to the housekeeper’s room to ask leave to take the child to the pantomime, judging that the Baptist preacher’s widow would set her face against all such exhibitions, he took a hint from the child’s mistake, and was so unprincipled as to persuade that pious matron that the spectacle in question was a historical affair, illustrative of the Israelites, and very instructive and edifying to the youthful mind. And so, with Mr. Richard to back him he talked the housekeeper into consenting that her child should accompany them, especially as Miss Anna was to be one of the party. And Mrs. Sterling began to dress little Drusilla—we shall call the child by her second name, for the same reason that Mr. Alexander did, to distinguish her from the other Anna.

Immediately after dinner the young party set out, and reached the theatre in time to get good front seats.

The pantomime was “Jack the Giant Killer.” But as Mr. Alexander kept little Drusilla beside himself, and kept the play bill in his own hands, he found it easy to persuade the simple child that the exhibition was of “David and Goliath,” Jack was David, and Jack’s first giant was Goliath.

And the child was exceedingly edified, as well as highly entertained.

Mr. Alexander found it “as good as a play,” and much better than a pantomime, to watch her. Her credulity was equal to her delight, and both were unbounded. But she thought it was not exactly like the Scripture story, after all.

Mr. Alexander explained to her that they could not make it exactly like, because things were so different now to what they were then.

Little Drusilla accepted the explanation in full faith, saying in her solemn way, that she supposed they did the best they could, and that we must “take the will for the deed.”

The pantomime was over a little after ten o’clock, and the youthful party returned home.

Little Drusilla, restored to her mother’s charge, would have rehearsed for her benefit all the great spectacle of “David and Goliath,” but that the good lady told her that it was time for her to be asleep, and made her go immediately to bed.

Notwithstanding the late hour at which the young people had retired on Christmas Eve, they were all up by times on Christmas day. All was lively bustle throughout the house. Everybody had Christmas gifts, at which each pretended to be as much surprised as he or she was expected to be.

Miss Anna had a little set of diamonds, consisting of ear-rings and brooch, presented by her grandfather; an ermine tippet and muff from her uncle; a set of antique lace from her aunt; a diamond bracelet from her betrothed; and from scape-grace Dick a real King Charles lap-dog, which she openly preferred to all her other presents, because she said it was alive, and could give love for love.

The old lady had a new patent easy chair, a new pair of gold spectacles, and a set of sables.

And the gentlemen of the party were overwhelmed with embroidered slippers, smoking-caps, dressing-gowns, penwipers, and so forth.

The housekeeper was presented with a new brown silk dress. And there was not a servant in the house but received a present.

“And who has got anything for little Drusilla?” inquired Mr. Alexander.

But nobody answered him.

“Well, I’m dashed! Only one bit of a baby in the house, and nobody has thought of her. And this especially a child’s festival, because it celebrates the birth of the Divine Child, who also loved little children! Say, mother, the shops are open in the city this morning, are they not?” inquired Mr. Alexander.

“Until ten o’clock, Alick; not after,” replied the old lady.

“All right, it is only eight now—plenty of time. I’m off; but I’ll be back to breakfast,” said Mr. Alexander, darting out of the drawing-room, seizing his hat in the hall, and rushing from the house.

“Ah, what a kind heart has this child of our old age, John!” said the old lady, turning proudly and fondly to her husband.

“Yes—yes; a good boy—a good boy,” answered the Chief Justice.

“Ah, Anna, my dear, you will be a happy woman if you live long enough, for you will have a good husband,” she continued, turning to her intended daughter-in-law.

Anna shrugged her shoulders.

“You don’t seem to agree with me, Anna.”

“Oh yes I do, Aunt Lyon, to some extent. I think Alick is really very kind when it amuses him; but I don’t think he would be kind to any living creature when it would bore him to be so. For instance, he would bring me home a present, and be really delighted with my delight in it; but he wouldn’t give up a skating party to take me to a wax-work show if I were to cry myself ill from disappointment.”

“Oh, I suppose you have had a tiff with him; that’s of no consequence at all. ‘The quarrel of lovers is the renewal of love,’” said the old lady, laughing to herself.

But Anna had had no tiff with her betrothed, and her judgment of him was a righteous one.

Mr. Alick soon came rushing in with his arms full of packages, and looking like a railway porter. He set down three large ones on the floor, threw himself into a chair, and exclaimed:

“Now then, mother, send for little Drusilla. It will be fun to watch her eyes when she sees these things.”

Mrs. Lyon rang the bell, and sent a servant to fetch the little girl to the drawing-room.

The child’s mother being in a particularly good humor since receiving the new brown silk dress, made no objection, but sent her along in charge of the servant.

Little Drusilla entered the drawing-room, looking very pretty in her new red merino frock, which suited well with her dark hair and dark eyes, and clear, pale face.

She made her little curtsy at the door, and then as Mr. Alexander held out his arms she ran straight up to him.

“Now, then,” said the young gentleman, taking her on his knee, while the mysterious packages lay all around his feet, “if you could have your wish, what would you wish for?”

“Mother says it is foolish and wicked to wish for anything, because if it is for our good, the Lord will give it to us whether or not.”

“Well but suppose you were so foolish and wicked as to wish for anything, what would it be?” persisted the young man, while all the other members of the Christmas party looked on, smilingly.

The child pondered gravely.

“Come—what would it be?”

“I think a work-box,” answered the child, looking up at length.

“What! not a doll-baby?”

“Oh, I would rather have a doll-baby, but I thought it would be too wicked to wish for that, because it is useless,” said the little one.

“Well, look here, now! First, here’s the doll-baby,” said Mr. Alick, unwrapping one of the parcels, and taking from a mass of tissue paper a splendid wax doll, with rosy cheeks, blue eyes and golden hair, all dressed in blue satin and white lace.

“Oh-h-h! m-y-y!” exclaimed the child, in breathless delight, as she took the doll and held it up before her, and gazed at it with ever-widening eyes.

Mr. Alexander laughed and squeezed her, he so much enjoyed her enjoyment, and the whole party looked on, amused and interested.

“Isn’t it a beauty?” asked the youth, giving the child another squeeze.

“It is a love! it is a darling! it is as pretty as—as—as Miss Anna!” she exclaimed, turning her eyes from the golden-haired doll to the golden-haired girl.

“Thank you, little one! That compliment is sincere, however flattering,” laughed the heiress.

“And now look here!” said Mr. Alexander, taking up another parcel; “she is wearing her ball dress, you know, which is very proper for Christmas, but would never do for every day. And a thrifty little woman like you would never let her doll wear her best clothes for common; so you must fit her out with a wardrobe, and here are the goods to do it with.”

And he unrolled a second parcel, and displayed a yard each of pink, blue and buff cambric, and several yards of white muslin, and some remnants of ribbon and lace.

“And now,” he said, as the child was contemplating these additional treasures with increased delight, “now you will require something to make them up with, won’t you?”

“Oh, no; I mustn’t wish for anything more. This is too much!” said the little one, with eyes dancing for joy.

“Except what you wished for first of all, which I think was something like this,” said Mr. Alexander opening a third parcel, and producing a pretty little work-box fitted out with scissors, thimble, needles, thread, and every requisite for sewing.

“Oh, how much I do thank you, sir. Once before I dreamt I had pretty things like these all to myself, and I was sorry I ever woke up. Do you think I’ll wake up this time, sir?” inquired the little girl, evidently perplexed between delight and dismay.

Mr. Alexander laughed, and intensely enjoyed the pastime that he had purchased at so small an outlay, but the old lady said, very gravely:

“You have bewildered the child, Alick. She is not used to presents, and you should have treated her upon the same principle as that upon which the doctors treat their patients, who have been suffering from a long starvation, and given her but a little at a time. And now put her off your knee and come to breakfast; or if you can’t part with her, bring her along.”

Mr. Alexander immediately put the little creature down, and told her to take up her treasures and run away with them to her mother as fast as she could.

Mr. Alexander could give the child presents and divert himself with her delight in them, but he could not consent to be bothered with her at the breakfast table, where he wished to give “his whole mind” to the business there to be on hand.

His mother, more considerate, touched the bell, and told the servant who answered it to help the child to carry her presents to the housekeeper’s room.

The man gathered the parcels up and took Drusilla by the hand; but as he led her from the room she suddenly looked back, impulsively broke away from her guard, and ran up to her benefactor and took his hand and kissed it.

“Why, what a grateful little imp you are, to be sure! It is worth while trying to please you; one succeeds so well and one’s efforts are appreciated and thanked,” said the young man, raising the child in his arms and kissing her, and then darting a half-merry, half-reproachful glance at his cousin Anna.

“If you meant that for me, Mr. Alick, I don’t see the point of it. You never do anything to please me, unless it still better pleases yourself. You are one of the sort of folk who would carelessly fling a dollar to a strange beggar, but would not lose an hour’s rest by the bedside of a sick friend,” said plain-spoken Anna.

“Well, there’s somebody that will do both,” said Mr. Alexander, jerking his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of Dick. “He sat up with old Jerry Brown, who had the smallpox. I wonder if you would have liked him so well, Anna, if he had taken it; as he might have done; and lost his hair and eyebrows and been otherwise badly marked?”

“Yes I would, Alick! But, thank goodness, Dick, darling, you didn’t get it, and you are not marked; but just as good-looking as ever,” said Anna, defiantly.

“Come, come, this is pretty quarrelling among cousins on Christmas morning, too! Put a stop to it,” said Mrs. Lyon.

The young people laughed and obeyed. They were only “sparring.” And they all sat down to the breakfast table in high, good humor.

And little Drusilla went back to her mother, as happy as it was possible for a child to be. And her happiness was all associated with the idea of Mr. Alexander, that splendid being who had been the central object of all her wonder, curiosity and admiration, long before she had set eyes on him. She had never dreamed of such bliss as she now enjoyed, and all through him!

Up to this time her little life had been dreary enough, more dreary than even she knew since she had known nothing better with which to compare it. Her very earliest recollections were of her father’s sick room, and his long and painful illness; and then came his death, and her mother’s sorrow and their poverty; and finally, this situation in the family of the Chief Justice, where the child had been led to believe that her presence could be only tolerated for the sake of her mother’s valuable services, and upon condition of herself being kept out of the sight and hearing of the family.

All these were very miserable and gloomy antecedents; but now they had passed away like the shadows of the night; for now came this bright, young Mr. Alexander, to bring daylight and sunshine into her infant life.

His kindness to the pale orphan did not cease with Christmas Day. So long as the Christmas and New-Year’s holidays lasted, Mr. Alick insisted on little Drusilla sharing all the young people’s amusements; because, in point of fact, it greatly enhanced his enjoyment to have her with them.

When the holidays were over, General Lyon took his grand-daughter back to school; Mr. Alexander returned to college; and the house was emptied of its visitors.

In taking leave of his pet, Mr. Alick had said:

“And now, Drusilla, when I am gone you must be my mother’s little girl, do you hear?”

“Oh, how I wish I might! Oh, how I do wish I might!” said the child, weeping and clinging to her friend.

“Mother, when I am gone, you’ll be good to the poor little thing, if only for my sake, won’t you?” he inquired, as a feeling of real pity moved his heart.

“Indeed I will, Alick,” earnestly replied the old lady.

“And you will not let old Bishop Sterling keep her mewed up in that horrid room all the time?”

“Not if I can prevent it, Alick.”

With this promise Mr. Alick departed.

And little Drusilla clung to the old lady’s skirts, and wept as if her heart would break.

For her the day had departed with the sun that had made its light, and the darkness of the night had come again.

You may depend upon it that the old lady sincerely sympathized with the child who wept for her son’s departure, and so she petted little Drusilla, and took her out that day, when she went in the carriage to purchase some articles that were needed in the housekeeping.

CHAPTER VI.
THE NEXT FEW YEARS.

When she commenced to love she could not say,

Ere she began to tire of childish play.—Wordsworth.

The little girl grew to be a great favorite with the old lady; first, for her beloved and only son’s sake.

“Poor Alick was so fond of the child,” she said; though why she called the gay and prosperous young collegian “poor,” only aged mothers can tell.

Afterwards she loved the little one for its own sake.

“The child is such a quiet little creature,” she said, “and so intelligent and obliging.”

Little Drusilla had the freedom of the house. When her tasks were over in the housekeeper’s room she might wander where she would, and was tolerated like a pet kitten.

She would creep into the old lady’s sitting-room, and nestle down at her feet, ready to hold a skein of silk for her to wind; to pick up her scissors when she should drop them; to ring the bell for a servant, or to do anything else that her little hands and willing mind could accomplish.

And so it came to pass that she became useful and even necessary to her benefactress.

“You have no idea how many steps about my room the little creature saves me,” said Mrs. Lyon to the child’s mother.

“I am very glad to hear it, madam; it is her duty to make herself useful,” replied the housekeeper.

“And then she is so much company.”

“I hope she knows her place, madam, and is not pert.”

“She is a little dear, and I would not be without her for anything; so don’t be troubled.”

“I trust in you, madam, to send her away whenever she becomes annoying to you.”

“Quite right; when she becomes annoying I shall do so,” laughed the old lady.

Whenever Mrs. Lyon got letters from Mr. Alexander she read them to little Drusilla; and in no one could she have found a more attentive, intelligent and sympathizing listener. In almost every letter the young gentleman wrote:

“Give my love to my little pet, and kiss her for me,” or words to that effect.

Whenever Mrs. Lyon wrote to Mr. Alexander she would smilingly ask the child what message she had to send; and little Drusilla would answer:

“Please say I sent him a love and a kiss; and I ask our Father to bless him whenever I say my prayers.”

And the message would be faithfully transmitted.

Sometimes when Mrs. Lyon chanced to be out of her room the little girl would creep to the door of Judge Lyon’s study, and peep shyly in.

And whether the old lady happened to be there or not the old gentleman would call the child in, and pat her head, and talk to her, and feel in all his pockets for stray pennies to give her.

Little Drusilla had but one use for pennies—“to drop in the purse” that was carried around on Sundays in the Sunday school.

Mrs. Sterling, seeing how really welcome her child was, “in hall and bower,” no longer tried to keep her confined to the housekeeper’s room.

So the winter passed away, and the spring opened.

Early in the season the family, with their whole establishment of servants, migrated to Crowood, the fine old country-seat of the chief justice, situated in the dense forest-land of the valley. Of course Mrs. Sterling and her child went along with them.

Among woods, fields, and streams, birds, shrubs and flowers, little Drusilla seemed in her native element, and with her fellow-creatures. Her enjoyment of nature was intense and her delight unbounded. Her joy overflowed and communicated itself to every one in the family. Even the old justice said:

“The child makes me long to have my grandchildren about my knees; for, after all, this little one isn’t ours.”

“Well, if she isn’t she’s a pet of poor Alick’s, and that makes me think a deal of her,” answered Mrs. Lyon.

The old lady was a great flora-culturist, and had one of the most beautiful flower-gardens in the country. It was her pleasure to tend it herself; and she passed much of her time in dibbling and digging, weeding and watering, planting and transplanting her favorite specimens.

And on these occasions the child was always at her heels, with little spade, rake, hoe, watering-pot, or guano basket; and she soon learned to know the name, and watch the growth of every variety of flower as well and as carefully as her benefactress could.

Mrs. Lyon was also a poultry fancier, and had some of the finest broods in the neighborhood. Moreover, she chose to look after her hen-roosts and nests in person.

And whenever she visited her poultry yard for this purpose little Drusilla would walk behind her with a basket, which she would carry full of corn for the chickens, and bring back full of fresh eggs for breakfast. And the child knew the relative merits of bantam, dominicho, duck-legged, or Spanish broods, as well as their mistress. Shanghais and Cochin Chinas were unheard of in that day.

But Mrs. Lyon’s pride of prides was her drove of cows—unexcelled and even unapproached in all the country around. And to these especially, the old lady often gave her personal attention.

And whenever she walked down to the cow-pen in the afternoon milking-time, to see for herself that her cows were in a good condition, and that her milk-maids did their duty faithfully, little Drusilla walked behind her, with a little basket in her hand full of small, sweet apples to treat the pets. And with her own little hand she would hold a small apple up to the great mouth of some prize cow, and laugh to see the long red tongue thrust out and folded around the morsel to be crunched up by the teeth. And the child knew the name and pedigree of every prodigious prize cow there, and could tell the distinctive points of the Durham, Alderney, Ayrshire, or other breeds.

In a word she became the old lady’s “shadow,” and she learned all the old lady could teach her without giving her teacher the least trouble, but on the contrary a great deal of assistance. She gained much practical knowledge, if but little book learning.

Strangers who saw them together invariably took the little girl to be the old lady’s grand-daughter; and Mrs. Lyon was always rather pleased by the mistake.

And little Drusilla was “as happy as the day was long.”

So passed the spring and half the summer.

But in the middle of July the chief justice and his wife went to the mountains, to old Lyon Hall, on a visit to the general and his daughter, where they expected to be joined by Mr. Alexander.

Little Drusilla wept over the departure of her friends; but when they were gone she occupied herself with the commissions Mrs. Lyon had left to her—left with the purpose of interesting and amusing the lonely child during her own absence. These were to weed the flower beds, feed the chickens, and take small sweet apples to the favorite cows at the afternoon milking-time.

All these pleasant tasks did the little girl gladly and faithfully perform.

Nevertheless the days seemed long, now that her dear old friends were gone.

But days and weeks, however tedious, pass away in time.

At the end of six weeks, on the first of September, the chief justice and his wife come back to Crowood.

Mrs. Lyon could not enough praise the fidelity of her little handmaiden. There was not a weed to be found in all the flower beds; the chickens were fat, and the cows in a good condition (though this last item was of course due more to the fine grazing than to the little treats of sweet apples tendered to them by the little Drusilla.)

The old lady and the child became better friends than ever. Mrs. Lyon had a great deal to tell about Mr. Alexander, and little Drusilla was never tired of listening.

And so three more pleasant months were passed at Crowood, and then the family went back to the city. They were comfortably settled in their town house by the first of December.

Mrs. Lyon went out in the carriage to shop, and took Drusilla, and purchased for her pretty, bright colored merino dresses, suitable for childhood.

Christmas came, and brought General Lyon, Miss Anna and Mr. Alexander, on their annual visit. And Mr. Richard Hammond came, an uninvited but not an unwelcome guest.

Little Drusilla was now always with Mrs. Lyon. The housekeeper had fairly given the child up to the old lady.

And Mr. Alexander, who, on this occasion was the first of the Christmas party to arrive, found Drusilla in the drawing-room, neatly dressed in a crimson merino frock, with a ruffled white apron, and with her pretty hair curled and tied back with crimson ribbons.

After affectionately greeting his mother and father, he turned to the child.

“Why—is this? No, it isn’t. Yes, it is actually my little Drusilla. Why, what a bright little bird you have grown, to be sure!” he exclaimed, snatching her up in his arms and kissing her boisterously, as she clung around his neck, smiling in delight, and timidly hiding her face.

“Well, I will say, mother, she does you credit. You have quite transfigured her. What have you been doing to her to improve her so much?”

“Giving her a little more sunshine, that is all, Alick,” smiled the old lady, greatly pleased because the son of her old age was so.

“I declare I never saw such a change in any creature. I left her a year ago, a dingy little chimney swallow. I come back, and find her a brilliant oriole. Indeed, I didn’t know her at first, and I shouldn’t have known her at all, but for her eyes and forehead; they will never change. I say, father, by the way, talking of her forehead, look at it. If there be any truth in phrenology she must have intellect.”

“I don’t think it requires an appeal to phrenology to prove that the child has rare intelligence,” said the chief justice.

“Intellect is a snare as well as beauty; goodness is the quality most to be desired,” remarked Mrs. Lyon, gravely. Then, speaking to the child, she added:

“Now run away into the garden and play for half an hour or so. This clear, frosty air outside is good for little girls.”

Mr. Alexander put his pet down, and then the little creature ran out of the room.

“I must beg you both, my husband and son, not to say such things as you have been saying in the child’s presence again. I have too real a regard for her to wish to have her spoiled.”

“All right, mother; I wouldn’t do anything to spoil her for the world,” said Mr. Alexander.

And the chief justice also acquiesced, for the old lady was queen-regnant in her own family kingdom.

An hour later General Lyon and Miss Anna arrived. And at night Mr. Richard made his appearance. And with the coming of Dick the holidays really commenced.

On Christmas morning a great many presents were interchanged. And while rich jewelry, furs, shawls, dresses, laces, slippers, caps, gowns and gloves were given and received, little Drusilla ran from one group to another, deeply interested and sincerely sympathizing in the pleasure and satisfaction of her friends.

“I have not forgotten you this time, little one; see here, what a lot of pretty stories to read these long winter evenings,” said Mr. Alick, unwrapping a parcel from which he took a large volume of “Fairy Tales,” profusely illustrated with splendidly colored engravings.

What child’s heart does not dote on Fairy Tales and on colored pictures?

Little Drusilla’s eyes fairly leaped with joy, and she caught the young man’s hand and kissed it eagerly, and pressed it to her heart, and put it on her head. Apparently she could not do enough to express how much she was obliged to him.

“Oh, nonsense; I’m not the Emperor of Morocco or Khan of Tartary, to be worshipped after that fashion,” laughed the young man, “and my knuckles must be knobby sort of kissing. Up here, crimson lips, and kiss me on the mouth, if nothing but kissing will relieve your mind. Come, Miss Anna won’t be jealous, not now, at least, though I don’t know what she might be if you were seventeen instead of seven.” And he took her up in his arms, and kissed her very fondly.

“And now see here,” he said, as he put her down again, “here is something else I have got for you—a pretty little papier mâché writing desk, furnished completely. See, here is an inkstand and a sand box, here are pens of several sizes, and pencils of all qualities, and here are envelopes and note-paper of every color and shade. Now I know you can write a little, as well as read a great deal. So, when I go away again, I want you, instead of sending me messages, to write me nice little notes, and give them to my mother, and she will put them inside of hers, and send them to me. Do you hear?”

“Yes, sir,” said the child, gravely, as the tears stole down her cheeks.

“Now, then, what are you crying for?”

“Because you are so good to me, and—and you are going away again, and I shall not see you for—for—for a year,” sobbed the little Drusilla.

“Whe-ew! here’s borrowing trouble! Why, I shall not go for six weeks yet, and who knows but the world may come to an end before that time, and we may all go to Heaven together? Come, stop crying. What! you can’t? Hey day! Do you love me as much as all that comes to?”

“Yes, sir,” sobbed the child.

“Well, then, if you do love me, mind what I say, and stop crying. It blubbers your face all up, and makes you ugly, and I couldn’t possibly love an ugly little girl.”

Drusilla wiped her eyes by rubbing her fists into them, and then, little woman-like, turned her head aside, and stole a furtive glance at the mirror opposite, to see if she had made herself as ugly as Mr. Alexander said, and finding that she had, she began to compose herself.

And in a few minutes afterwards she seemed deeply interested in sorting the contents of her writing desk.

This was one of the merriest Christmas seasons that the young people of the Lyon family ever passed. The weather was very fine. Everybody was in good health and high spirits. Amusements were many and various. And where-ever the young party went they took little Drusilla with them. She was the family pet.

Bright seasons must terminate, as well as dark ones, and the merry Christmas holidays came to an end, and the happy Christmas party separated.

Again little Drusilla was inconsolable, until time reconciled her to the absence of her friend.

But she obeyed his order, given half in jest and half in earnest. She wrote a little letter to him to be put in every one that his mother sent. And real love-letters they were too, though scratched in the most awkward of infantile hands.

“I love you so; I do love you so much; I do love you more than anybody in the world; every time I say my prayers I thank Our Father for making you, and I pray to Him to bless you and to keep you good. And I do all you tell me to do, and it makes me feel glad. And I don’t do what you tell me not to do. And when anybody wants me to do anything well that is hard, they speak your name and then it seems easy for me. I let mother cut off all my long curls and did not cry, for she said that my hair would grow out so much nicer by the time you come back. But oh, how long it will be before you come back. But I won’t cry after you, for you say it makes me ugly and you couldn’t love an ugly little girl. Mother says I must not wish to be pretty; but oh, I do, because you like pretty people. But if I am good you will always like me, won’t you? Is there any little girl at college that you like as well as me? You’ve got the little dog, I know. You took him with you. To think you could take the little dog and couldn’t take me. It does seem hard, because I love you, oh so much more than the little dog could. I’m not jealous of the poor little dog; don’t think that, only it seems so hard, when I love you so much.”

Such was the sort of ardent nonsense the little child wrote to her big hero; but after all, it was no worse nonsense than many of her grown-up sisters write to the heroes of their imaginations.

Old Mrs. Lyon never looked into little Drusilla’s scrawls—or, if she did, she never took the trouble to decipher them.

Mr. Alick would smile over them; because they pleased him. He liked to be loved. The preference of any dumb brute was pleasing to him; how much more so then the worship—for it was little less—of this fervent, earnest, enthusiastic little girl?

“How devoted to me the little quiz is, to be sure. Christopher Columbus! if this sort of thing should grow with her growth and strengthen with her strength, what will become of me? Bosh! by the time she is seventeen or eighteen some young prig of a parson will cut me out and there an end.”

And Mr. Alick laughed at the conceit, and thought of the black-eyed girl he had danced with at the last party.

But for all that he could not do without the child’s love or the child’s letters; and he cherished both.

This first year of Drusilla’s life with the Lyon family was a sample of several that followed.

Every Spring the family went to Crowood, taking the housekeeper and her child and all the servants with them; and Drusilla renewed her acquaintance with woods and fields and streams; and increased her knowledge of plants, poultry, cows, and animate and inanimate nature generally, from personal observation.

Every midsummer she was left princess regent of the poultry yard, etc., while her benefactors went to visit their relatives in Old Lyon Hall in the mountains.

Every autumn the family returned to Richmond to spend the winter.

And every Christmas came the grand family re-union, in which, to the child’s worshipping eyes, Mr. Alexander was the central figure. This Christmas gathering became to her the crowning glory of the year, for then she saw him. He became thus associated with all that was best and brightest in her life. He brought her the books and pictures for which already her intellect and imagination had begun to hunger. He always examined into the progress of her education; though that was scarcely necessary, for the constantly improving style of her letters to him revealed her steady advance. I believe that with her bright intelligence, she would have studied well from the pure love of knowledge, even if Mr. Alexander had never patronized her; but now all cooler motives were lost in the ardent desire to please her friend. And indeed she did please him; he was proud of her, vain of her, not as if he had been her father, but as if he had been her creator. He seemed to think, as she grew in beauty and bright intelligence, that he had made her what she was. To his apprehension, he was the sun and she the sun-flower, ever turning towards him for light and life.

Every one, who is not blindly selfish, likes to patronize where to do so costs little or nothing. Mr. Alexander’s patronage of this child amused and interested him; cost him nothing; but won for him a vast return of love and gratitude.

CHAPTER VII.
THE GIRL’S FIRST GRIEF.

One hurried kiss, one last, one long embrace,

One yearning look upon her tearful face,

And he was gone—C. H. W. Esling.

At ten years of age little Drusilla met her first great grief; and very heavy it was, for it nearly crushed out her life.

Mr. Alexander being twenty-two years of age, and having completed his college course, graduated with some honors, and returned home to spend a week or two of the beautiful spring weather with his parents previous to starting on his travels.

The family had not yet left the town house in Richmond, where General Lyon and Miss Anna, now a blooming young lady of sixteen, came to visit them.

During this visit it was arranged that Mr. Alexander should travel for two years and then return and marry Miss Anna, and that the young couple should take up their permanent abode at Old Lyon Hall.

But in all the interest and excitement of arranging his own and his promised bride’s affairs, Alexander did not neglect Drusilla. He had come into a little property of his own, left him by a bachelor brother of his mother; and so before he went away he said to the old lady:

“Mother, little Drusilla is going on eleven years old and ought to be sent to school. And I wish you, if you please, to look out a good one for her, the best that can be found, and send her. I wish you to do this for me at my expense. My money is in the City Bank, and I will leave you a number of blank checks, to fill up as you may require them. Will you attend to this for me, mother?”

Mrs. Lyon hesitated and pondered, and then answered:

“Yes, Alick. I can’t refuse you anything on the eve of a voyage. And I don’t see any harm in this—a good common school education——”

“Oh, mother, not that only; but the best—the very best—that can be got for her. See what a bright, intelligent, industrious little creature she is,” hastily interrupted Alexander.

“What! do you mean that she shall learn languages and music, and——”

—“Everything that a young lady is taught, mother. Everything that Anna knows. Why not? Think how small the cost, after all, to me; how great the good to her.”

“That is true, Alick. You are really a very noble-minded young man. I must say it, if you are my son.”

“Bosh, mother, begging your pardon, I’m nothing of the sort. But I like to do a good thing now and then.”

“And this will be a good thing for her. It will enable her to get her living as a governess.”

“Not a bit of it, mother; Heaven forbid that my child should ever become a governess, to be teased by stupid children and snubbed by insolent mammas.”

“Then I am afraid you and Anna will have to adopt her,” said the old lady drily.

“And what’s to hinder us? Think what a charming companion my child will be for Anna, and how much more charming if she should be well educated.”

“Why, you talk as if you were her father.”

“Well, I feel as if I was!” said the young man, as a real tenderness softened the expression of his face.

The next day Mr. Alexander left home for his distant travels.

No one took the parting hard but his mother and his “child.”

His father and his uncle shook hands with him heartily, wishing him a good voyage. His mother held him to her heart and prayed and wept over him. Miss Anna kissed him with a cordial, cousinly smack, and told him not to forget her in foreign parts.

But when he lifted Drusilla up, as he had been accustomed to do, and kissed her on the mouth once, twice, thrice, and said feelingly:

“I cannot do this when I come back again, my child!”

She clung to his bosom and gasped, but could make no reply, she was so suffocated with grief.

He set her down very gently and went away.

The general and the judge looked for the morning papers.

Miss Anna sat down to cut the leaves of a new novel.

But old Miss Lyon took the hand of the pale, tearless, motionless child, and led her away.

Little Drusilla, sensitive, impressible and inexperienced, dropped under the heavy blow that had fallen on her with all the force of a first great sorrow. She fell ill, nearly unto death, moaning, in her semi-delirium, snatches of her grief:

“Oh, don’t go! don’t go! Two years—two long, long years! Oh! so far away! His man could go with him, and not I—not I who will die about it! Oh, come back! come back, or I will die—indeed I will die!”

Mrs. Lyon soothed this distress as well as she was able, and when, after weeks of illness, the little girl grew better, the old lady told her of all Mr. Alexander’s plans for her welfare—that he had decided she must be sent to school and educated like a young lady; that afterwards she was to be taken to live as a companion to Miss Anna.

Drusilla listened very humbly and gratefully to this communication; but much as she loved knowledge, and anxious as she was to acquire it, she felt too bereaved and sorrowful to take delight in that or in anything else, as yet.

As soon as the child recovered her health, she was fitted out and put to one of the best boarding schools in the city.

Her mother made no objection, only mumbled to herself this piece of philosophy:

“If we don’t know much of the future, of this we may be certain—when we expect anything to turn out this way, it will be sure to turn out that. I thought the child was going to be a nuisance and a bore, and behold! she is a treasure and a pet! And so it is with everything!”

And meanwhile, with one great bond of sympathy between them, the old lady and the little girl grew faster friends than ever.

But her devotion to Alexander—it grew with her growth and strengthened with her strength. It was her one faith, hope, love—her inspiration, her religion, her soul; it was a part of herself—no, her very self—this all-absorbing, all-concentrating, all-devoting love to him.

His bosom was her home, though he might never let her into it; what the nest is to the bird his bosom was to her—the bourne of all her thoughts, the safe and happy resting-place of her heart, though as yet she was an exile from it.

The sphere of study was around her; it did not govern her, but served her, for all that she could get from it was drawn in to help the one great moving power of her being. She loved learning so much for his sake, that she did not know whether she loved it for its own. Her expanding intellect seemed only her enlarging love. Her advancement in knowledge seemed only to be progress towards him.

She seemed to herself to belong to him—to have been made for him, made of him, almost by him. She was as the rib taken from her Adam’s side, conscious of her dislocation, and longing to be put back again, and made one with the life of her life. If Alexander had died at this time, I think that Drusilla would have ceased to live.

One other such case as hers I have seen in common life, and that must be nameless, and one I have met in history, the love of the child-queen, Isabella, for her grown-up consort, Richard II. And that there are many other instances of such devotion, I have no doubt.

Drusilla remained at the “Irving Institute” for nearly three years. With her love of knowledge and desire for improvement, her quick perception and retentive memory, her progress in education was both easy and rapid.

As yet she had not seen enough of the world to know herself by comparison with others, so there were some things in her school life that gently moved her wonder; first, in the study hours, to see that the pursuits which were pastime and delight to her, were labor and vexation to most of her classmates; and second, at the school parties, to which the younger brothers of the pupils were invited, to see girls of her own age actually engaged in flirtations with boys who were no older than themselves, and who seemed to her, to be children.

With the great religion, idolatry—call the passion what you will—that inspired her soul, she could not understand such silliness in her companions, and therefore, pretty and intelligent as she was, her reserve made her somewhat unpopular.

She wrote to Mr. Alexander every week, because he had requested her to do so and she had promised, and also because writing to him was the greatest pleasure she had in this world except receiving his letters.

She wrote to him regularly every week, as I said; and about once in two months, on an average, she got a letter from him; but she could not complain for his mother got one no oftener, and both made excuses for him; he had “so much to engage his attention,” they said.

At length, when he had been gone more than two years, the letters ceased, or seemed to cease, altogether. Several months passed, and nothing was heard of Mr. Alexander. His father opined that he had passed over into Africa, where post-offices were few, and mails doubtful, and hoped that he would soon return into a more civilized section of the world, from which he would write to his relations.

Old Mrs. Lyon grieved and complained. She was sure that he had been killed by the Arabs of the Desert, or sold into slavery by the Algerine pirates.

Drusilla pined in silence, or if she opened her mouth to speak upon the subject, it was to try to encourage her old friend, and herself also. She told Mrs. Lyon that Bedouin outrages and Barbary piracies were horrors belonging to the past. She showed her the modern map of Africa, and pointed out how few and far apart were the points from which letters could be sent home, and she sought to demonstrate that the absence of post-offices and mail routes was the all-sufficient cause of the silence of the traveller in Africa. Thus she succeeded in cheering the old lady; and whenever Mrs. Lyon felt more discouraged than usual, she always sought Drusilla to be comforted by her.

General Lyon thought as the judge thought, that Alexander being in Africa could not write home; and he wished as the judge did, that the wanderer might soon return to Europe, civilization, and post-offices.

Miss Anna never troubled her head about the matter. She was his promised wife, and so his mother hoped that he might write to her, if to no one else. And Mrs. Lyon often wrote to Anna, to ask if she had heard from Alick yet. And Anna always answered—“I have not had a letter from him for ages. He has forgotten me.” And Anna’s “wish was father to this thought.” And furthermore, she advised her correspondent not to be uneasy. Alick, she thought, would come back safe in time, no doubt.

People who are not anxious can be so rational!

But at length suspense was ended.

It was early in December. The judge and Mrs. Lyon were in their town house, looking forward to the annual Christmas visit of the general and Miss Lyon, when the old lady received a letter from her son. It was dated from Paris, and contained the joyful news that he had returned from Africa in perfect health and spirits, and was going over to Southampton to take the first steamer bound for New York; and that soon after they should get his letter they might expect him in person.

Mrs. Lyon, after reading this letter to her husband, and receiving his comment:

“Well, I told you so. I shall be glad when he is safe at home, though;” hurried off to the Irving Institute, to tell the joyful news to the only one from whom she would be sure of perfect sympathy, in this her great happiness.

She sent for Drusilla into the reception parlor, and told her all the news, and then read the letter to her.

The girl clung to her old friend and wept with delight.

“This letter came by the steamer that got into New York harbor on Wednesday. This is Friday, and there is another due this week! He may be in it!” said Mrs. Lyon.

“There is another due now, and he will be sure to be in it. Think, madam, the steamer that brought this letter should have been in last Saturday. The steamer that should have followed it in order must be at her pier now. We may expect Mr. Alexander by every train,” said Drusilla, as soon as she had recovered her composure.

“That is true! So we may! And, my dear child, you always say something to comfort or delight me! And you shall go home with me directly, so as to be there to welcome him when he arrives. There is nobody in the world he will be gladder to see. And this is Friday afternoon, and of course there are to be no lessons Saturday or Sunday, and so you can just as well as not go home with me and stay over until Monday. I will speak to the principal about it.”

And she rung the bell, and desired the parlor-maid who answered it to take her respects to Mrs. Irving, and say that she should be pleased to see her in the parlor.

“I told the judge to write to the general, and let him and Anna know that Alick was expected every day, so they might hasten their coming. But la! you know, my dear, these cross-country mails are so slow, it will be impossible for them to receive the letter in time to get here to welcome him on his first arrival. However, I know they will come as soon as ever they can. And I suppose we may prepare for a gay wedding soon. And no doubt you will be one of the bridesmaids. You are quite old enough—nearly thirteen, and I like the bridesmaids to be much younger than the brides.”

And so the delighted old lady twaddled on until the door opened, and Mrs. Irving entered the room.

Old Mrs. Lyon soon told her news and made her boon.

And the accomplished principal warmly congratulated her visitor, and graciously granted the request.

And Drusilla left the parlor to prepare for her ride, and in ten minutes returned, ready to accompany Mrs. Lyon home.

They reached the house in time for the old lady to hustle into the housekeeper’s room, and order sundry dishes of oysters, poultry, game, pastry, cakes and jellies added to the bill of fare for supper.

“For you know he may arrive by the nine o’clock train—that is the first one in,” said the old lady.

“Who may arrive, Madam?” inquired the housekeeper, who had not heard one word of the good news.

“My son, to be sure, you stupid woman—who else?” exclaimed Mrs. Lyon, delightedly. And then she poured forth the news of the letter she had received from him.

“Oh!” said Mrs. Sterling. And she turned and kissed her daughter, inquiring:

“How came you out of school?”

“Madame brought me home with her to welcome—my benefactor,” answered Drusilla, returning her mother’s kiss.

“Oh,” said the housekeeper a second time. “Well, I’m going to be very busy to get up all these dishes in time for supper, so don’t interrupt me.”

“Can I not help you?” asked Drusilla.

“No, you would only hinder me. I have no time to direct new hands now,” answered her mother.

“Come with me, Drusilla, my dear, and we will go and see that his rooms are opened and aired,” said the old lady, beckoning to her favorite.

They went up stairs together, attended by Mary, the colored housemaid. This girl herself could have done the duty well enough alone; or at most with the instruction of either Mrs. Lyon or Drusilla; but both chose to see to the work and make it a labor of love.

The handsome bed-chamber, with dressing-room and bath attached, was opened and aired. A fine fire of sea coal was lighted in the polished steel grate. His rich dressing gown was taken out from the sandal-wood chest into which it had been packed with sundry other garments he had left at home: and it was shaken well and hung over the resting chair beside the fire. His slippers were laid upon the rug. A complete and well-dried change of clothing was spread out upon the bed.

“For you see, my dear, his luggage may not be here for hours after he arrives; and he will want to change his dusty travelling suit for clean clothes as soon as possible, so as to be sweet and nice and comfortable for the evening,” said Mrs. Lyon, as she laid a couple of fresh, scented pocket-handkerchiefs beside his other personal equipments.

Then fine soap and fresh towels were laid upon his wash-stand. And the Bohemian glass bottles on his dressing-table were filled—one with Cologne water and the other with Macassar oil. Finally the wax candles each side the glass were lighted. And then, after a glance around to see that all was right, Mrs. Lyon called Drusilla and the housemaid to come after her, and left the apartment.

She passed to her own chamber and put on her best black moire antique dress, and her finest point lace cap and collar.

And then she went down into the drawing-room to wait for her son.

“And after all, we have no assurance that he will come to-night. We do not even know that the steamer is in, or if it is, that he is aboard,” sighed the aged mother impatiently.

“He will come to-night, Madam. In one hour he will be here. I feel sure that he will,” said Drusilla, cheerfully.

CHAPTER VIII.
FATAL LOVE.

Childhood’s lip and cheek

Mantling beneath its earnest brow of thought;

And in the flute-like voice murmuring low,

Is woman’s tenderness, how soon her woe!

Her lot is on thee, silent tears to weep,

And patient smiles to wear through painful hours,

And sumless riches from affection’s deep,

To pour on broken reeds—a wasted shower!

And to raise idols and to find them clay,

And to bewail that worship—therefore pray.—Hemans.

He came, even before be was expected. By some happy chance the train was in half an hour earlier than usual.

Old Mrs. Lyon had gone into the “study,” to have a chat with the judge.

Drusilla was alone in the drawing-room, when a cab dashed swiftly up to the street-door, the bell rang sharply, and was answered quickly; and there was a pleasant bustle of arrival in the hall, and Mr. Alexander burst into the drawing-room.

He looked not fatigued or travel-stained, but flushed and excited with exercise and anticipation.

With an irrepressible cry of joy, Drusilla sprung to meet him, and then suddenly recoiled, blushed and trembled between delight, timidity and embarrassment.

Alexander caught her hand, gazed in her face, and exclaimed:

“Why—Who are you? I ought to know. Your face seems familiar, and yet—Drusilla!” he suddenly cried, as he recognized and caught her up in his arms, and covered her face with kisses.

“Welcome! Oh, welcome!—I am so glad you have come at last!—I never was so happy in my life!” she tried to say, as she dropped her head upon his shoulder and wept with delight.

“And my child is the first one to welcome me!” said Alexander, sitting down on a sofa and drawing her upon his knee, where she sat, painfully embarrassed yet unwilling to move, lest she should wound his affection on this, the first day of his return.

“All are well?” he inquired.

“Quite well,” she answered.

“Ay, so the servant told me at the door. Where is my mother?”

“Just stepped from the room. I expect her back every instant.”

“Why, what a beautiful girl you are growing to be!” he said, looking down with earnest admiration at the long, black eye-lashes that, being cast down, shaded and softened the crimson cheeks.

“Come! look up at me; I wish to see if your eyes are changed. I never could decide whether they were gray or hazel. Let me see!” he said, putting his hand under her chin to lift her face.

She looked up with a quick and quickly withdrawn glance, and her cheeks deepened in their hue. She hated to sit on his knee, where years ago she had sat a hundred times, and she hated to hurt his feelings by leaving him; and she doubted whether she loved him now as well as she did then, and whether her love was not turning into something very much like distrust and dread; and she wondered why this should be so, and secretly blamed and disbelieved in herself.

“Am I so altered by travel that you don’t like to look at me?” he asked, smilingly.

“Oh no, sir, you are not altered, except to be—improved,” she forced herself to say, with courtesy.

They were interrupted.

“She is too great a girl for that sort of thing now, Mr. Alexander, if you please. Be so good as to put her down, sir.”

It was the voice of the housekeeper that spoke, as she entered the room.

“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Sterling,” said Alexander, laughing, and releasing his favorite; “but it is hard to realize that my little pet is growing up.”

“She is thirteen, sir,” curtly answered the housekeeper.

“Dear me! Is she so? Why I dandled her when she was a baby! What an old man I am growing to be, to be sure!”

“Not quite old enough to be her father, Mr. Alexander, and therefore too young to make a pet of her.”

“Come, now, this is a pretty way to welcome me home with a rebuke the first thing.”

“I am very glad to see you home, sir, however; and—Here is Mrs. Lyon!”

The housekeeper cut her speech short, as the old lady entered the room.

“Oh, my son! my son!” she cried, and fell sobbing for joy in his arms.

The housekeeper withdrew, taking her daughter with her, and leaving the mother and son alone together.

Arrived in her own room, Mrs. Sterling sat her daughter down before her, and began to lecture her.

Drusilla—she preached—must not allow Mr. Alexander to pet her and caress her now, as he had done before he went away. Drusilla was too great a girl now, for that sort of thing. Truly, she was not a woman yet; but she was growing into one, and so the familiarities that were quite innocent when she was a child, would be extremely improper now that she was almost a young woman. Such was the purport of the sermon.

Drusilla trembled excessively, and wept a little over this exordium. In her heart she agreed with it, but grieved over it.

It was just such a lecture as any prudent mother might have given her growing daughter under the circumstances. But Drusilla, while acquiescing in its propriety, was shocked by its plainness.

Their interview was interrupted by the voice of Mrs. Lyon, who came herself in search of her favorite.

“Where are you, Drusilla, my dear? Come and thank your benefactor for all that he has done for you, and show him how much you have profited by his kindness,” said the old lady, as she came in.

Blushing and embarrassed, the girl followed the lady to the drawing-room.

Mr. Alexander had changed his travelling suit for an evening dress, and was sitting talking to Judge Lyon about the voyage home.

Drusilla, at a sign from Mrs. Lyon, seated herself near the talkers.

“I want you to see how much your protegée has improved, Alick,” said Alick’s mother.

“Oh, I have seen, Madam,” answered Alexander with a smile.

“After supper I want her to sing and play for you. She has a wonderful proficiency in music,” said Mrs. Lyon.

“I shall be glad to have a specimen of her skill, mother,” said the young man, turning to his father, and taking up the thread of the broken conversation, in order to relieve Drusilla, who was embarrassed by all this notice.

What between her own half-consciousness and her mother’s severe lecture, Drusilla was perplexed and distressed. The great pleasure she had anticipated from the arrival of Alexander was mixed with strange pain—a pain not the less poignant because she could not understand it. To become the cold and formal stranger to him that her mother wished her to be, seemed impossible; while to continue the familiar child-pet that she had hitherto been to him was not to be thought of. If he had only been her brother, so that she might have had a right to his caresses, how happy she could have been, she dared to think.

But as it was, she could scarcely venture to glance at him, because each glance thrilled her soul with such strange, wild emotion, half delight, half dread. Ah, friends, she was a child of the sun, fervent, earnest, devoted in all her ardent soul. She was already, all unknown to herself, deeply and passionately attached to Alexander Lyon. The budding love of years had this evening burst into full bloom. And yet it was even more religion than love, and more worship than passion.

Supper was announced and every one arose.

“Come, Drusilla, you are the only young lady present,” said Alexander, taking her hand to lead her in to supper.

He felt that small hand flutter and throb within his own like the heart of a captured bird. He turned suddenly and looked at her. Her eyes were cast down, and her cheeks were crimson. He gazed on her for a moment in grave silence, and then slightly frowning, led her on into the dining room, and placed her in a chair at the table. He paid her all due attention at the supper, but with a certain reserve that he had never used with her before.

The evening meal was, notwithstanding this, a very happy one.

The judge chatted gaily with his restored son, encouraging him to talk of his wanderings in the old world.

The old lady listened with pleased attention, and only once in a while broke her silence to ask whether he had been presented to all the queens in Europe, and which was the most beautiful woman among them, or some such question as that.

Her son answered that he saw no woman in Europe prettier than some he found at home; and he glanced at Drusilla with a smile.

The girl beaming in the light of his countenance, and drinking in the music of his voice was intensely happy and—vaguely wretched.

When supper was over they went back into the drawing-room, and Mrs. Lyon made Drusilla sit down to the pianoforte and play and sing for Alexander.

He shrugged his shoulders at the proposition, but politely acquiesced and prepared to be bored. Alexander was a connoisseur in music, and he had heard the very best singers of the day. Consequently he had little patience with the crude efforts of young misses.

She, Drusilla, began with a very simple song—chosen in compliment to the newly-arrived son:

“Home again! home again! from a foreign shore,

And oh, it fills my soul with joy to meet my friends once more.”

At first her voice trembled slightly; but the tremor only added to its pathos; and as she went on it gained strength and volume. She sang with much feeling and expression. And Alexander was surprised, and pleased and profoundly affected.

“My child, you sing well; I tell you so, who have heard the best singers in the world. Your voice has reached the depths of my heart, Drusilla, and awakened it to a deeper consciousness of its joy in home-coming,” he whispered as she finished her song.

She bowed her head, partly in meek acknowledgment of this praise, and partly to conceal the blush that overspread her cheeks.

“Oh, that little song is very pretty and very appropriate, but it is nothing to what she can do. Sing Casta Diva, my dear,” said Mrs. Lyon.

Drusilla raised an imploring glance to the old lady’s face, but met with no reprieve there.

“Come, my dear! the Casta Diva!” she repeated.

With a deprecating look at Alexander the girl took down another volume of music, and turned to the selections from Norma. The piece chosen by Mrs. Lyon was a great trial to any immature and half-cultivated voice like Drusilla’s, however excellent the quality of that voice might naturally be; and Drusilla knew this, and thence her imploring and deprecating glances.

“You are too exacting, mother. She cannot sing that; I do not think any woman under thirty years old could, unless she had had a very remarkable and precocious experience,” said Alexander, laughing.

“Ay, you say that because you know nothing of the intuitions of genius. You must hear your protégée sing, and you will understand better,” said Mrs. Lyon.

Thus urged on, Drusilla began to sing. Her voice arose tremulously, as at first, like a young bird fluttering out of its nest, but then it soared and swelled, gaining power and volume, until it filled all the air with the music of that wild, impassioned, agonized, terrible invocation and appeal.

Certainly Drusilla had never known remorse, anguish or despair, yet all these wailed forth in her soul-thrilling tones.

She ceased, and dropped her head, exhausted, on her book.

Alexander made no comment, but took her hand and led her from the instrument, and then went and resolutely shut it down.

“There! what do you think of that?” demanded the old lady, triumphantly.

“I will tell you some other time,” said Alexander, and he took and lighted a bedroom candle, and put it into Drusilla’s hand, and said:

“Good night! go to bed, my child.”

Drusilla took the light and turned to the old lady, and held up her face for a kiss.

And Mrs. Lyon stooped and touched her lips, saying, with a smile:

“I suppose I may kiss you now.”

Alexander held the door open until the girl had passed out, and then he shut it after her and returned to his seat.