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Show iliipl. FROM THE DIARY OF INSPECTOR BYKSK3. By JULIAH HAWTHORNE, Author of "The Great Bank Robbery," "An ' American Penman," Etc. (Copyright by O. L Dunham, oml puhlLsiiad. throitRh special arrangement by the American Fresa Association with Cassell & Co,, New York aad LouUou.J C II A PTEE L i THE NOLENS. 1 A 1 F YOU couia put on the cap of invisibility in-visibility and sit for twenty-four hours in the private pri-vate room of Inspector In-spector Byrnes at police headquarters headquar-ters you would see many strange sights. Representatives Repre-sentatives of every grade of the community pas3 through those mysterious p o r - nd one of the subjects of his ttiit.'iiiu.i.n wasth fi.' .: ilit-of getting larger returns re-turns from i..., invested proiKTty. Among his acquaintance were n.uy nii'n whose trade was finance, and -tennis got in the habit of counseling with them upon financial matters. No doubt they gave him the best advice at their disposal; but when one begins to buy stocks, advice is of little use; and Mr. Nolen, after several ups and downs, oame down with somewhat some-what of a thump, to the extent of about a third part of his total possessions. At tliis juncture he proved his exceptional good sense and self control; for he never risked another dollar in speculation. Neither did he reveal the fact of his losses, which was at least prudent. Hut these virtues could not save him from being and feeling a good deal poorer than he was before. He owned the house h? lived in, and continued to live in if, but ho curtailed his expenses, and by strict economy contrived to render them less than his income. His sons would soon bo through college, and would then, it was to be supposed, take care of themselves. them-selves. It was for his daughter that he was saving, and he hoped to leave her at least a decent fortune after his death. But other misfortunes were in store for him. His oldest son, Jerrold Nolen. had graduated from college, and came to New York to study medicine, living, meanwhile, at his father's house. He was a young fellow of ability and agreeable agree-able manners, and was popular among his fellows. His father was proud of him, and treated him with partiality. It soon became apparent that Jerrold was rather inclined todissipation; hissociable nature had its detrimental side. This was the more unfortunate, inasmuch as he haU a tendency to heart disease, and was of an excitable temperament. As this matter will be dwelt on hereafter, it is enough to say here that Jerrold died under tragic circumstances in the second year of his medical studies. His death, besides bringing bitter grief to his father and mother, led to legal proceedings against a person supposed to have been instrumental instru-mental in compassing his destruction proceedings which led to no good results, re-sults, and involved a large expense. Mr. Nolen never recovered from the shock and disappointment of his eldest son's sudden end; and in little more than a year afterwards the morning papers contained con-tained respectful but brief notices of his decease. His will was admitted to probate; it devised twenty thousand dollars to his 6on Percy Nolen when the latter should come of age; the remainder was settled upon Mrs. Nolen, with certain provisos in the event of Pauline's marrying with her mother's approval. Percy's bequest was intended to start him in business, he having 6hown a tendency to take up mining engineering as a pursuit. He too was an intelligent boy, and left college col-lege in good standing as to scholarship, but his character resembled Jerrold's in its lack of firmness and persistent energy; en-ergy; while, unlike Jerrold, he was of a selfish disposition. After graduating and coming into possession of hi3 patrimony, patri-mony, he announced his intention of postponing for a while his professional studies and seeing a little of metropolitan metropoli-tan life. This made his mother anxious, rememlring the unhappy career of her older son, but she interpreted Percy's design de-sign in the manner most favorable to him, as simply a wish to become practically prac-tically familiar with the ways and manners man-ners of o-ood society. succeeds in his wish," he remarked aft-.-r a while. "Percy has a good deal of tin tamed blood in his composition, and he will probably work it off in his own fashion. His father gave him his money without conditions or restrictions, ho; ing that the sense of responsibility would sober him; but it will need more than that. He will spend it that is, throw it into the gutter and then we may look for the dawning of reason in him." "I am sure he is a good boy," said his mother. "He is only full of life and thoughtless." "There is no reason to suppose him actually vicious," the judge replied, "and, that being the case, we may expect that the want of money will bring him to terms. I do not look to see his father's son commit any act that will bring hin.i under the cognizance of the law; lie is, I tako it, incapable of any dishonesty; consequently, when he becomes bankrupt, bank-rupt, he must do one of three things: either he will sit down and starve like a gentleman, or ho will find some employment employ-ment that will give him a living, or he will come back to you, like his prodigal prototype in Holy Writ." "Percy starve! Oh, judge!" faltered Mrs. Nolen. "Do not be uneasy; Percy will not starve," returned he, with a slight flavor of irony in his tone. "He is not naturally natu-rally disposed to asceticism, nor has lis tho kind of pride that would prompt him rather to die than betray signs of human weakness. On the other hand he is clever and quick, and could easily pick up an honest livelihood in other ways than by pursuing his project of mining should he find it necessary to forego that. But my own anticipation is, my dear Mary, that he is too lazy, and that his habits of application, such as they were, have become too much broken up to make that course likely. What I do expect is that he will come back to you and ask you to provide for him." "That is all I ask!" Mrs. Nolen exclaimed, ex-claimed, "I have no doubt of it, my dear," answered an-swered the judge with a smile. " But in this connection thero is something that I wish to impress upon you very strongly. Do not, as you value his ultimate welfare, wel-fare, not to speak of your own, give him any money without first consulting me. If you fail to observe this precaution, depend de-pend upon it you will get into trouble. I know what young men are, and how they regard their mothers as just so much indulgent soft heartedness to be taken advantage of! No, it isn't cynicism; cynic-ism; it's tho truth; and so you will find it. Now, what Percy needs is the conviction con-viction that there is no choice for h 1 but to work. So long as he thinks that he can be supported without working ho will remain idle. It may be hard for you to refuse him, but unless you do you will only work him an ill turn. Yon are not a rich woman by any means. Bar-temus Bar-temus it is as well you should know it now lost a large part of his fortune by injudicious investments; and when you take out of that the sum secured to Pauline Pau-line as her dower a sum w hich, fortunately, fortu-nately, neither you nor she can touch for tliree years to come you will have left barely enough to live comfortably on. As for Percy's twenty thousand, we may look upon that as being as good as gone; it is only a question of time, and no very long time. Until it is gone it is no use attempting to influence him. So much for that! But now, my dear Mary," continued con-tinued the judge, changing his tone, "I wish to speak to you on another matter of no small moment to you, to myself and to Pauline!" possibility into consideration," he returned. re-turned. "Pauline is mature for her age; and it is not too much to say that sho is one of the most beautiful young women in New York. You take her a good deal into society; she can hardly fail to meet with admiration." "Yes, yes, you are right," said the mother. "Now tha you speak of it, I see that such a thing may happen. But she has spoken to me of no one, and I am sure she would have spoken if" "Do not trust too much to that," he interposed. "A young girl, with a mind as healthy and pure as hers, doe3 not readily ask herself if she be. in love; 'she may become so before she is aware of it, and only the avowal of her lover will open her eyes. Till then you cannot expect ex-pect her to speak of it to you. And then, if she have made up her mind, it would be too late to 6peak." "But would you advise me to question her? Might it not suggest to her something some-thing which she otherwise would not have thought off" "That is not improbable. But why not approach the matter from the other side? Is there no one among the young men who know her who have shown signs of any particular interest in her?" "They all seem to admire her," said Mrs. Nolen. "But I can think of no one in particular unless it be Percy's friend. Mr. Martin." "Valentine Martin the young Englishman?" Eng-lishman?" "Yes. Percy sometimes brings him here. But his being a friend of Percy makes a difference between him and the others." "How so?" "In the fact of his being here oftener. I mean, if it were not for that I should think his visits had some further significance." signifi-cance." "I am not altogether convinced that his being a friend of Percy would deprive de-prive hia visits of significance," said the judge. "It is conceivable, at any rate, that ha might hare made a friend of Percy in order to facilitate his access to Pauline." "He seemed a frank, straightforward young man, not one you would suspect of doing anything underhand." The judge laughed; a very low, pleasant pleas-ant laugh he had, which made those who heard it disposed at once to like him. "You are more like a nun, in your un-suspiciousness un-suspiciousness and unworldliness, than like a married woman who goes in New York society," said he. "Let me assure you, my dear, that a man in love is not to be held a criminal, or even a hypocrite, hypo-crite, if he uses some strategy to get near the object of his affection. I should forgive for-give Mr. Martin even if ho went so far as to pretend a cordiality for Percy that he did not really feel, if so he might induce in-duce Percy to admit him tothe intimacy of your household. No, if we are to take exceptions to him, it must be from another standpoint. What do you know about his personal history and his social standing in his own country?" "I suppose it must be good," said Mrs. Nolen. "I think he said that his family owned a large estate in Cumberland." "Is he the eldest son?" "The next to the eldest, I believe." "And what is his business in America?" Amer-ica?" "I don't know. But a great many English En-glish people come here nowadays, you know. It is a part of their education." "Yes; but some of them are pretty well educated before they get here," remarked re-marked the judge dryly, "and occasionally occasion-ally they manage to teach us something before they leave. There is in England the same difference between an eldest tals during the day. All sorts and conditions condi-tions of men. from the depraved pickpocket pick-pocket to the cultured millionaire; all varieties of the daughters of Eve, from the poor vulgar trull to the refined and lovely queen of society. Here meet youth and ago, virtue and vice, industry and idleness, wise and foolish, good and eviL Strange events are there brought to light; life histories, fantastic, tragic, comic, pathetic, romantic, crimes startling start-ling or sordid; human passions are there unfolded of every species love, hate, revenge, re-venge, avarice, self abnegation, ambition and despair, which is the death of all passion, good or bad. And what a gallery gal-lery of faces follow one another, in endless end-less succession, across the threshold beautiful, hideous, sorrowful, joyful, contented, con-tented, wretched, cultivated, degraded, spiritual, bestial. And all whocomehave some story to tell, some accusation to bring, some defense to oppose, some end to gain. Having said their say they disperse dis-perse again some to liberty, some to trial; some to death, some to victory; some to prisons, some to palaces. All tho contrasts of human existence, all its lights and shadows, appear in the inspec- tor's room, and disappear again, while you look on in your cap of invisibility. And there, at his desk, sits the inspector, in-spector, examining, weighing, deciding, investigating, advising, reproving, encouraging; en-couraging; cheerful or grave, as the case may be, even tempered, firm, suave, stern, penetrating, impenetrable; the depository de-pository of all secrets, the revealer of none; the man who is never hurried, yet never behindhand; never idle, yet never weary; always patient, and always prompt. No position under the municipal munici-pal government requires more tact than his, more energy, more courage, more experience. Ho must be pliant, yet immovable; im-movable; subtle, yet straightforward; keen, yet blunt He must know all the frailties of human nature, and yet be not too cynical to comprehend its goodness; he must be an advocate, and at the same time a judge. In short, he must be a chief of New York detectives; and, whatever what-ever else his office may be, it is certainly CHAPTER II. SUITORS. RS. NOLENS face, which had assumed an expression ex-pression of pen-siveand pen-siveand brooding sadness, brightened bright-ened at her daughter's name, and she looked up at the judgo with an expectant air. "Pauline is now eighteen years old," the latter observed. "As I look back, it seems impossible, but so it is. I re- son and the other sons that there is between be-tween a rich man and a pauper. By tho law of primogeniture the estates, and generally the bulk of the money, goes to the first boru; the other boys get positions, posi-tions, if they can, in the army, tho civil service or the church. They are seldom fitted to enter the learned professions, and it is not considered good form for a gentleman's son to go into trade. Of course the army and the church don't afford accommodation for all applicants, and the consequence is that every year a number of young Englishmen are thrown on the world, who by training and inclination inclina-tion are good for nothing but to be idle and. ornamental, and who nevertheless have no means for honestly leading such a life. They form a class of gentleman adventurers. They are men of agreeable manners and culture, talk well, look well, are excellent at cards and billiards, and live no one knows how. Some of them come over here for reasons known only to themselves; they are very pleas- no sinecure. Of the countless dramas and episodes that come to his knowledge, many cannot can-not be told again; and many, if told, would not be credited, so different from tho strangeness of fiction is the strangeness strange-ness of real life. On the other hand, not a few of these tales can bo repeated without with-out indiscretion, and, in all substantial respects, precisely as they actually came to pass. Such narratives havo one ad-Tantage ad-Tantage over the conceptions of the imagination, im-agination, that they are a record of facts, not fancies, and carry the authority and impressiveness of fact. But they also labor under a disadvantage which, perhaps, per-haps, more than balances the gain of reality; for facts are stubborn, and accommodate ac-commodate themselves but awkwardly to the rules of artistic construction and symmetry. Like rocks in a New England Eng-land farm, they ar continually cropping up where they are least wanted. And yet it will sometimes happen that nature 60 nearly accommodates herself loart that the story assumes a tolerable grace and proportion; and such a one is contained con-tained in the pages that follow. But, although the sequence and character of the events has been adhered to, the names of the persons are changed; for the affair took place but a short while since, and nearly all the actors in it are still alive, and several of them moving in the best society in New York. Mr. Bartemu3 Nolen was a representative representa-tive of a good New York family, and was possessed of comfortable means; by profession he was a lawyer. He was a-member a-member of the Episcopalian church, and he married, at the outset of his career, a lady of the tame persuasion, a woman of excellent education and gentle and benevolent disposition. The first twenty years of their married life passed happily hap-pily and prosperously; two sons were bom to them, and a few years later a Percy ' o.r-uiu! imposes may, indeed, have coiu.ii; k.ted no more than that; but that was far from being the limit of what he actually did. His advances towards to-wards the best society were neither considerable con-siderable nor prolonged. For a few months he went to dinners and receptions recep-tions and danced at balls, but it soon became be-came evident that ho was getting inti-mato inti-mato with a class of people who, by no stretch of courtesy, could be counted among the upper ten. These were chiefly young men who dressed well, had dash and assurance of manner and were commonly com-monly to be met with on fashionable thoroughfares, in tho corridors and billiard bil-liard rooms of the best hotels, on baseball base-ball grounds and race tracks, and, towards to-wards the small hours of the night, at certain restaurants and other places cf resort more remarkable for brilliance and liveliness than for respectability, in which the company ceased to bo exclusively ex-clusively masculine and was yet not improved im-proved by the alteration. Percy had his choice, and this was the class with which he chose more and more to associate. They were, as a class, not wealthy; nevertheless nev-ertheless to be with them was not necessarily neces-sarily to be economical; neither did it involve regular habits or early hours. Before long Percy was convinced that the sort of life he was leading was not compatible with making a home under his mother's roof; so he took bachelor rooms on the west eide of the city and went to bed and got up at what o'clock it best pleased him. He did not keep away from home altogether; he would drop in now and then, when nothing else was going on, sometimes to lunch, sometimes some-times to dinuer, sometimes to accompany his sister to the opera or theatre, but he bad cut loose from his mother's apron strings and showed no present signs of meaning to come back to them. He was living a fast life, and not the best kind of fast life either. member her as an infant lying in your arms; and it does not seem to me that I have changed much since then. And yet Pauline is a woman, and has more character char-acter and substance, too, than many a woman of twice her age. What miracles time works!" "She is the best girl in the world!" said the mother tenderly. "I am much inclined to agree wiUi you," responded the judge. "She is so strong, so clear sighted, so faithful and upright," pursued Mrs. Nolen. "And yet there is nothing cold or unsympathetic about her. When her emotions are touched, she seems all lire and spirit, lam sure no sister ever loved her brother, nor any daughter her mother, moth-er, as Pauline loves Percy and r.ie." "I can well believe it. And have you ever seen signs in her of another sort of love not that of the daughter or the sister?" sis-ter?" "Oh. I am afraid to think of that!" ro- ant acquaintances, but it is well not to trust them too far. They have no fixed place in tho world and no responsibility." "You don't mean that Mr. Martin is an adventurer?" demanded Mrs. Nolen, in a voice of faint consternation. "So far as 1 know he may be the best fellow in England. But I know nothing about him one way or the other. How did Percy become acquainted with him? ' "He me him somewhere at some club, I imagine." "That may be all right, or it may not. At all events, you will see that you should proceed with some circumspection. The rules that apply to our young men do not necessarily apply to foreigners. Mr. Martin may be much better educated, and have more polished and quiet manners, man-ners, than nine out of ten of your Amor- daughter, Pauline. Mr. Nolen achieved honor and eminence in his profession; the boys did well in school and afterward after-ward at college, and the daughter gave promise of singular intelligence and beauty a promise which was afterward fulfilled. But at length the current of luck took a turn, and began to set against the honest lawyer. He was affected with a cataract in one of his eyes, which had not proceeded far when the other also showed signs of being affected; this misfortune mis-fortune was a 6erious drawback to his practice, and finally compelled him to abandon it almost entirely. Of course, practice meant money, and the cessation from it diminution of income. There was still enough left, however, to live upon with comfort, if not luxuriously; but unfortunately Mr. Nolen, being deprived de-prived of Iris customary mental employ-blent, employ-blent, took to thinking of other thuiga' One of the executors of Mr. Bartenius Nolens will was Judge Odin Kctelle, a gentleman who had at one period been a partner of Nolen's, and had always remained re-mained on intimate and friendly terms with the family. Ho was a man of position po-sition and influence, and was quietly and steadily amassing a large fortune. Mrs. Nolen, in her anxiety about Percy, naturally nat-urally turned to this friend for counsel; and probably she could not have done better if she were to do anything. The judge heard her timid and fond complaints, com-plaints, in which she tried to shield the son whoso misdeeds sho was forced to expose. When she had finished ho sat with his hands folded on the table and his eyes under their thick eyebrows fixed in thoughtful contemplation a3 he had been wont to sit on the bench when considering con-sidering some point of law advanced by counsel. "If a boy wants to be a fool he mostly turned Mrs. Nolen, pressing her white hands nervously together. "It is so easy for a girl to make a mistake; and for her a mistake would be fatal!" "I think she has good sense enough not to fall into any serious error," 6aid the judge, "though 1 am no less persuaded per-suaded that, if she loved a man who in himself was worthy of her, she would allow no considerations of merely selfish prudence to prevent her union with him. But I was going to ask you," he added, with a certain subdued anxiety in his deep toned voice, "whether it has come to your knowledge whether you have I any reason to think that she has already met any one who whom she would be likely to prefer to anj one else?" "I have not thought of it it has not occurred to me." said Mrs. Nolen, with an accent of apprehension, looking at the judge with wide open eyes. "it is hardly too soon to take such a ican acquaintances; and yet it might bis better that Pauline should many the least attractive of the latter than Mr. Martin." "I wish you would seo him and find out whether he is nice," said Mrs. Nolen, with anxious earnestness. "I would willingly do so, but for one reason," tho judge replied, "and that is that the peculiar circumstances might disqualify me from forming an unbiased opinion." "Oh, I am not afraid of that. My husband hus-band used to say that there could be no one more impartial and just than you." "Even assuming that judgment of his to have been impartial, I should nevertheless never-theless be disqualified from presiding at a trial where, for instance, the prisoner was charged with the murder of some friend of my own." "I do not understand. Mr. Martin has surely not murdered any one?" turned into a large jewclrv shop ou tha ri.-ht. If. w.is as good a pi.-..-., another Ur an interview, r;n,l he fit a fcveri.ih desire de-sire to sm-v.'c t . Ii r. He followed her i ; i t the ami, as she came to a pause a! oiti t the counters, lie stood be-bide be-bide b.-r and ult.Tcd her name. CITAITRR V. A ".ATA1. M:rixo. HE shop was a very large one, and' was full of customers, for the holiday season sea-son was at hand, and the wealthier portion of the community wm presenting itself w i t h precious gifts. The cus-t cus-t o m e r were chiefly ladies, though there was -Bless me, no! I was only using an I extreme illustration, l'.ut Sfr. Martin might wish to obtain something which ! had set my own heart on possessing." There was a manifest embarrassment I in the. judge's manner. Sirs, Nolen looked puzzled. She began to suspect there was something behind all this, bat sho could not divine what it was. 'I began life pretty early, as you know," continued he, after a pause. "Since the age of 11, 1 believe, 1 have supported myself. Measuring my existence exist-ence by that standard, I might be called an old man. But though, in the matter of years, 1 am not exactly a boy, yet .1 am but 43 rears old, and you will admit, my dear, that men have been known to ' live a good deal longer than that." "I am suro you will live to bo twice 43," put in Mrs. Nolen kindly. "Half that is all I would ask, if 1 might realize the happiness that I hope for," returned the judge, with a faint smile. "And is this happiness anything that 1 can help to insure you?" "I can hardly say that. In fact, it is essential in one way that it should come, if come, at all, as freely and spontaneously spontane-ously asthe sunshine from heaven. Nevertheless, Nev-ertheless, I am under obligation to speak to you of my hopes, that you may appreciate ap-preciate my position and understand my conduct." Ho stopped, and the color mounted to his face. '"I love Pauline," he said, a strong, emotion vibrating in his voice. "I hope to make her love mo and to accept me for her husband." "Oh, judge!" exclaimed Mrs. Nolen, taken wholly by surprise. . She looked at him intently for a few moments, and then the startled look in her face softened, soft-ened, and she began to smile. She left her chair, and, coming to where he sat, put a hand upon his shoulder; and as ho looked up at her she bent down and kissed him upon the forehead. She was still smiling, but there were tears in her eyes. "Do you think me absurd?" said the judge. "I think you are right." was her reply. "At first I could not believe I had always al-ways looked up to you as to a sort of elder brother I could not imagine you as the husband' of my little daughter nay own son-in-law. lint I think you are right. Pauline is a little girl no longer; in almost everything but years she is older than I; she is fitted to be the wife of a man even so much older than herself as you are. No one of her own age would suit her as well." "Then you will not be against me?" he said, starting up. 'Indeed, I will not. All that I do shall ho done for you." She put her hands in his, and be grasped them warmly, "it is more than half selii.-hness in me," she added. "It would give me some rig! to relv on you. I should not feel so extended to him, seeming to prefer a less formal and regular life, lie made no pretense of largo wealth, but, on the other hand, ho never seemed to be ! cramped for means, and no one could lc found from whom he had borrowed money. If ha were a trifle mystei ions, nobody was concerned to fathom his mystery, for it was no one's interest to do so. Valentine Martin had not come to America to speculate, to organize a company, to raise capital, or to do any of those things that are apt to render engaging en-gaging foreigners suspicious in our eyci. He had apparently come to amuse himself him-self and mind his own affairs; and after a time he was permitted to follow this innocent inclination. The upper ten. whom he neglected, ceased to take an active interest in him, and those with whom he associated relinquished the vain effort to persuade him to reveal his secret, and came to the sensible conclusion conclu-sion that there was probably no secret to reveal. Tho acquaintance and subsequent friendship lxtween Martin and Percy Nolen had sprung up spontaneously, without any formal introduction. Thoy had tastes and ideas in common, and they mutually pleased one another. Martin's was perhaps tho stronger character, but Percy's was the hiore .enterprising and lively; so that they were upon fairly-even fairly-even terms. One day the Englishman accepted an invitation to come and take afternoon tea at tho Nolens'; he met Pauline on that occasion, and it was not afterwards necessary to urge him to repeat re-peat his visit. Pauline was interested in him as an Englishman, and after discussing discuss-ing his native country with him admitted ad-mitted him to a certain degree of friendship, friend-ship, partly on her brother's recommendation, recommen-dation, partly on his own account. Ilo seemed gloomy at times, and she was sorry for him, without knowing or even caring to inquiio what made her so. At other times he conversed in a manner that interested her and stimulated her to talk in return; and, though Pauline was but a girl, she had a mind that was worth coming in contact with. The Englishman English-man never made any direct demand upon her sympathies or emotions, and probably he gained rather than lost by j this forbearance. When a woman has insight she would rather exercise her intuitions in-tuitions than have things explained to her. Matters went on in this manner for several months, and the year's vacation which Percy had allowed himself was more than up. He had as yet shown no ; sign of being bankrupt, unless a certain I abstraction of manner at times, aceom-! aceom-! panied by a biting of his nails, anil a j drumming with his foot, might be con-; con-; sirued as symptoms of approaching im-! im-! pceuniosity. But another affair, not j connected with finance, was going on at ! this pei iod which, unless put an end to ; betimes, might result in trouble. morning he was careful not to u;;,e:. hi wile. That was tho style of the menage. But Cuthbert Tunstall was not a fool a fact which his wife perhaps failed to fully appreciate. As long as her conduct was above reproach, according to the somewhat vague standards of society, he would not interfere with her pleasures; but he was not tho man to permit the least step beyond this. And though he was naturally unsuspicious, and slow to wrath, any one who understood men would have known that it would be uncomfortable un-comfortable to arouse him. But Sylvia got the idea that sho could do exactly as 6he pleased, and she did it. One day Tunstall got a hint from some precious friend of his a very distant, indirect, ambiguous and innocent hint, but a hint all the same. He appeared not to understand it, and passed it over without comment; but the repressed emotion which it aroused was so strong that he came near fainting where ha stood. Ho attended to his business the same as usual, returned home at his customary hour and sat down to his solitary dinner. His wife was upstairs dressing. By and by she Came down to say good-by to him for the evening. She was beautifully dressed and was lovely to look upon. Cuthbert looked at her in Bilence. "Good night, dear," she said, drawing on her gloves. "I suppose you won't bo up when I come home." "Not if you come at your usual time." 'I wish you'd drop your horrid business busi-ness and come with me." "I am more useful as I am. Do you know a gentleman by the name of Percy Nolen?" "Percy Nolen? No ves I believe I do." These were her words, but her face and the tone of her voice betrayed her, and they both knew it. ' "He is an agreeable fellow, isn't he?' pursued the husband, quietly. "I suppose he is like the rest; all men are alike to me except you, of course, dear! But why do you ask?" "Some one who knows him happened to mention him today. Well, and what is going on to-night?" "Dine at Mrs. Murray's, and then the theatre." "Won't you want something to eat when you get home?" "Oh, no. Don't bother. I shan't bo hungry." "It might be better to order something to be ready for you here than to take supper at Delmonico's," he said slowly, looking her in the eyes. She turned away her eyes after a moment, mo-ment, ostensibly to pull up her cloak. "I had no idea of going to Delmonico's," 6he said, in a slightly strained voice. "Of courso not!" ho repeated; and then he turned tohis evening paper, and she went out, with a smile on her lips and fear in her heart. Her husband had given her warning, and he hoped against hoped .that it would be sufficient. He would not take the next step unless she compelled him to it; but he was resolved (and she partly felt it) that the next step would be final. How much he actually knew of her flirtation flir-tation with Percy she could of course only conjecture. She had taken supper with him in a private room of a fashionable fash-ionable restaurant the night before. They had not been alone; there had also been present another young married woman, and a young man not married. But the two couples had not been in each other's way; they had rather helped each other out. It was certainly not an affair which Sylvia would have wished to have generally gen-erally known least of all to be suspected by her husband. Did he know about it? or had his questions been only the result of chance? She wished to believe the latter, but she could not. After all, she did not seriously care for Percy Nolen. It had been a mere flirta- n rule; but .Mr. Shorthouse was under 6tood to be a religious writer, and she enjoyed his book very much without entirely en-tirely understanding it. Percy kissel her, and sat down in a chair opposite. After a little desultory conversation lie said, "Mother, I'm in a scrape!" Her heart sank; she closed her hook, and folded her hands upon it. "Oh, my Bon!" she said, falteringly. "Well, it's nothing so very dreadful," he returned, forcing a smile. "I was up at Monmouth Park the other day, and lost a little money well, it was a pretty-good pretty-good sum, for me. I'm not a Cner.us, you know, and a few thousand dollars makes a difference." "Monmouth Park? What is that?" "It's a track; they race horses there, ! you know." "Percy, have you been betting o.i horse races?" "Mercy, mother, it's no crime! All the fellows do it. I should look queer if I didn't chip in with the rest! Only this time I happened to get in pretty deep; and as all the favorites were beaten I got badly left." "Do you mean that you lost all the money you wagered?" "Every cent of it; you never saw such a run of bad luck in your life. The trouble was, I made up my mind to win anyhow; so each time I lost I put it all on the next race, so as to get back what was gone, and more into the bargain. It was as good as certain that I wouldn't lose every race, you see. So when it came to the last I had a big pile on; and it was voted a sure thing. I believe it was the jockey's fault, after all. Anyhow, he lost the race by a short head; and if I hadn't had a return ticket I'd have been obliged to walk home." "Ail your money gone! Why, my son, if you had invested it, you might have lived comfortably on the interest of it! And your father gave it to you to start you in your profession. What can you do?" "Well, mother, I must do tho best I can. I know it's all wrong, and I'm very sorry and all that. But it's no use crying for spilt milk. I'm in a hole and I've got to Ihs helped out of it somehow!" "I will speak to Judgo Ketelle and see what" "Wliatever you do, don't speak to Judge Ketelle! He can do no good, and would be certain to do a lot of mischief. What business is it of Judge Ketelle's anyway?" "He was appointed executor under the will and" "That is no concern of mine, mother! My interest in the will ceased when I got my patrimony. I have no further relations with the judge nor he with me. He has no right to help me, even if he wanted tot which he doesn't." "My son, he is the best friend I have, and whatever is for our good" "My dear mother, I tell you it won't do! I know what the judge would say, and after he had said it I would be no better off than I am now. I liave some pride, and I don't want all the world to know that I'm a beggar. I shouldn't think you would, either." "Percy, you know I wish nothing but your good, but" "Tho long and short of the matter is that unless I am to be disgraced I must have some money, and without any delay, de-lay, too. I owe a few bills they don't amount to much and I must have a little lit-tle to go on with. A thousand dollars would cover the whole thing. You can let me have it, can't you?" "A thousand dollars! But after that, Percy? You will be wanting money all the time, and this cannot go on forever." "It isn't going on forever. This is the first time I have ever asked you for a cent, mother, and it shall bo the last. Heaven knows it was hard enough to have to come to you at any rate; but I didn't expect you would make it harder by arguing about it!" isk of compromising herself. At the same time, had it been in her power to banish Percy forever by tho utterance of a single word, it is doubtful if she would have done it. She knew that, were Iter husband to discover any further correspondence corre-spondence between them, be would not hesitate to act decisively and finally, and tlie first result of that "action would be that she would find herself cast upon the world with a damaged reputation. Such a thing was not to be thought of. But the very peril of her position was an allurement al-lurement to linger in it; and then there was the excitement of knowing that a man was in love with her who had no business to be so, and who was willing to go all lengths for her. Moreover, she was angry as well as dismayed because her husband had spoken to her as he did (like all women, she interpreted what was said by what was meant), and found a pleasure in defying him in thought if not in deed. So, although she did not openly and explicitly encourage Percy, she allowed him to believe that he was not indifferent to her. Neither he nor she had committed any-actual any-actual sin, but they were on the road io do so. People always believe that they can pull up at the last moment, and are therefore willing to go on until the last moment is reached. But by that time events combine in an unforeseen manner and push them over the edge. Then they are astonished to find, themselves linked with the brotherhood of crime. And once that link is forged it defies all attempts to break it. It happened before long that Percy needed more money. He had less than two hundred dollars left, and he owed more than that. He did not wish to go to his mother again, partly from shame, partly Iwcause lie knew that, in order to raise the sum be needed, she would be obliged to sell some stock, and that would involveapplyingto Judge Ketelle. One night at a club he was asked to tal.. a hand at a game of poker with three others. He sat down and played with varying success for an hour or two. Then two of the quartet withdrew and he and the other kept on. Percy had faith in his luck, and had fortified himself with several whisky cocktails. His opponent was a quiet man, and seemed to bo in a dejected and timid frame of mind. The chips on the table represented a good deal of money, how much exactly Percy did not know; ho meant to win it all. Some good cards were dealt to him; he drew, and found himself in possession of a superb hand. He was quite certain that his adversary held no such cards, and he began to bet. His adversary was drawn into raising him; they continued to raise each other. Percy swallowed another cocktail, and felt that he could not lose. He acted upon this conviction and lost. Upon investigation, in-vestigation, it appeared that the quiet man bad won not only Percy's original stakes, but some nine hundred dollars into the bargain. Percy preserved a calm exterior, and wrote his I. O. U. for the amount, to be redeemed within twenty-four hours. Meanwhile, he was in a cold sweat of consternation, for he did not know how . he was to get the money. It was too large a sum to borrow from any of his acquaintances; those whom he knew well enough to approach on such a matter mat-ter were aware of his financial standing, and would not lend anything. There was nothing for it but to go to his mother. mo-ther. The money must be forthcoming. If he failed to pay, he would be dishon-ered. dishon-ered. Sylvia would hear of it. No! he must have the money at any cost. He went to bed, passed a very bad night, and after attempting to eat some breakfast he betook himself to his mother's moth-er's house. The nature of his errand was so apparent in his manner and appearance ap-pearance that she divined it at once. The interview that ensued was a very painful one to both parties. box toward her, she opened it. It contained con-tained a necklace of fine diamond, which had been selected some time before, be-fore, and set according to Mrs. Tunstali's directions. She examined them and expressed ex-pressed her approval. "It is twenly-li e hunched dollars, is it not?" she said. "Twenty-five hundred dollars." ro-peated ro-peated the salesman, softly. .She looked around for her muff, which Percy had just replaced on the counter. She slipped her hand in it and uttered an exclamation. Then she sent a quick glance over the counter and on tho floor. "I lave yo a seen it?" she said in a star lle.l tone. "I beg your pardon," said tho salesman, sales-man, blandly. Percy maintained a gloomy silence and an abstracted gaze. "My jKM'ket b:io'; and some money i.i bank notes. I had them in my uiutT,'' she exclaimed. "Have you" she went on, turning to Percy. .no looked at her uncomprehendingly. "What is it?" he demanded. "My purse and the money. Why, you had my muff just now. Didn't you" "Did I have your muff? I wasn't aware of it. I know nothing about it," said he, unconcernedly. "But I can't lose it; it must be found it was right there!" she exclaimed again. "It can't have disappeared into nothing!" "May I inquire if the sum was a large one?" put in the salesman, softly. "Why, yes! there were twenty -live-hundred dollars and some smaller iiotoj in the purse. I had brought it to pay for the necklace." By this time several persons ha.l collected, col-lected, drawn by theevident agitation of the handsome young lady: among Ihoi.i was a small, bright looking man. with an alert and confident manner. He subjected sub-jected Mrs. Tunstall and Percy to a keen but unobtrusive scrutiny. "Perhaps you put it in your pocket," Percy suggested, who, on hearing so large a sum mentioned, had begun t arouse himself from his curious apathy. She put her band in tho pocket of h. r dress and felt in it anxiously, then shook her head. "No," she said, "and, besides, I recollect recol-lect it all now distinctly. I put the money in my purse when I went out this moi ti-ing, ti-ing, and put the purse in my muff, as I always do. When I got here 1 took out the purse and took the notes from it" "Pardon me, madam," interposed tho bright looking man at this point; "I am connected with this establishment, and it is my dutyto investigate casesof iais:.i:i,; articles. Can you state what iva: the denomination de-nomination of the bills representing t!u sum of money twenty-five hundred dollars dol-lars I think you said?" "There were four bank notes." Mrs. Tunstall replied; "One of a thousand dollars, dol-lars, and three of five hundred each." "Thank you," said the man, making a note on some tablets in his hand. "Do you recollect the numbers of the notes or the banks they belonged to?" She shook her head. "I didn't look," she said. "You took these notes out of your purse, you say" "I took them out so as to have them ready. I was a little nervous alxmt carrying car-rying so much money, and I thought if I should lose the purse I would have tho money separate. But now it is all gone!" "After taking the notes out of your purse, what did you do with them?" pursued pur-sued the bright looking man. "I held them in my hand in my muff; in this hand.' indicating her left. Then, just as I came up to the counter, this gentleman spoke to me." "This gentleman is a friend of yours?" Mrs. Tunstall hesitated and colored. "I am acquainted with him slightly acquainted ac-quainted with him," she said at length. "Will you Oblige me with your name, sir?" said the other, turning to Percy. . "I don't know what my name has got to do with it!" returned Percy, rather brusquely. "Who are you?" The man turned back the lapel of hi3 coat and showed the badgeof the Central Detective bureau. "I am attending to my business, sir," he said, "and as you were in this lady's company at the time the loss occurred you will bo needed as a witness, if for no other purpose!" He pronounced the last words in a peculiar tone, which caused Percy to turn upon him sharply. "What do you mean by that?" he demanded. de-manded. "I mean, sir, that it is proper for me to make a note of your name," the detective detec-tive replied. "I have no power at present pres-ent to make you give it, however." "Oh, I have no objection," Percy returned, re-turned, carelessly. "Here is my card," and he handed it to the other, who read it, nodded and slipped it into his pocket. "Now, madam, what did you do after this gentleman spoke to you?" "I answered him." "Did you still hold the money in your hand?" "No," she said, after a moment's thoujht. "I took my hand . out of the muff and left it lying there on the counter." coun-ter." "Were tha purse and the money still in it?" . "Yes." "Where was he standing?-" "He was facing me, on this side." "So your back was turned on your muff?" "For a minute or two yes. " "Did any ono approach you during that time?" "Not that I remember. Of course,,... some one might have come up behind without my knowing of it." "What did you do next?" "I think the salesman came up then and I spoke to him about the necklace. He wentff to get it." "And you continued your conversation conversa-tion with tliis gentleman?" "Yes." . "Was ho in the same position as be- s ' fore?" "No yes I don't remember!" She had suddenly become embarrassed and the color flew into her cheeks again. She glanced at Percy with a frightened look. There was a short pause. "Doet your memory serve you on that lonely." 'However this may turn out, always know that you may rely on me," the judge returned, with deep feeling. "Our friendship began long ago, Mary, and doesn't need any other tie to bind it. If Pauline, when the question is put before her, decides against me and I am fully aware how easily that may lie her verdictI ver-dictI shall accept it like a man, and you will remember that, so far as I am concerned, it will involve not the slightest slight-est change in ;ny devotion to you and yours. I shall leave no honorable means untried to win her; but, above all things, I desire to avoid forcing her inclination, either by any act of my own, or through you. That you should approve of rny purpose is all I ask. Leave the re: t to Providence, and to her." "I understand," said Mrs. Nolen, "and, indeed, if I wished to help you, I should not do it by singing your praises to her. You being what you are, the best thing to do is to leave her to find you out for There was a young married woman in New York society named Mrs. Cuthbert Tunstall. Her husband, also young, bad inherited from his father an immense business in coal. Cuthbert Tunstall was fond of activity, and he plunged into his coal with hearty good will, intent upon creating a fortune twice as largo as that which his father had left him. As a matter of course, and of necessity, he was absent all day at his office, and was often obliged to run down to the mines to oversee things there in person. His wife was the daughter of an aristocratic aris-tocratic Knickerbocker family; she had leen a reigning belle in her coming out year, and the year following the match between her and Tunstall had been made. She liked her husband, because he was a good fellow, because he was in love with j her and becauso he was considered a big ! catch; but sho cared nothing for coal, and was jealous of his devotion to it. j She wanted him to be devoted to her and to nobody else. She hated to think ! of him working actually working all also a fair sprinkling of the other sex. 'I here were also the salesmen and the walkers, and perhaps a few other persons per-sons whose office was not to promote sales but to prevent appropriations of stock by individuals who had not gone through the formality of paying for it. Yet it seemed impossible that, among such a midtirnie, the eyes of a detective should be able to fix upon tho malefactors, malefac-tors, and nevertheless a successful theft was a very uncommon occurrence in the great jewelry shop. When Mrs. Tunstall heard her name, she turned with a start, and her vivid but pretty face paled. "Don't stay,'' she said in a low voice; "do go! what is the use of running any risks?" "I have as good a right as anybody to be here," Percy replied. "If we both happen to be here at the same time, what of that?" "What is tho matter? You look quite ill!" she said. At this moment a salesman, having dispatched dis-patched an adjoining customer, presented pre-sented himself before her with a "What can I do for you, madam?" She handed him a card and said, "I have called about that necklace; it was to have been ready this morning." The man took the card, bowed and hurried off. She turned again to Percy. Her mutf was in her left hand, and as she turned she laid it upon the glass counter, on the side furthest away from him. His sudden appearance had evidently disconcerted her. He met her look and thought how charming she was. She was dressed in fine, black velvet trimmed with soft furs, and wore a wonderful bonnet, adorned with birds' feathers and sparkling points: a delicate silken veil was bound around it. Her oval face, with its bright eyes, small straight nose and rather full lips, was perfectly pretty; and now the blood, which had been driven from her cheeks for a moment, came ebbing back beneath the transparent skin. She was lovely, luxurious and rich; those diamonds in her ears would have paid all his debts, and he believed that she would relieve his necessities in a moment had she known of them. But how impossible it was to tell her! How inaccessible she was, though he could have thrown hi3 arms around her as she stood there! He felt a helpless rage an impulse to seize upon her and make off with her bodily. If he only had had money money, and plenty of it there was nothing so wild that he would iyi havo ventured to propose pro-pose it to her. it a power money was in this world! , All this time he stood gazing at her and saying not a word. "What is the matter with you, Percy?" she repeated. "What makes you look so? You are making everybody notice us. Are you" She hesitated. "I am sober, if that's what you mean," he said. "If we were alone I would show you what is the matter with me! Good God ! Is there no place in the world where we can be aloha together for half an hour?" Some one touched him on the arm. He turned savagely. It was only a gentleman gen-tleman who begged his pardon. He had left a cane standing against the counter; it was not there; he apologized and went off. Percy came round to the other side of Sylvia and leaned on the counter, taking tak-ing her muff in his hands. "I can't stand this," he resumed. "I never see you at all now. 1 have as much right to see you as any of your acquaintances. You keep out of my way I" "If you would be content to see me as my other acquaintances do but you know perfectly well how dangerous it is. And you could not have chosen a worse place than t lis." She bent forward and added in a whisper, "I expect Mr. Tunstall Tun-stall may come in at any moment. He knew I was coming here this morning about the necklace, and said something about intending to try and meet me. Do go! It will only make it more difficult hereafter." "It cannot be more difficult than it is already," replied Percy sullenly. "I should like to meet him and have it out with him, if he wants to say anything! What is there he can say, for that matter? mat-ter? He has no business to interfere." "Y'ou don't know him!" "He doesn't know me, if ha thinks 1 care for him! Why should we mind? If the. worst comes to theworst.it would only throw us together I am ready for it are you?" "Percy, you are crazy! How can you talk so! You w ill make me wish, never to see you again. Nothing of that sort is possible. 1 never thought of such a thing." "Such things have been thought of, and they are possible. You are not happy as you are now, Sylvia, and you know it.. Why not let society and respectability go to the devil, where they belong, and enjoy en-joy life in our own way? There are other places in the world besides New York or America." "Here is the necklace! Mrs. Tunstall," said the voice of the salesman. He w as standing on the opposite side of the counter, coun-ter, with tha box in his hands. She was thankful for the interruption, for she was becoming seriously alarmed at Percy's manner; and, drawing the herself." "If Mr. Martin bo my rival," resumed tho judge, "let him have bis chance and defeat me if he can. If he be the belter man it will appear; and God forbid that I should make her my wife knowing that ehe would have been happier with another. an-other. But if love go for anything. I love her well, and in all my lil'eshe is tho first and only woman I have loved." "Y'ou might have rival.-, more danger ous than Mr. Martin," returned the mother, with another smile, and so the interview came to a close. CHAPTER III. IIK. CUTHBERT TUNSTALL. tion for pastime. She had not supposed that her husband would care much, even if he knew, no had not of late betrayed any very passionate affection for her. If he loved her, why did ho not accompany her on her social rounds? It was ridiculous ridicu-lous to say that ho was obliged to attend to his business. They had plenty of money without any business. There was nothing except his own obstinacy to pro-vent pro-vent him from retiring to-morrow and never going near his office again. But if ho preferred his business to his wife, why could he not allow his wife her preferences? It was unjust and tyrannical. tyran-nical. Nevertheless, if he was determined to be ugly about it, of course there must be no scandal. She would tell Percy, the next time she saw him, that the acquaintance ac-quaintance must cease. It was not worth while to run any risks on his account-Having account-Having made up her mind to this, she was more at ease. After the second act at the theatre, Percy Nolen came into her box. She greeted him coldly, but he sat down beside be-side her, and began to make various propositions. pro-positions. She repulsed him, but not very vigorously. At last she whispered: "You must really be more careful! People Peo-ple are beginning to observe us. If anything any-thing should happen, I would never for-givo for-givo you!" "I will take every precaution, but I love you!" he replied in her ear. He had never said so much before, and 6he turned pale and gave him a look. The curtain went up on tho next act, showing how the hero, by a combination of circumstances, was arrested and taken to police headquarters. CHAPTER IV. NEEDS MUST. ' nrui( bcapuci t b c m -e 1 e f 1 li tor: but. for the time beuiL'. thev seemed to to ll 1 c ii IVrcv Nolen i i in t i 1 1 brilliant career, and attained u certain nst motion mo-tion among the persons uuli whom he associated. associ-ated. He wa-i a day long. He came home to dinner, it was true; but he was not fond of dining out, and when dinner was over, he was tired, and liked to stay quietly at home and go to bed at half past 10. Such an existence as this was the next thing to unendurable to a woman like Sylvia Tunstall. Forty years hence, perhaps, this Darby and Joan kjnd of life might be practicable; but not now, in the flush of youth, variety and curiosity I She absolutely ab-solutely would not stand it! Tunstall was a manly, straightforward, single hearted fellow, and at first he did not com prebend his wife's attitude. He i had homely idfas of married life, and i tho routine of social dissipation was ! without attractions for him. When at 1 t be learnt how matters stood, he : thought it over, and came to the conclusion conclu-sion that bis wife had much reason on her side. She was young, good looking and full of the wine of life, and it was 1 only natural and proper in her to wish to and to be seen. So he bpgan by attempting at-tempting to "go out" with her; but he presently discovered that going to bed at '2 o'clock in the morning was not compatible com-patible with having breakfast at half- past 7. He then tried giving dinners twice a week and a reception once a : month; but Sylvia pointed out to him that tho customs of good society demanded de-manded that they should accept invitations invita-tions as well as give them; so that his : second state bade fair to be even worse than bis first. What was' to be done? lie would not consent to give up his busi-: busi-: ncss; on that point he was firm. Sylvia was equally convinced that it was impossible im-possible to give up society. For a time there threatened to be a deadlock. Finally a compromise was effected i Sylvia had relations and particular friends who were in society, and of j whose escort and countenance she could avail herself. Her husband could take ' her to places and her relatives or ! friends could bring her home again, lty ' degrees it was found unnecessary to have I him take her, and she both went and returned re-turned without him. His anticipations of domestic felicity were disappointed; but Sylvia was enjoying herself, and he always looked forward to a time when she would weary of gayety and return to him. He loved her as much as ever, and wan proud of her social popularity; bo bad perfect faith in her truth and honor. He ate his dinner and went to bed ok e, and when he rose in tha "My dearest boy, you might have all I possess, so far as I am concerned" "Who else is cSncerned except you? a thousand dollars isn't going to ruin you, mother, but it is ruin to me if I don't get it. And don't fear I shall be coming to you again. I am going to stop the kind of a life I have been living the last year and turn over a new leaf. I have several opportunities to get positions in the city, and 1 am going to set to work at once and find out what will be the best thing. As soon as I am in a place where I can turn around I shall put in my spare time studying up my mining, and before another an-other year is out I shall be ready to accept ac-cept an engagement. I can support myself my-self as well as the next man and make a fortune, too! But I don't suppose you want to see me miss all that for tho sake of a paltry thousand dollars?" The end of it was that Mrs. Nolen gave him a thousand dollars. She trie:) to make him promise that he would come and live under her own roof, but he put her off with a temporizing reply, alleging, alleg-ing, in no very logical vein, that he did not wish to make himself a burden to her, but when he got "fixed"' so that he could pay her for his board and lodging he would come with pleasure. The request indicated that getting fixed was an operation that required time. The fact was that Percy paid sums on account to his most pressing creditors, including the proprietor of his lodgings, and went on living much as before; to salve his conscience he did make some inquiries about work, but not in such a manner as to secure practicable answers. One subject possessed his mind, and that was Mrs. Tunstall. It was impossible for him to live with his mother while that affair was going on. His infatuation wa3 intensified by Sylvia's timidity and reluctance. re-luctance. A man's brains count for nothing in such a matter. Percy lived in the desire of the moment; he gave no thought to the inevitable consequences. If he might see her today, or to-morrow, no matter about the day after, and no matter that the meeting was fraught with danger both to her and to him. The difference between a good desire and an evil one generally is that tha former is sane and the latter has more or less of insanity. Sylvia's heart was not engaged if she could be said to have a heart and it was clear la hit mini that sue must run no Mrs. Nolen had not got the money, and could not get it for a week at least. She convinced her son by documentary evidence evi-dence that such was the case. It might be possible to borrow from Judge Ketelle; there was no other way. These were facts which no arguments or entreaties could alter. Mrs. Nolen was terribly agitated by the revelation of her son's incorrigible perversity, and her tears and anguish put him in almost a suicidal frame of mind. It seemed to him that if he could only escape from this predicament predica-ment he would never allow himself to get caught again. But there was no escape, except through the judge, and that was almost as bad as no escape at all. The judge, even if he agreed to the loan, was not the man to spare Percy a plain and severe statement of the reprehensibility of his behavior. The young man writhed in anticipation of this rebuke. He knew he deserved it, but it would not be easier to endure on that account. Under ordinary ordi-nary circumstances be might rebel and answer back; but it would not do to fight with a man whom he was begging money of. He had always been proud of his pride; now that pride was going to suffer a fatal- humiliation. Only one thing could be worse, and that was to inform his opponent of the night before that he could not pay him. Percy wished that he had never been born, and then he wished that he were dead. The first wish being impracticable, and the second one that he did not care to put into practice, he left his mother's house in an unenviable frame of mind, and turned his steps in the direction of Judge Ketelle's office. He felt gloomy and desperate. He could understand how men, heretofore respectable, were induced in-duced to become thieves or robbers. Had he been a bank cashier, he felt that he was in a mood to rob the safe and depart for Canada; or if he had been alone on a dark road with a wealthy old gentleman, gentle-man, he could have taken him by the throat and gone through his pockets. But he was on Fifth avenue, in broad daylight, and these short methods of reimbursing re-imbursing himself were not available. He struck into Broadway, and presently, pres-ently, about a block in advance, he caught sight of a graceful female figure that he knew, walking in the 6ame direction di-rection with himself. It was Sylvia Tunstall. He hastened his 6teps; but just before he came up with her she big. handsome youth, with broad sli.u.l- ders and sturdy limbs, a clever U..-.e.,.. good whip, a fair billiard player; his spirits were exuberant, ami he bad .:ore mental resources and ideas tb.oi .a-vouchsafed .a-vouchsafed to the generality ot oun.; gentlemen of his kind. Thus 1ic,,miii.. .I, to some extent, the position of a leadei among them; and, as be was uniformly good natured and yet not to be imposed upon, he was liked and not laughed at. But his favorite companion and friend was Valentine Martin. The two men were nearly tho same age, Martin being A little the elder, and were a good deal .alike in size and personal appearance. Martin, being English, wore side whiskers, whisk-ers, and Percy, being American, wore a mustache. Martin was inclined to be fair and Percy to be dark; but they might have been taken to be brothers. The Englishman, however, was of a somewhat gloomier temperament than the American; "more reticent and more given to moods and inequalities of temper. tem-per. He had brought with him several good lcttersof introduction and had duly deUvered them, but he had availed himself him-self but sparingly of the social courtesies nil LTDGE KETELLE'S KETEL-LE'S pro p h e c y was delayed; but ' it, came true ut last; and Mrs. Nolen did not keep her promise to him. One morning Percy cameto the house, and came up to his mother's boudoir, w here she was sitting reading Mr. Shorthouse's romance ro-mance of "John Inelesant." Mrs. I Nolen was not given to reading fiction aa VAL ilAKIIN. HILE these untoward un-toward events were occurring at the jewelry shop and the police-office, police-office, an affair of a different nature na-ture was being transacted at the house of Mrs. Nolen. A couple of weeks had passed since Valentine Martin had called on Mis. Nolen and her daugh- poiut, sir?" inquired the detective, turning turn-ing to Percy. "I have uo particular recollection." he replied; "but I know that when the salesman came back with the necklace this lady was between nie and the door and I had her muff in my hands.'' "That agrees with my own impression," impres-sion," said the detective, dryly. "I hap tiened to be looking at you at the time bid vou notice whether there was anything any-thing in the muff at the time you were holding it?" "There was nothing in it. f put my hands inside, and if there had been anything any-thing there I would have felt it." "When you first spoke to the lady you were between her and the door. Afterwards, you went round to the other side of her. I want to be sure I have the details all right, you know. What was the occasion of your changing 'round?" "I don't know. I wasn't thinking of what I was doing. While she was talking talk-ing with the salesman I had nothing to occupy mej I didn't even remember that I touched the muff until you asked me." The detective glanced over his tablets, and said, slowly: "The question is, how to reconcile the two facts: that the muff had the purse and money in it when you first spoke to the lady, and a few moments mo-ments afterwards, when you had hold of it, it was empty." "I don't pretend to account for it; that Is your business, I suppose," Percy replied. re-plied. "Of course, if the money was there, somebody must have taken it out." "Yes, sir, somebody must have taken it out," the detective repeated, fixing his eyes upon the young man. "Well, you don't mean to accuse me of It," I suppose," rejoined Percy, with a laugh. "I am not accusing anybody at present, pres-ent, sir. What does the lady think?" "Oh, of course, that is impossible!" said Mrs. Tunstall, looking much distressed. dis-tressed. At tins moment a gentleman entered the shop, glanced this way and that until he saw Mrs. Tunstall, and then came straight toward her. As he approached Percy recognized him; it was Cuthbert Tunstall. The two men bowed politely - und coldly. CHAPTER VI. THE END OF AN DtTRIOGK. "I came in here to pay for the necklace, neck-lace, you know," she said. "I know. If you have paid for it, I am ready to escort you home unless you have some engagement with this gentleman." "Oh, I have- do engagement. Mr. Nolen happened to come in and find me here. But" "Then perhaps Mr. Nolen will excuse us." "But, I have just found I have mislaid mis-laid my pocketbook." "Left it at home?" "No, I have lost it since I came in here." "Do you mean it has been stolen from you?' "It seems to have been. I can't account ac-count for it." "If you will step this way, madam and gentlemen." put in the detective, "we can talk over the matter in private. There is a parlor at the back, where wi shall not be disturbed. You understand sir," he added, addressing Tunstall, "thr time is of importance in such thing and the sooner we can take measures i capture the thief, the better chance ther is to recover the bank notes." "Let us go in, by all means," said Tun stall. "But in what manner is Mi Nolen concerned?" "I was here when the robbery wa committed if there was a robbery," said Percy, "and, according to this detective, de-tective, my assistance is necessary." The deteojjva- pushed a wayR rough the crowd that had collected, an cned the others to the a part of the building, where there was a small room, with chairs and a table. Into this room were admitted Mr. and Mrs. Tunstall, Percy and the salesman. "Now, tlteii," said the detective, shutting shut-ting the door, and taking up a position with his back toward it, "plain words don't break any bones, and the best thing we can do is to clear away whatever what-ever may look puzzling. Here's the way' the case stands: Mrs. Tunstall comes into the shop with her hands in her muff, and four bank notes to the amount of two thousand five hundred dollars were inside, together with the purse. She comes up to the counter, and this , gentleman," pointing to Nolen, "conies in right after her, and speaks to her While she is talking with him, she lays her muff, with the money and the purse in it, on the counter, and turns her back on it. After a while, along comes the salesman, and while she is speaking to him this gentleman goes round the other side and takes up her muff, and turns it in his hands, as it were. A minute afterwards after-wards she takes the muff from him, and finds that the money and the purse are gone. The gentleman says he had his hands in the muff, and that it was empty. That's how the case stands. Now, I want to know if the gentleman has anything any-thing mere to say." And lie looked at Nolen. "I have told all I know about it," replied re-plied Percy steadily. "I found the muff empty, and if Mrs. Tunstall had not I been so positive that the purse and the j money were in it I should say she must i have been mistaken. The bank notes might have fallen on the ground and net I been noticed, but the purse would have been heard to drop." "May I ask, then, what your theory is?' inquired Tunstall, courteously. "I hare pone," he answered shortly. 0 '.'And what is yours, Sylvia?" her husband hus-band continued.' 'Tin sure I don't know what to think." she said In a faltering voice. The eyes of Tunstall- and the detective fixed themselves upon Percy in silence. He reddened as he returned the gaze, but whether with anger or with some other emotion it was impossible to determine. "Well," he broke out at length, "it seems to me that I stand in the position of a suspected person. I can hardly believe," be-lieve," he added, in a hoarser voice, "that I can be seriously charged with picking a lady's pocket especially a lady with whom I am acquainted." He paused; no one spoke. "Well, then," he went on, angrily, "I will say that I repudiate l!;o charge, and I will hold to account Whoever Who-ever has the face to make it. I mean you, sir!" he said, with a fierce look at Tunstall. "Have you anything to say to it?" "So far as I am aware," said Tunstall, coolly, "the only person who has spoken of charging you with the theft is yourself. your-self. I was not present, and can only judge from hearsay. But I will say this, Mr, Nolen: if I were in your place, I should wish to vindicate my innocence in some other way than by asserting it. I should begin by asking this detectivo to search my pockets." "Do you dare to say you want me to be searched?" cried Nolen, his face flushing flush-ing red, while he advanced a step toward the other, with a threatening gesture. "That is what an honest man would wish to have done," replied the other, not flinching. "Come, come," said the detective, stepping step-ping between them, "we don't want any hard words here, gentlemen. But I'm bound to tell you, Mr. Nolen, that Mr. Tunstall is right. There's no disgrace in being searched, that I know of; and it would be worth more than a lot of loud talking." y Percy stood uncertain for a moment; then he stripped off his overcoat, and tossed it to tho detective. "Do as you like," said he. "You have your duty to perform, I suppose. I will settle with Mr. Tunstall afterwards." The detective put his hand into ono of the side pockets of the overcoat, then into the other. "Heres something, at any rate," he remarked; and with the words he drew out a lady's purse. Percy uttered a cry, as of utter astonishment aston-ishment and dismay, and stared at the pocket book like a man bewildered. "Is that yours, Sylvia?" inquired her husband quietly, taking the purse and handing it to her. She took it mechanically and opened it. "It is mine," she said, under her breath. "Are the notes in it?" demanded the detective. - - She shook her head. "They are not in the overcoat," the detective de-tective added. "We shall have to pursue pur-sue our examination a little further, Mr. Nolen," he said in a grave tone. "I don't understand I have nothing to say there seems to have been some plot against me," said Percy, in a dazed manner. "I desire to have the thing cleared up mare than any one else can. I wish to be taken to the station and examined." ex-amined." "That's the best sense you've talked yet," answered the other approvingly. "Call a couple of hacks, Ferris," he said to the salesman, "and we'll start at once. You charge this man on suspicion of the robbery?" he added, turning to Mrs. Tunstall. Tun-stall. ' She was standing with- her eyes cast down and her hands hanging folded before be-fore her, leaning against the table. She was in a delicate position, and she knew it. If she sided with Percy, it would be tantamount to a defiance of her husband a defiance which he would never forgive for-give and would fight out to the bitter end. It would mean for her loss of social position and consequent exile and obscurity, obscur-ity, of, if not obscurity, a kind of prominence prom-inence that no one would envy her. If, on the other hand, she took sides with her husband, it would afford the strongest strong-est possible indication, in his eyes, of her virtuous and wifely conduct and rebuke of the suspicions he had entertained against her. Moreover, the evidence against Percy was very "strong and plausible. It might be misleading and in the bottom of her heart she did not believe him guilty but, in case it should turn out that he had yielded to some sudden temptation, it would beawkward, to 6ay the least, to have compromised herself for a felon. Had she loved -him, indeed, there might have been a tragic pleasure in sacrificing herself; but it was now revealed to her that the only love in the matter was a love, not of Percy, but of excitement The excitement had run itself out, and was succeeded by a desire to get out of the scrape by the shortest route. But did she feel no remorse at abandoning her lover at the moment of his greatest need? No; tho feminine conscience con-science is not so easily caught. It was with a glow of conscious virtue and connubial con-nubial rectitude that she lifted her pretty face, and addressing her husband, said: "Well, I suppose he must have done it. I don't see who else could have. Yes, I will make the complaint, though it will be very disagreeable to appear in court among a lot of criminals!" She just glanced at Percy asshe turned away, perhaps to see how he would take it. His eyes were fixed upon her with an expression of half incredulous curiosity; but the next moment he threw back his head and burst into a loud laugh. She shrank a little at that sound, and edged toward the door; and this was the lovers' parting scene. Such was the train of events that brought a young gentleman who might have made a good and respectable figure in the world to the office of Inspector Byrnes at Jtelice headquarters. The inspector in-spector listened to the story, contemplating contemplat-ing the prisoner and his accusers dreamily dream-ily in the meanwhile; and after it was told he sat for a while absently making lines on the blotting pad in front of him with the point of a paper knife. Finally. he. looked up and briefly requested re-quested that every one should withdraw except Mrs. Tunstall and Percy Nolen. When the three werealone together he regarded Mrs. Tunst.il pensively and said: "How long have you known the prisoner?" pris-oner?" "Oh, a year or more." "Has your husband approved of the acquaintance?" "How do you mean, sir?" inquired the iady, with a blush. "You know what I mean, I think." "I don't think my husband has ever liked Mr. Nolen," she replied, uneasily. "Considered him rather detrimental, I uppose?" "Well, suppose so" "Were the prisoner and your husband at any time intimately known to each other?" "They knew each other scarcely at all." "And yet your husband considered him detrimental? . There ought to have been some reason for that! Are you prepared to state to me, Mrs. Tunstall, in Percy Nolen's presence, that your husband's hus-band's ill opinion of him was in no way connected with what he knew or suspected sus-pected of Percy Nolen's relations with you?" The question was put so sternly and gravely that Mrs. Tunstall was unable to maintain the composure of her countenance. counte-nance. She stammered and hesitated, and looked first one way and then another. an-other. Was it possible that the inspector, in some incomprehensible manner, had become acquainted with the truth? "He I never asked him the reason of his opinion," she faltered at length. "There are many ways of getting rid of a man when he ceases to be convenient conven-ient and becomes objectionable," continued con-tinued the inspector. "Are you ready to stand before me and take your oath that you honestly and truly believe this man guilty of stealing your pocket book? Remember, Mrs. Tunstall, your answer may be the means of condemning an innocent in-nocent man to irrevocable ruin!" But she had gone too far to withdraw; selfishness and cowardice alike forbade it. Yet it was not without an inward struggle that left her pale and trembling that she said desperately, "Yes, I believe be-lieve he stole it!" and then, "The evidence evi-dence shows it it is not I!" "That is for neither you nor me to determine, de-termine, Mrs. Tunstall," returned the inspector, rising. "I will not detain you any longer now; you will be informed when your sworn testimony will be required re-quired hereafter." And Mrs. Tunstall went out. The inspector resumed his seat, and addressed himself to the prisoner. "I was willing," he said, "for the sake of your family and friends, to give you every chance to which you were entitled. You had every advantage of training and education; but you have lived a foolish fool-ish and useless life, and this is the result of it. You were in need of money in immediate im-mediate and pressing need of it; you had tried every way you knew to get it; you found those bank notes in your hand this morning, and you were unable to resist the temptation to take them. From a gentleman you became what you are now!" "Inspector Byrnes," said Percy, firmly but apathetically, "I did not commit that crime. I have lived a bad and useless life, and no doubt I deserve to suffer for it; but 1 honestly believe that no temptation tempta-tion would have induced me Jo do such a thing as that. I am obliged to you for suggesting to Mrs. Tunstall that she would reconsider her accusation; but it will be no satisfaction to me to escape in any such way. If I cannot prove my innocence, inno-cence, I may as well be in jail as anywhere any-where else." "Innocent men are very seldom convicted," con-victed," said the inspector impassively. "The facts are against you. No one but you is known to have been near the mulT after Mrs. Tunstall laid it down. You admit having had it in your hands; the pocket book was found in your pocket. It is true that the bank notes were not found; but the presence of a confederate would account for that. It is for you to judge whether or not your plea should be guilty." "I am innocent, and that's the end of it," said Percy. "1 don't expect to prove it. The evidence is all the other way. Somebody must have taken the purse out of the mutf and put it in my pocket; as for the notes, I know nothing. Vou say I may have had a confederate. If he was near enough to take the notes from me, he was near enough to rob the muff; and if he could do that, it would remain to be proved that he was my confederate, con-federate, or that I knew anything about him. But all that would he in my favor is guess work, and all that's against me is fact; so it's a bad look out!" "Undoubtedly it is," assented the in-pector in-pector quietly. "There was only one niinute when a thief could have taken the money and left the purse in your pocket; and that was when you were talking to Mrs. Tunstall and her back was turned towards the muff. If any one had been near enough to put the purse in your pocket, you could ha'rdly expect a jury to believe that you would not have noticed him." Percy maintained a gloomy silence for a moment; then his expression suddenly lightened and he exclaimed, "Now'that I think of it, some one did touch me on . the arm, and when I turned round he asked me if his cane was standing against the counter. Perhaps he was the man!" "Can you describe him?" asked the inspector in-spector indifferently. Percy shook his head. "He had a dark mustache, I believe; he might have been under 30, but I hardly looked at him. I doubt if I should know him again." The inspector stroked his mustache. "That will hardly do," said he. "You have no defense at all. The best advice I can give you is to make a clean breast of it. Such a defense as that is worse than nothing." "Probably you are riht; but I am in-locent, in-locent, and I will never say the contrary," con-trary," replied the prisoner with a sigh. "So far as I am concerned, I don't care much what becomes of me. I owe money I can't pay, and there are other things. I am sorry for my mother and sister; but I never was much good to them; and Judge Ketelle will look after them, I hope." "Is Judge Ketelle a friend of yours?" "Ho was my father's partner, and is the executor of his will." "Do you wish to send for him? There will be the question of bail to consider, as well as other matters." "I suppose that will be the best thing I can do; I thank you for suggesting it, inspector." "Don't trouble yourself to thank me until you find out whether there is occasion oc-casion for it," returned the chief detective detec-tive coldly. He touched a bell, made a sign to the officer who entered, and Percy was led out. 1 "That boy never took that money," he Baid to himself, when he was alone. "Such fellows as he don't steal, least of all from the woman they're in love with. As for her!" the inspector's face grew very stern, and he brought his hand down heavily on the table. "She is sacrificing him to pull wool over her husband's eyes. Either Nolen's suggestion is the true one, or else she invented the story to get rid of him. It's a bad lookout; but let's see if we can't straighten it out!" CHAPTER VH. ter, so tltat his appearance there that day had something of the charm of novelty. nov-elty. Mrs. Nolen, however, was too much upset by her interview with Percy to be able to extend the visitor a welcome, and that duty therefore devolved upon Pauline. The latter, it may be observed, had not been informed of her brother's pecuniary troubles, and only knew that her mother was for some reason greatly distressed. She came down stairs and found Valentine in the library. Judge Ketelle liad pronounced Pauline a beautiful girl; and beauty was her most noticeable external quality; but it as not her chief claim to distinction among those who knew her. She was finely organized or-ganized and trained in mind as well as body, and possessed a charm separate from any physical attraction. It was not that she was a learned young woman; she never embarrassed any one by revealing re-vealing the presence of more information than might reasonably be supposed to belong to her; but there was in her expression ex-pression a spirit and understanding that promised whatever was delightful in mental scenery and tone. Her temperament tempera-ment was calm and equable because it was deep and healthy; it could not bo aroused save for adequate cause, but when aroused it would clothe itself in power. This wide and vigorous nature would go on ripening and enriching itself long after ordinary people dry up and dwindle away. Pauline could not be measured or assigned her definite and fixed place in human nature, ner sympathies sym-pathies were broad, and what she might do or be depended rather upon the demands de-mands made upon her than upon any limitations in herself. The young Englishman, after the first conventional thing3 were said, did not appear to be in a loquacious mood. He replied in monosyllables to Pauline's observations, ob-servations, but his eyes kept returning to fix themselves upon her with an expression ex-pression of somber thouglitf ulness. "Are you getting tired of America?" she asked him at length. "I have enjoyed some of it, very much," he replied. "I wish I had known, years ago, what I should find when I came here." "Would you have come sooner?" "It isn't that; but I should have left undone some things that I have done in the past. A fellow is generally a fool in the beginning. He gets sense after a while, but the things the fool did remain re-main worse luck!" "If they did not, you would never grow wise." "What is the use of wisdom, if it only makes a man curse himself for having been not wise?" "What do you expect wisdom to bring you?'' 3 ELL, Sylvia," said her husband, "have you transacted trans-acted your business?". busi-ness?". She had been standing with her back toward him as he approached; at the sound of his voice she gave a Vtart and faced him. Her face expressed alarm, agitation and something of defiance. de-fiance. Tunstall, on the contrary, was quiet, cold and slightly contemptuous in hi9 bearing. It was certainly unfortunate that he should have come upon her and Percy together. For months'-past she had taken every precaution to avoid such a mishap, and now it had occurred, nor had any advantage accrued as between her and Prcy, but quite the.re-' "Did yon leave the rest of your logary ft iU; Jlr. Urowii?" "Yes; and you were quite i-i-lit. !l was on the voyage out from i,oudu:i. There wa it woman on board. Uh'.n wert-aclied Napier I married Iter secretly. Rrown was tliu only man who ever knew it. It was not a wise afTair, Miss Kolcn. bhe is living; she will outlive me. 1 know I should have to toll you, and I've done it!" CHAPTER VIII. A REVELATION. to the judge, In an undertone, and Ire gavellmt gentleman a look, the si;,'t;i:i entice of wlu'ch lie understood. He dr. out his watch. "Tho court will sit within an I.,. i .' ho remarked. "I must y.i ba-.-k to -di -liead.-iuarters to be on band with bail, il you care to accompany me. Mr. Jlartir. I should be glad of your society I '-inline, I will leave the task of opening the matter to your mother to you. Von iil know how best to manage it; 1 should avoid appearing to attach very serious weight to it, and yel it won t do to altogether alto-gether make light of it, cither. You may expect to see Percy in the course of a couple of hours or ao.H "Good-by till then," said Pauline, rising ris-ing and giving him her hand. Then site turned to Martin and added in a lower tone, whilo the judge walked towards the door, "1 should not feel so safe if it were not for you." CHAPTER IX. BAIL. F you have a wife why do you not live with her?" Pauline asked, her calm black eyes dilating a little as she turned them on Valentine. "I'm not entirely en-tirely a free agent in the matter. We were mistaken mistak-en in each other that's the long nnd short of it. She captivated ' :i lie cei-Miii lo collie tun. now that I e iliiite is .nine into the nevspaiers." 'What is 11,:,!?" "My ivl.it ions with Mrs. Tunstall. My in. . -Iter wi'l li.-ur of tint, and that U a thin; I c.tn't d.-nv. 1 l.ive mv mother, and I k:i ..Vi.!ie loven me; but she could ti..".vr m.-ike any allowance on such a subjv-i-t. It would br? a useless (.ain to I ml 1 1 of tii tn attempt to discuss it, and I am not aoin- to put myself in the way of it. No. 1 can't agree with you, judge," he added, as tlio judge seemed about to make a rejoinder: "I have been through as much as 1 can stand for tho present, and any thing more would break me down. Say to mutli.'r that I will see her by and by, but not now." The judge saw that the young man was obstinate, and felt that his sensitiveness sensitive-ness was, under the circumstances, not discreditable, lie further reflected that, in the cours? of a day or two, he would probably be more disposed to modify Ids resolution. Accordingly, he relinquished for the present tho attempt to persuadi him, and having ascertained that ho would take up his quarters with Martin pending further movements, he bade him farewell, little thinking how long a time would elapse before they met again. Percy and Valentine betook themselves to the latter's rooms at once, and, having hav-ing ensconced themselves there, Martin poured out some whisky, offered his friend a cigar, and after they had smoked for a while, said: "How much do you owe here, outside of your gambling debt?" "Not more than three hundred dollars." dol-lars." "Thirteen hundred dollars debts, and your bail fifteen hundred. Two thousand eight hundred altogether. I have over seven thousand dollars. What do you say to my settling all your liabilities tomorrow, to-morrow, and taking you with me to Australia?" CHAPTER X. PAULINE. AVE you any knowledge about this, Mrs. Tun-stall?" Tun-stall?" inquired the judge, when he and Martin were in the street together. "It's a nasty com pi i cation," replied the Eng-I Eng-I i sit man. "1 fancy Percy has been making a fool of himself younger son, your p.eferences are not j consulted; and it is not in human nature ; lo enjoy hav ing even a good thing crammed dou n your throat. Howovcr, I will sav i'ur nr." governor he was Sir llem.ikcr Mania, of Uerwent Hall, near Kisw ie-k, Cumberland that he did very fairly by me, as a whole. To begin with, he laid the foundation of my future discontent dis-content by giving me what is called a liberal ediK-at-on lha Eton and Oxford business, you know. I distinguished myself in both places." "Not for scholarship?" "Since you will have it, no; but for running up debts. Tho trouble with me was, I was too good a fellow. I was the most popular fellow in Eton, at the time I left it; I had documentary evideuce of that." "lXicumentary?" "Yes. When a boy leaves Eton, tho fellows who liked him each give him a book something swell, you know, bound in calf, and all that, such as ho will be sure not to spoil by reading it too much. Well. I got a hundred and eighty of those 'leaving books,' as they call 'em." "A popular library!" "Yes, and all gone now, like the popularity. popu-larity. It was the same way at Oxford, only bigger bills and less innocence. But the governor paid up like a man, antt then got me a clerkship in the foreign office. of-fice. If he had made me chief secretary of foreign affairs, I might have buckled, down to business; but the clerkship only made bad worse. Easy hours, light work. Of course I went out into society, head over ears. No end of friends lots of popularity! You never saw such a clever, good looking, good humored chap as I was. I had no time to waste in my office; my chiefs began to growl; at last father called me up, told me I was no good and that he was tired paying for it; gave me two thousand pounds and ait outfit anil packed meoff to New Zealaud. It was to be sink or swim, as luck mighu have it. but no more life preservers from the old gentleman!" "Were you popular there, too?" "It's every man for himself there. I w-ent to Napier Hawke's Bay the best sheep farming country in the colony. There 1 r.tn across a chap I had known at Eton, Cartwright Brown his name was; he had ii station (that's what they call a ranc!) out there), Matapiro, on the banks of the Ngararoro river. Well, CartwTi.'rhi initiated me into the mysteries myster-ies of sheep farming, docking, tailing, and all the rest of it. Very different from Mayfair and Piccadilly, I can tell "Was there no society out there?" "Very entertaining society in Napier, i and plenty of it. Oh, yes,, there are women everyw-here," said Valentine; and he w as ileiH for a time, and seemed to lose himself in revery. "There was a neighber of Brown's, Hector Pope, between be-tween us and Napier; I invested my money in his ranch, and got to spending a good deal of my time there and at the chib in town. I didn't scrimp myself much; I kept a couple of race horses and played unlimited loo at the club; my sheep and my other investments had to take care of themselves. You can imagine whai the end would be, without with-out my telling you." "Mr. Martin," said Pauline, "you have j left out something! You would not have gor.e on in that way if you had not had some experience that influenced you." He raised his head and looked at her; after a moment she added,' "I don't mean that you should tell it. You lost your money, you were saying?" "All but fifty pounds, and a heap of clothes. I packed the clothes iu my trunks, forty of the fifty pounds I handed to Brown to employ as events might require; re-quire; and I was just on the point of shipping for Australia when a Maori outbreak in the Taupo district was reported. re-ported. I camo to tho conclusion that I was probably born to be shot; so I entered en-tered thq service as full private iu the Armed Constabulary. Y'ou have heard of the Iri-h Constabulary. This was something cf the samo sort. "I enjoyed that campaign more than anything in New Zealand. The Maoris are splendid chaps for a fight. Y'ou have your Indian wars hero; hut you should see those fellows! Well, one day we had to attack a hill which the Maoris were posted, it was about the shape of a beehive, bee-hive, and covered with trees; it was called Niho o te Kiore, which means Hat's Tooth. That tooth gnawed a big hole in our regiment. The Maoris had never put. The two had been so taken up with what was passing between them that they had not noticed the sound of the door bell or the tread of a heavy foot upon tho hall floor. But at the moment Valentine was about to speak, perhaps, with the effect of changing all their lives, the door was thrown open, and Judge Ketelle abruptly walked into the room. He stopped short on seeing the two, and there was an instant of silent embarrassment; em-barrassment; but the judge evidently had something on his mind too serious to be postponed for conventional formalities. formal-ities. "My dear girl," lie said to Pauline, Pau-line, "you will excuse my blundering in here, for it is probably better that 1 should have met you before seeing your mother. Y'ou will know better than I how to carry my message. " "Have you bad news, Judge Ketelle?" "Painful no, no, not the worst! your brother is perfectly well; he has suffered no physical injury whatever." He paused and turned to Valentine. "I think this is Mr. Martin?" he said. "Yes; can I be of any use?" "I believe you are a friend of Percy's! Well, I dare say you could bo of some consolation to him. He has got into a scrape a matter in which he is not in the least to blame, however that is, at all events regarding the main point at issue. It is a misfortune, but it will be set right; but meanwhile Mis. Nolen must be brought to a knowledge of it with all the tact possible. Indeed, if it were not one of those things that are certain to get into the papers, and pri -hap3 to become for a time the subject of idle gossip, it would ba best to say nolh-ing nolh-ing to her at all." "I am waiting to hear what tho trouble trou-ble is," said Pauline, in a voice entirely calm, though her great black eyes shone with unusual brilliance. "You needn't hesitate to tell me anything." "It is annoying that is. the most and least that can be said of it. Percy is now at police headquarters, my dear. He will be bailed out as soon as a magistrate can be got to hear the case; and I cams up here in the interval." "Oh! been punching somebody's head, has he?" said the Englishman, in a tone of relief. "Where was he last night?" "Why, he was hero this morning a few hours ago," said Pauline. "He had a private talk with mother. Ha was not'' "He was entirely himself," put in the judge. This is one of those pieces of bad luck which may occur to any man. The circumstances were such as to suggest sug-gest the hypothesis though upon entirely en-tirely inadequate grounds, in my opinion that Percy had been guilty of an infringement in-fringement of the law. You w ill smile when you hear it; but the absurdity of the thing does not render it less annoying annoy-ing for the moment. He happened to be in a jewelry store when a lady missed her pocket book. It was supposed that it had been stolen" "And Percy was accused of taking it!" said Pauline, iu a low voice. "In default of any other plausible object ob-ject of suspicion, the detective pitched upon him and he was taken to the station." "That is too preposterous, to do hitn any harm," Martin remarked. "If it had not been so bad, it would have been a great deal worse." "When the lady knows who he is, she will refuse to prosecute him," said Pauline. Pau-line. "So I should have supposed," returned the judge. "But it appears that there was already some acquaintance between them; and Percy was in conversation with her at the time the loss was discovered." dis-covered." "Who is she?" demanded Pauline, turning turn-ing very pale. "Her name is Tunstall, 1 believe the wife of one of our coal barons." "Tunstall Mrs. Cuthbert Tunstall," repeated Pauline. "I think I have mt her yes I have met her. She is a pretty woman fashionable. And she accuses Percy of having robbed her?" The judge moved his head silently. Martin, at the mention of the lady's name, had changed countenance slightly. "She must be hi3 enemy," said Pauline, Pau-line, setting her grave lips together. "No woman who knew Percy would have done that except from a wish to ruin him. She knows he is not guilty." " Was Mr. Tunstall with his wife?" inquired in-quired Martin of the judge. "Ho came in the midst of the affair. II E q uest ion staggered Percy for a moment. "I didn't know you were going to Australia," he said. "To Australia, or Mexico, or South America, or the North Pole; it don't make much difference where. But I am going, and I'm going to morrow. And I want you to come with ma. me as women will sometimes captivate men when circumstances are favorable, and a long sea voyage is a very favorable circumstance. Then, for her part, she expected certain advantages from the marriage which it was not in my power to provide for her. It was a mutual misunderstanding. After the explanation, explana-tion, she went her way and left me to go mine. She did not ask my consent, and I did not enforce my authority. But whatever I have she has a right to share; and whatever cannot be shared I have no right to have." "I am sorry for you," said Pauline, in a tone that conveyed more than many assurances. "There's no help for it," returned Valentino, with an assumption of indifference, indif-ference, "not even in the law." "You mean you cannot be divorced?" "She will not consent to it." "Why not?" "Because 'she happens to know that my eldest brother is in delicate health, and thai nothing stands betn een me and a fortune except his life. But let us talk of sometliing else. I am thinking of leaving town." "In the midst of the season?" "The seasons are pretty much alike to me. Besides, New York will not be a pleasant residence for me any longer." "Has New Y'ork changed, or have you?" "The change is in my relations with you, Miss Nolen," said Valentine, leaning forward with his elbow3 on his kriee3. "I can't come beta any more. As long as I could keep up my false pretenses as long as you did not know me to be a married man I could take advantage of your ignorance. But I have committed hari-kari, so far as that is concerned, and it's time I disappeared." "It is not keeping any false pretenses to be silent about your past life." "Not in the abstract, perhaps; but in this case it is." "Why, Mr. Martin?" "May I tell you? Y'ou won't be offended?" of-fended?" But without waiting for her answer, and as if fearing that it might be unfavorable, he added, hurriedly: "I have no right, being a married man, to feel tow aids you as I do. At first I didn't care. When I first saw you I knew it would be better for myself to keep out of your way; but then I thought that it could make no difference to you you would never know what I felt for you and that I might as well endure the pain for the sake of enjoying the pleasure. But 6ince then my feeling lias changed. You are not the kind of woman who ought to be the object of the love of a man in my position, even though you were not aw are of it, and though as I am able honestly to say I would rather have died than attempt any act of deception towards you. I had never known before what love was; there is a sort of sacrilege sacri-lege in my hanging around you, as I have been doing, not daring to show myself my-self to you as I am. Two weeks ago I made up my mind never to see you again. But I couldn't stand going off without letting y ou know all about it. So here I am, Miss Nolen, for the last time. I can look you in the face now and say good-by. good-by. And it won't hurt you to shake hands with me." The changing tones, the passion, the "What is llw evidence vou speal: ol :' ; iskcd Martin. "He has been short of money f,u : -,-. time past." sid the in p. -i tor. -The ;. is reason to think that !; borrowed a : -:- , i of money sever,.! weeks :t-;.i. !!'i'v. i : , i the last two days hi n.v.i. hci-aiiie -..t.. j pressing. He incurred a debt ol nea.h a tlk.usand dollars at play last idbi. j The money has to lie repaid this cvc-tiM j. umlur pain of social exposure, lie was I unable to borrow again, and il made his '' situation very trying. When a man in that condition suddenly find two or three thousand dollars in his hands, and remembers re-members that they belong to a woman whom he has every reason to tliink will not betray him well, when a skillful lawyer tells that story to a jury, it w ould not be surprising if it makes soma impression im-pression on them." "You dou't take any stock in such rubbish yoursnif, inspector," observed Martin, with a laugh. The inspector, lifted his eyebrows. "1 ' should be very apt to take the same view of the case that the judge and jury do-after do-after 1 know what it is," he returned, quietly; and that was all that could be got out of him. They now descended to the basement and were conducted to the imprisoned Percy. He was much more composed than they had expected to find him. In fact, he had experienced 6uch intense and varied emotion during the last few hours that no matter for discomposure was left in hitn. Martin's presence seemed to gratify him. Ho asked the judge about his mother and sister, and received his somewhat rose colored account ac-count of their condition with apparent indifference. "But you will be able to judge of them for yourself at dinner," the judge added, kindly. "You mean when I am out on bail:" "Certainly; that will be in a couple of hours from now." Are you going to furnish bail, Judge Ketelle?" "Undoubtedly I am. Who has a better bet-ter claim to stand by your father's son?" Percy was silent a moment. "Have you ever believed that I might possibly have committed this crime?" he asked at length. "No such idea has ever entered'my head. I am surprised you should ask me such a question," said the judge, with an emphasis that indicated that he was a little hurt by the insinuation. Percy took a long breath, and as he looked up his face betrayed signs of a feeling that he had not hitherto betrayed. be-trayed. "You are a good man," he said in a husky voice. "I wish I had had the sense to trust you long ago. I was afraid you would pitch into me, and the fact that I deserved it made it all the mere difficult to face it. I don't know whether you have heard that I borrowed a thousand dollars from my mother two months ago. She wanted to consult you, but I wouldn't let her. This morning I went to her again; but she didn't have anything, and there wa3 nothing for it but to apply to you. I wa3 on my wa y your office when this thing occurred. If I had not happened to see her" He He broke oS and altered his phrase "if things had not taken the turn they did I should long since have received your blowing up and the money, paid my debt, and but it turned out otherwise." "Who is the man to whom you lost the money?" inquired Martin. "His name is Henry Cotton," answered Percy. "You know him." "To be sure; und he is a friend of Tun-stall's," Tun-stall's," returned Martin, thoughtfully. "Upon my word, the luck is against you. Will you answer me one question?" "If I can." "You can, and we are among friends. Are you cured of a certain lady?" . Percy laughed, and that laugh of bitter bit-ter resentment and humiliation was a more convincing answer than any words could have framed. It put all doubts to rest. "Ah!" ejaculated Martin, with an expression ex-pression of satisfaction, "then it will be all right!" At that moment an officer came with the information that the court was ready to decide the question of bail, and the whole party proceeded to the court room. The transactions there were brief and not particularly complicated. Mrs. Tunstall's lawyers professed to consider the case an especially grave one, and requested re-quested that bail be fixed at the full amount permitted by law. Counsel on the other side maintained that the charge against Mr. Nolen was a preposterous one, and demanded that he be allowed go on his own recognizance. The court, after due deliberation, declared that the facts against the prisoner, though not conclusive, were sufficient to warrant a prima facie evidence of guilt, and required re-quired bail to be furnished to the amount of fifteen hundred dollars. Judge Ketelle Ke-telle immediately qualified for that sum, the bonds were signed, and the prisoner left the court with his friends. "And now," said the judge cheerfully, "the worst is over. Let us get into a hack, Percy, and drive up to the house. Your mother and sister will be anxious to see you." "I am much obliged to you, judge, for all you have done for me," replied tho young man; "I wish I had known you sooner and better. But this affair is not-over not-over yet, and it may end differently from what we hope. Until the trial, at all events, I must remain a suspected man, and I cant go to my mother's house with that suspicion hanging over me. When I have been publicly acknowledged to be an honest man I will go to my mother and sister, but not till then." "My dear boy," said tho judge kindly, "you are a little off your balance after all this trouble, and you naturally take a morbid view. I assure you you have no fieed to feel sore about the matter. I Oied not tell you that you will find nothing noth-ing but love and confidence awaiting yoa at home, and that there can bo no other place in the world where you can hope to find them to anything like the same degree. de-gree. On the other hand, your mother and Pauline could not fail to feel hurt if you did not appear." "That is all very true, judge," Percy answered, "but there's something else that yu haven't considered, and which about her. There was no actual harm done, you understand; but there was some nonsense and imprudence, and Tunstall, somehow or other, got wind of it. Percy has been in a state of mind lately, but I didn't expect the woman would behave in this way. I suppose she had tho alternative of turning against her husband or against Percy, and finding find-ing that the strongest battalions were on her husband's side, she very prudently and with much propriety sided with him. But what is Percy's defense?" "He denies the charge," the Judge answered; an-swered; "bet he has no theory as to how the thing happened." "What is the theory of the prosecution prosecu-tion as to the disappearance of the bank notes?" "They assume that Percy must have passed them to a confederate." "Was anybody resembling a confederate confeder-ate seen hanging atout?" The shop was full of people coming and going; but no one in particular wa3 ' noticed." "It's a lame theory," remarked Martin, after a little consideration. "If Percy had passed a confederate the money, he would have passed him the purse too. It is more likely that whoever did the stealing kept the notes, which could not be identified, and got rid of the purse, which could be identified, by dropping it into Percy's pocket as he passed by." "I think that view is a sound one," said the judge; "but the thief has got off, and the prospect of apprehending him is vety small. Percy may not be convicted; I hardly think he could be; but there is, nevertheless, evidence enough against him to produce a disagreeable dis-agreeable effect upon persons not acquainted ac-quainted with him. And, of course, when it is known that Mrs. Tunstall was acquainted with him, and yet did not hesitate to accuse him, his position-even position-even after he has been legally exonerated will be a painful and embarrassing one. I am inclined to thing that the best thing for him will be to leave New York and remain away for some years. Meantime, the affair will be forgotten, and possibly the true culprit may be discovered." "I agree with you," said Martin, thoughtfully. "Percy can be of no use here, no matter how the affair turn3 out. I have a mind to propose to him to go with me." "To go with you!" repeated the judge, with an involuntary accent of surprise. "I infer, then, that you contemplate leaving New York?" "I shall leave New York very shortly. My idea is to go to Australia by way of San Francisco. In Australia Percy would have a fair field to start out and do something. I might be able to give him some help." "His family should feel much indebted in-debted to you," observed the judge, cordially. "There's no obligation," returned Martin. Mar-tin. "I am fond of Percy not on his own account only. If 1 can be of any good to him I shall consider myself lucky." The two gentlemen now entered a horse car, and the conversation ceased. Martin lapsed into a gloomy revery; but the judge's spirits seemed, for some reason, rea-son, to have visibly improved. He had received a severe shock at the moment when he entered the room and found Pauline and Martin together. The latter's lat-ter's announcement of his intended departure de-parture brought an immense relief. He had already begun to like the youug Englishman, but he now began to regard him with sincere affection. They left the car at Bleecker street and proceeded to police headquarters. There was still a quarter of an hour before the formality of getting bail could be arranged. ar-ranged. They were admitted to the inspector's in-spector's room, and at tho judge's request he courteously gave permission to them to have an interview with the prisoner. "How is he standing It, inspector?" asked Martin. "He doesn't find it amusing, I suppose; but ho is as comfortable as could be expected," ex-pected," replied the impenetrable officer. "There will ba no difficulty in getting bail, will there?" "I presume there will be nothing unusual. un-usual. But the case is not a simple one. There are some awkward features to it." , "How is that?"' demanded the judge. "Well, as regards motive for one thing." "It would need a strong motive to give weight to such an accusation," Martin remarked. "That may be true for those who have , tnt.de up their minds beforehand not to believe him guilty. But the jury will tot be composed of such persons." Percy." "And jump my bail?" "And jump your bail." "1 can't do that. Judge Ketelle ia liable." "Haven't I told you that I will settle all your liabilities? Half an hour before we leave New York, I will post a check to him for the amount. Your friend Henry Cotton will receive his duc-s this evening; eve-ythir.g shall be paid. Ana we will be off together and make a fortune, fort-une, if you like.'' "If 1 went off in that way," said Percy, after a little thought, "everybody would come to the conclusion that I was guilty and feared conviction." "Y'ou are not guiltv, are vou?" , "No." "But you do fear conviction, and ail the more if you're not guilty than if you are. That stands to reason." "Of course I hope not to ba convicted, but" "Exactly; and now do you know what I think? I think there is a strong probability proba-bility a deuced strong one that you will be convicted. You can see for yourself your-self that your defense doesn't amount tc ft row of pins. And if once you get intc jail, my boy, you are done for. Innocent Inno-cent or guilty makes no difference; you will have a stigma on you that all the years of your life will never obliterate. If I were in your place, I wouldn't risk it. You have an opportunity to escape now, and you had better take advantage of it." "But if I escape judgment will go against me by default, and I shall have the stigma just the same." "Listen to reason, Tercy. To have the stigma of being adjudged guilty is bad enough; but what is it compared to being adjudged guilty and sent to jail into the bargain? If you were actually guilty, or if I thought you were, the situation would be different: but you are innocent, inno-cent, though you can't prove it; and, being innocent, why should you spend two or three years in Sing Sing just to gratify the spite of Cuthbert Tunstall and his wife? It would be more sensible to take that razor and cut your throat. You are innocent, and you have a perfect per-fect right to avoid being imprisoned if you can. No one will suffer by it, and there is no telling how much you may gain. The robbery of which you are accused ac-cused was committed by somebody, and probably by a professional thief. Professional Pro-fessional thieves pickpockets especially are always practicing their trade; and sooner or later they are certain to get caught. When the thief who stole Mrs. Tunstall's money is caught it is more than likely that the truth about the robbery may come out; you will be vindicated, vin-dicated, and then you may come home with flying colois. But if your vindication vindica-tion came after you had served your time in jail it wouldn't do you much good not to mention the positive harm that jail life might have done you in thq meanwhile; people would never forget that you had worn the stripes, though they might easily forget whether or not ou had deserved to wear them. But Come back with a fortune come back f ter having made a respectable namo tor yourself in another part of the world or after having simply lived in freedom free-dom instead of in bondage and in tho society of thieves and, trust me, you will never regret it! This is not a matter mat-ter to be treated on sentimental grounds; it is a serious thing quite as serious as a question of life and death to you. You are innocent, and you have a right to your freedom; that's the cate in a nutshell. nut-shell. Don't throw away your whola career for a figure of speech 1" t posted themselves in the trees up in the branches and had made a sort of glacis round the trunks; it was capital cover; they could see our fellows coining, and pot them tit their leisure; but our lire ! was waited on the trec-3. If we got too near, they would slip down from one I tree and run to another. Our men kept dropping, but there was no sign that we ; were producing any effect ou them at j all. By and by the men came to the ! conclusion that the f tin wa3 too ext)en- I may as well give you an account of the affair." And the judge went on to tell the story that is already known to the reader. Both his listeners listened intently. in-tently. . "My opinion is," said Martin, when the narrative was finished, "that the job was put up on Percy. The woman did not have any money to lose." "Y'ou forget that her pocketbook was found in his pocket," said Pauline. "She may have put it there herself. But at all events that does not account for the bank notes. New York women are not in the habit of traveling about town with two or three thousand dollars in bills in their muffs. She would have had a check, if she had had anything." "The same objection occurred to me," said the judge, "and I spoke of it to Inspector In-spector Byrnes. But it appeared, upon investigation, that Mr. Tunstall, knowing his wife had several bills to pay today, including this at the jeweler's, had drawn a check for 5,000 in the morning, and given it to her before going down to his business. She has a private account at tho Fifth Avenue bank; she cashed the check there, and received, among other notes, the thousand dollar and the five hundred dollar ones specified in the complaint." com-plaint." "No; it was not done in that ws-y," said Paulino. "A woman like her would not dare to run such a risk. She must have lost the money. She may have lost it before sho entered tho shep, or soma one may have stolen it from her there. But I am sure she did not accuse Percy because she thought he was guilty. The: e was some other reason, and when she missed her money she took advantage of that pretext for attacking him. But she forgot he lias a sister!" "It may have been her hu.iband who pat her up to it, yu know," said Martin restraint and simple pathgs with which all this was said touched Pauline's virgin soul more deeply than it had ever been touched before. She divined all that was not spoken, and recognized tho gallant spirit of the man who loved her too well to stay where she was; and whether or not she had hitherto been conscious of it, her mind now contrasted tho man, fatally encumbered as he was, with the free man that sho had supposed him to be; and involuntarily the question presented pre-sented itself, Had he been free, would she have yielded what he desired? It was a perilous question, but she contemplated con-templated it steadily before dismissing it. She had an intellect capable of discriminating dis-criminating between merely conventional conven-tional morality and the deeper distinctions distinc-tions bet Seen good and evil. Her respect re-spect was as small for the former as for the latter it was profound. "If you had not cared for me as you do, you might have stayed, and wo have been friends," she said finally; "but as it is you are right to go. I am only a girl and I fael more than sorry foryou; I don't know what I might feel if you were always here. No; I do not love you! don't think it, Mr. Martin. It is only that if I wanted to lovo you 1 should not send you away!" Valentine sat silent: and whether he were happier or unhappier tlian "at any previous period of his life he could not have told. So far a3 the significant part of his life was concerned, lie felt that it was over with him; lie would never henceforth be the victim of any strong desires, hopes or fears. Only one possible possi-ble event would give him liberty, the opportunity op-portunity to live a real life. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask Pauline whether, in case this event occurred, she would let turn return to her; but an accident ac-cident postponed the question and it was "it ought to bring fortune and buppi- ! ness, but it doesn't." ! "No, wise people don't seem to be liappy or fortunate. But they .ir? v. i :r: they should expect to pay for that." "Very true, .Miss Nolen; we can't cat our cake and have it. too. But 1 mi.ulit have been content to have eaten my ca!c if only it hadn't turned out to be made of bran and shavings. How would you 'like to hear my strange, eventful hi -- tory? It has never been published." "I would like to hear the real Hie of a man what he thought and felt. But that is the part the stories leave out." "Well, the whole truth is a vulgar and sordid affair; a good deal of it is. And there's a reason for it, too. For it. is chiefly the analysis of a lie." "That is not the truth's fault." "Oh, of course not; tho children of light always have the best of the argument! argu-ment! Thero has been plenty of min k in my career, but plenty of variety and adventure, too. Younger sons have tiu.t advantage, at least, over the elders." "According to our American way of thinking, it is no advantage to inhei ii a great estate. It can only tempt a mr.n to be like his ancestors. I would choose to be a younger son myself." "If it were a matter of choice, perhaps those most concerned might more often ejree with you. But, if you are born a sivo, anil they began to fall back. Of course the Maoris followed us pretty fast, too 1 hated the idea of getting shot in the back: I had a few rounds of cat-trill -s left, and I kept drawing up and imppkig at 'em. Brown was near me at thai time. It was bad going under foot rocks, bushes, gullies; all of a sudden I felt something hot just beneath be-neath my collar bono a bullet through the left lung, I remember feeling pleased that I hadn't been hit in the back after nil: then I stumbled over a root and went down. Brown saw me he was a lieutenr.nt he hailed three of our men, and they lifted me and carried me. I was pretty heavy and very bloody, and I had fainted, and the men thought I was dead and began togmmble.for the Maoris were closing- up. They wanted to drop me, but Brown pulled out his revolver and vowed he'd shoot the first man who let go. As that was a certainty, whereas thero was a chance of dodging the Maoris, they held on, and brought ma off. I got well and was promoted to a lieutenancy what for I never discovered. discov-ered. Before I could be aliout again the I war was over. I w-ent back to Napier, j and there I heard that Miss Dorrien Tay-I Tay-I lor, my mother's sister, wa3 dead, and j had left ma eight thousand pounds. 1 took a part of it and sailed for Aspinwall 1 and came up to New York." y 'Shouldn't wonder if we had a blow be-lre be-lre night." CHAPTER XII. THE SHADOW OF DEATH. inclosing dome. It sang and resounded and roared, but still with an inner sound, as if that -st hich uttered it were still afar, or walled oil by some obstacle that it had not yet overcome. Everything else was deathly still; the plash of the foam against the vessel's bows and under her stern was the only other sound, but that seemed abnormally loud. The captain's voice on the bridge broke fut with startling distinctness, though he spoke not above his customary pitch, lie gave the order to put' the essel about. Immediately she began to swing round on her course, describing a semicircular semi-circular sweep with her stern; and in a few minutes she lay with the cloud at her back, and her bows pointed towards the unclouded regions of the northeast. Her propeller still moved, but slowly; she was like a champion awaiting the onset of an enemy and gathering himself up for the struggle. The enemy was now at hand. Bv this ARTINand Percy Per-cy looked in tho direction indicated indicat-ed by the officer. It was then about 5 o'clock in the a f t cr noon, the sky clear over-head, over-head, the sea calm, the sun sinking red toward to-ward the west, over Cuba and Hayti, which were below the horizon, some hundredsof miles away. The temperature tem-perature during The sharp sound of tho electric bell (j-oused him. Had Martin returned already? al-ready? Ho must have left his pass key, to be obliged to ring. Still p.-.rtly asleep, Percy arose and went to the door and opened it. A lady stood on the threshold, thres-hold, and as the door swung liack she stepped quickly inside. Percy recoiled a pace or two with a disagreeable sensation, ne thought that the visitor was Mrs. Tunstall. But the next moment, she spoke, and tha voice was that of his sister. "I am so glad you are here!" she said breathlessly. "I feared I should miss you." "Are you alone? How did you come here?" returned he. He closed the door and led her into the sitting room. "Judge Ketelle told us that you were staying with Mr. Martin. Is he" she glanced about the room and hesitated. "He has gone out," said Percy. "Did you come to see him?" "I came to see you, Percy. 1 can understand under-stand why you kept away froiTi us, but 1 waited to tell you that I am your sister. I love you and believe in you, and whatever what-ever happens you can trust me. Let me do something for you!" She spoke with great emotion, though in a controlled voice, and he could perceive that a tremor passed through her now and then as she stood before him. A feeling of strong brotherly tenderness tender-ness and gratitude came over the young man; he put his arms round Pauline and kissed her. "I couldn't do that if 1 w asn't innocent, my dear," he said. "Of course I know you are innocent!" she exclaimeM indignantly. "What made that woman accuse you? She knows it is false. Why is she your enemy?" Percy hesitated. "Appearances were against me," he muttered. "What are appearances to any one who knows you?" broke out Pauline, impatiently. im-patiently. "She must have hated you. Why did she hate you? Women do not hate unless has she ever loved you, Percy?" she demanded with a changed voice. "She why, she's a married woman!" he returned, uneasily. There was a pause. "Yes, I understand under-stand nowl" continued the girl, with a sad laugh. "Oh, my poor brother!" She caught her breath and sobbed once or twice. "1 am so sorry it is that," she said, tremulously. "I have been a fool, but nothing worse than that," said the young man. "There is no actual sin on my conscience, Pauline. Pau-line. It is no thanks to me, but it is the truth. It is all over now, and I thank heaven it is over!.". . "I thank heaven, too, Percy; for whatever you had done I should support ycu and defend you; and if you were wicked I should be wicked, too. I am your sister" it seemed to give her satisfaction satis-faction to repeat this "we are the same flesh and blood; if we do not stand by each other who else will? But what 6hall you do, Percy? You cannot tell lughly tired out; but were up again by B iu the morning, and had some coffee and eggs brought to them by the janitor. "The chances are," observed Martin, ' as he cracked his egg in -the English style, and put some salt in it, "that the authorities, who are pretty widwake in this country, may have conceived the idea that you contemplate giving them the slip. When I went out yesterday afternoon, I noticed a man smoking a pipe on the opposite corner of the street; and when I returned in the evening 1 passed the 6ame man under the gas lamp just below. That may have been a coincidence; coin-cidence; but then it may have been" "A detective?" said Percy. "Something of that sort. At all events, it is well to be on the safe side. Now what I propose is this. Wo are of the same height and build, and look not unlike. If we were dressed alike, the chief point of distinction between us, to one who did not know us well, would be the fact that you wear a mustache and I whiskers What do you say to a bit of a disguise? You will find a razor in the dressing case; shave off your mustache and then put on these." As he spoke, he produced from his pocket a small pair of false whiskere. "All you have to do is heat this inside surface at the gas jet, and they will cling to you as if they had grown. Then put on my cap and overcoat, over-coat, and our detective will be a clever fellow if he recognizes you." "But what will you do?" "I shall remain what I am. You will start an hour before I do; and, by the way, you had better turn up town when you leave here, so as to give the impression impres-sion that you are bound anywhere rather than to the United States and Brazil Steamship company's wharf. Afterwards After-wards you can cross over to Sixth avenue ave-nue and take the elevated dowu. I will meet you on board the steamer; the trunks will go by express in my name." "All right," said Percy, with a sigh, for he was a good looking fellow, and his mustache was not wholly indifferent to him. "And when we are safe at sea we can resume our natural selves." "As soon as you like," returned Martin, Mar-tin, "though perhaps it would do no harm if wo exchanged names for a while longer. There is no telling what may happen, or where some spy may turn up who might find it for his interest inter-est or amusement to gossip about us in . the wrong quarter." Breakfast being over, nothing remained re-mained but to label the trunks, which Martin did by writing his name and that of the steamer on tags, and attaching them to the handles; an expressman was then called and the trunks were removed. Percy sacrificed his mustache and affixed the whiskers, and finally, attired in his friend's outer garments, left the house without interference and strolled up to the Thirty-third street elevated station. From there it was a twenty minutes' ride to his destination, and then all he had to no objection to this arrangement; he had his place to make in the colony, and the necessity of providing a suitable home for his wife at the outset would have seriously hampered him. She went to her relatives in Napier, and he, as b is 'been already related, cast in his lot with his friend Brown, and visited her in town whenever opportunity served. Now that she was his wife, however, she no longer felt any necessity of concealing con-cealing from him her real belief as to the extent of his means; she proceeded from veiled intimations to plain speech, and ho became aware for the first time that she had married him, not for himself, him-self, but for something that he did not possess. Her plain speech led to explanations explana-tions on his part equally plain, and thus they speedily arrived at a perfectly clear understanding of their mutual attitude. The consequence was a bitter quarrel and recriminations. The woman appeared ap-peared in her true colors, which were not engaging; she called him a variety of hard names, and if he had refrained from retorting in kind it was not because there was any lack of suitable expressions expres-sions waiting behind his lips. But they were still husband and wife, and the bond between them could not bo severed. As their marriage was a secret, however, there was no difficulty about a separation; separa-tion; and Valentine agreed to whatever pecuniary conditions she chose to dictate. dic-tate. In case of his brother's death she would come in for her share of the inheritance; in-heritance; but here he stipulated that she should receive the money only on condition that she forbore to assume the title, or allow her relation to him to bo known. She at first demurred to this; but on his offering to hand over everything every-thing except the real estate and lands an offer extremely advantageous to her from a pecuniary point of view she finally consented, probably reflecting that it would be difficult or impossible to make such a contract legally binding. and that when the time came if it ever should come she would be able to repudiate repu-diate it with impunity. This affair produced a bad effect on Valentine; lie became reckless and indifferent in-different to his business interests, and ill fortune attended him. He welcomed the Maori revolt as an opportunity of ridding himself of his troubles by stopping a bullet; bul-let; but though he stopped the bullet, the bullet failed to stop him, and the legacy that he received changed considerably the complexion of affairs. He placed half the sum in the bank at Napier for the benefit of his wife, and sailed for San Francisco with the rest. Ha had had no settled plan in leaving New Zealand, Zea-land, except to appease his restless desire for change and excitement. The future could hold nothing good for him, because, be-cause, however good in itself it might be, it would be denied by the chronic and inevitable necessity of sharing it with that wife of his for what is the greatest blessing, stimulus and joy, to a man hap- deck. The hurricane caught him and hurled him forward, he w as jammed between be-tween the stump of the mainmast and the shaft of one of the anchors, which had somehow been carried there; the wind turned his coat over his head and whipped it into riblxms in a moment; iu another moment he was naked to tho waist; then he was twisted and beaten and lashed about until he wasa shapeless.-mass shapeless.-mass of bloody flesh and shattered bones. At length a sudden pitch of tho vessel loosened the anchor, and it and tho corpse went overboard together, and the ship swept on. It was perhaps an hour after this, and long after the most sanguine had yielded dumbly to despair, that the steamer rose on a monstrous wave, which mounted and mounted beneath her until it seemed as if it would end by carrying her through the sky; then, with a last furious effort, flung her forward, and slipped back under her keel. The great vessel wa3 carried on by the impetus of the onset, and fell with an appalling crash, not on the sea again, but on the solid earth. Her voyage was over, and she was in port at last. Her iron ribs were crushed by the fall, but her frame still held together, and all motion ceased. Tho wind still shrieked and the sea bellowed and thundered, but no waver, struck the ship. She seemed to have been lifted beyond their reach; but where they were no one knew, nor could have guessed within a hundred miles. After an interval, the quartermaster, quarter-master, who had been tiie last man at the wheel, crept to the companionway, and, securing himself by a rope passed round his waist and made fast to tho railing below, looked out. At first he could distinguish nothing, and the rush of the wind stifled him; ho dragged himself back and waited. Ha had not waited long before it appeared to him that the noise of tho hurricane was abating, and the darkness was less intense. At length ho ventured forth again. Moment by moment tho wind was decreasing; the change was not so sudden as it had been when thocenterof the tornado passed over them, and occasionally occa-sionally there was a return of rage and fury. But these became less and les3 frequent, and there were great cleavages upwards through the clouds, revealing the remote sparkle of stars, for tho sun had gone down long since. One by one-those one-those of the ship's company and passengers passen-gers who remained came on deck and stared about them. Were they on a. desert inland? A number of square objects, curiously-symmetrical curiously-symmetrical in shape, and distributed with ail appearnnro of -regularity, became be-came visible in tho immediate neighbor-Ill,::! neighbor-Ill,::! of tho steamer. They were ail of nearly the ame lii-iitht, though in their other diiu.ni.':i3 they varied considerably: consider-ably: their side:; were w-hitish, the tops darker. I:i fro:it of tho vessel, a3 she lav. the land rose UDwards in a srentle the last few days had been growing warmer and warmer, and they w-c-.e :s.-near :s.-near the twentieth parallel of nortii latitude, lati-tude, and about ou the sixty-sixth meridian me-ridian west from Greenwich. Since passing between Hatteras and the Bermudas Ber-mudas they had had fair weather, wtith light airs between the south and east. But today there .had been no breeze whatever, and the heat bad been oppressive. op-pressive. The surface of the sea looked oily, and lay quite flat, without any perceptible per-ceptible heave or swell. Masses of drift weed were passed occasionally, strung out in long lengths, as if drawn by invisible in-visible currents. Sometimes a cocoanut or an orange would float past, silent heralds of the islands near at hand. Tho course the steamer was steering was taking her toward the group of little islands between be-tween the greater and lesser Antilles, of which St. Thomas is one. It was there that they were to make their first landing. land-ing. The officer had pointed toward the southwest, or a few points off the starboard star-board bow. Percy could see nothing remarkable re-markable there; but Valentino, who was familiar with the sea, at once fixed Wis eyes upon a small dark cloud, low down on the water, the peculiarity cf which was that it changed its shape with great rapidity, and without any apparent cause. One moment it looked like a hand, with the lingers extended; then it was like a hat, the crown of w hich grew larger and larger until it presented the aspect of a pointed foolscap. Then the cap suddenly inverted itself, and stood ou its apex; then the foolscap divided down the center, and took the form of a huge bird with wings pointed upwards. "That is rather odd," muttered Valentine, Valen-tine, intently watching the protean littl-i cloud. "I have seen a hurricane begin that way. I hope it will give us a wide berth. This is a bad place to be caught by a tornado, with that string of islands right ahead of us." "It must be a couple of hundred miles time the central advance had thrown out two long black arms that crept along the horizon to the right and left, inclosing the vessel in a deadly embrace. Darkness Dark-ness fell over them as from an eclipse; the unshadowed east, ere it vanished altogether al-together from sight, looked like a scene viewed through a tunnel. The moment was one of awful suspense; no human creature could long have endured it without giving way to some outbreak of intolerable emotion. The blood flowed thick in the veins; the brain throbbed confusedly; the breath came iu difficult siglis. With a sudden but majestic upward up-ward gradation, the minor roar swelled to deafening shrieks of noise: there was a vision of a white fury of waters astern; a blast as cold as winter swept from the taffrail to the bowsprit; the darkness dark-ness shut down and became absolute, ab-solute, so that the observer seemed plunged into impalpable pitch; and then with a paralyzing shock the hurricane, smote tho vessel, beating her down into the sea as by the sheer weight of a giant hand. The next instant, with a shudder and a spring, she leaped forward, staggered, stag-gered, and leaped again. Fragments of boiling surge hurtled along her decks, striking what they encountered wifh the of grape shot. The mizzen mast broke off within a yard of the deck, and, lashing lash-ing forward, struck the main mast and brought it down in ruin, though the noise of the crash was inaudible in the yell of the frenzied gale. The steamer was rushing onward at headlong speed, yet she seemed to be standing still, so fast did wind and sea fly past her. Site reeled, staggered, leapoj, was buried and rose again, again to be overwhelmed. It seemed another world, another age. compared com-pared with the suniKktand ealmot'a few-minutes few-minutes previous. Blind, whirling, weltering wel-tering chaos had engulfed all tiiinys; nothing could be seen, nothing hear,, nothing done nor directed: only awful plungings and strainings could be felt, and thunderous blows and shocks. Only This was a powerful appeal, and it lost Mhing by Martin's delivery. It pro-laced pro-laced an evident impression on Percy. "If I were certain that I should be convicted." con-victed." he muttered, half to himself. "You may fairly take that for granted," grant-ed," said Martin. "When there has been a crime, thcro must be provided a criminal; crim-inal; that is the legal maxim, and in default de-fault of a tetter you will have to bear the brunt." "It is not myself, only, that is to be eonsidered, Yah; my mother and sister are quite a.i important." "I dorfc'eny it; it's a part of my argument. argu-ment. Vlti s;:id this afternoon that you did not intend to see them again until after you were vindicated. Did you mean what you said?" "Certainly I did." "I think you were right in your decision, de-cision, for more reasons than one. But if you remain iu New York you will not be able to keep your resolution. If you don't go to them they will come to you. But if you are a thousand or two thousand thou-sand miles away you will have no such embarrassment. And that isn't all, my boy. If you were put in jail it would be a bad thing for you, but it would simply kill your mother outright and ruin your sister's prospects as effectually as your own. Whereas, if you go off with me, you and I can keep up a correspondence with them and explain exactly how the ase 6tands. They can watch your career step by step, and the knowledge that they are doing so will give you thestrong-est thestrong-est stimulus to succeed that you could have. Meanwhile they will be watching tho progress of affairs here, and as soon as anything turns up in your favor they can let you know and you can act accordingly. ac-cordingly. If there were no other reason for jumping your bail, consideration for your mother and sister would be enough." This suggestion practically decided Percy. "I believe you are right," said he; "but I don't see what right I have to let you pay all my liabilities. You and I have been friends, Val., but I have never done auything for you, and I have no prospect of repaying you for what you propose to do for me." "You will ewe me less than you suppose," sup-pose," Valentine replied. "In the first place, my money is no use to me; if I didn't spend it for you, it would go into the pockets of the tradesmen and bummers bum-mers of New York. In the second place, I want your company; we suit each other, and that is not a thing that happens hap-pens every day. But the real truth is I have never 6poken to you about it, although al-though you may have guessed something for aught I know the truth is that I am a good deal influenced in what I am doing by the fact that you are Pauline Nolen's brother." "Ah! You care for her, then?" "Yes, I care for her. She is the dearest dear-est friend I have in the world, and for ljer sake I would do most things. But she can never be more than my friend, ani I can do very little." "If you want to marry her, I am sure she" Valentine interrupted him with a gesture. gest-ure. "It can never come to a question of that," said he; "lam married already." "Youareaniarried man! Does Pauline know it?" - "I told her this morning. It's a long story, and you shall hear it another time if you want to. I married in haste, and I am likely to have plenty of leisure to repent. re-pent. We!4; you can imagine that nothing noth-ing could please me so much as serving her in any way I can, and I know that no better way is open to me than to give a helping hand to you. So, if you agree to join me, you will be doing 'e the best kindness that one man can ji- another it is not to be measured .i time, or money, or anything else. My prospects, as you may suppose, are not especially clieerful at the best; but whatever good comes to me will be from the thought that I am of some good to Pauline's brother. I can't live with her, or see her any longer; but I can live with you, and that's the next best thing, not to mention men-tion that you are tolerably good company on your own account." He ended with a laugh. "It's very kind of you to put it in that way, old fellow," said Percy, in a somewhat some-what unsteady tone. "Well, I'll go with you. I have been a drug in the market so far, and I won't make any promises; but I don't think you'll find me a volun-.. volun-.. tary drag on you, at all events. Have you any definite plans?" "I have a thousand; we have only to pick and choose," Valentine replied. "My intention this morning was to go direct to Australia by way of San Francisco, Fran-cisco, but I think I shall change that, for one reason, because I mentioned it to Judge Ketelle, and, in any case, it will be well to get outside the country as soon as possible. We might go to Mexico by steamer, to begin with. I have some . good letters to people there, so that we shan't be strangers. If anything good turns up we can stay there; if not we can go to Colon and Panama, and get aboard some vessel bound westward. You may find an opportunity to make a practical acquaintance with mining before be-fore you are done." It was then about 4 o'clock in the afternoon. after-noon. On consulting a newspaper they ... learned that one of the United States and Brazil Mail Steamship company's vessels sailed on the following day, Wednesday, at 3 o'clock. This vessel stopped at St. Thomas, where, if they saw fit, they might disembark and take passage to Havana, ami thence to Vera Cruz and Mexico, thus throwing possible pursuers off the scent. This seemed to bo the best route open to them; and, as there was no time to be lost, Martin left at once for Broad street to secure their passage. Percy was left alone to meditate on his position. Martin's rooms were in a bachelor apartment house, not far from the junction junc-tion of Fifth avenue and Broadway. The roar of the streets was audible as a continuous sound; and to Percy, sitting in an easy chair before tho fire, and wearied with the emotions and vicissitudes vicissi-tudes of the day, it had the soporific influence in-fluence of the wind among pines, or the noise of surf on a shore. The sun had set, and the room became dusky. Percy's eyes closed, and he was just on the point of falling asleep. 0 that in court." He took a quick resolution. "I shall never appear in court," he said. . "Has the case beeout aside?" she exclaimed ex-claimed eagerly. "No; I am going away. I am going with Martin. He has gone to take our passages to the West Indies by to-morrow's steamer." "Well, perhaps it is best," she returned, re-turned, with a composure that surprised him. "Your bail has to be paid, has it not? I will do that I have money." "Martin has done it already. He will pay everything. I shall leave no debts, thanks to him. I thank you just the same, my darling sister." "He is a good friend lie is a good man," she said thoughtfully. "I can afford af-ford to let him do it, for I know he docs it willingly. So you are going away together!" to-gether!" She gave a long sigh. "Well, I will take care of mother." "Poor "mother!" said Percy, a great wave of grief and remorse coming over him. "Tell her the best you can of me, Pauline." "I can manage her don't fear! It will come right at last, I know. I will go now, brother." She threw her arms around him. "Be good," she 6aid; "do the best you can.' Oh, Percy, Percy!" she suddenly cried out, with a heart breaking sob, pressing him to her with passionate energy. "I must go now, or never," she said, controlling herself by an immense effort; and the next moment he was alone. But the ardor of her last embrace had something more than sisterly; sis-terly; it conveyed a message to one who was absent. CHAPTER XI. AT SEA. do was to go on board and wait for Martin. Mar-tin. -The latter arrived in due course, and at 2 o'clock the steamer moved out into the river and pointed her nose toward the Narrows, much to the relief of two at least of her passengers. And yet both of them were leaving behind what was dearer than anything they could expert to encounter. But thoso thougTlts lay deep; the more trifling ones only appeared ap-peared on the surface. There were but few other passengers on the steamer, and those not being people peo-ple whose society was especially attractive, attrac-tive, Percy and Valentine passed the greater part of the time in each other's company. Valentine had an almost inexhaustible in-exhaustible fund of anecdotes concerning concern-ing his past life and advenaires on hand, and many hours were spent in narrating those experiences to Percy, until the American had become almost as conversant con-versant with the Englishman's past career as if it had been his own. The episode of his marriage interested him more than anything elce. Valentine had met the girl upon the outward bound steamer from England to New Zealand. He had previously known nothing of her, nor heard her name; but it afterwards transpired that she was well acquainted with his family history, a cousin of hers, with whom she corresponded, corre-sponded, having been engaged as companion compan-ion to Lady Martin during several years. She had thus learned a fact that was supposed to be known by few or none outside the family circle that Valentine's Valen-tine's elder brother, who inherited the estate, was subject to a species of fits, which, though not always incompatible with long life, might bring his career to a close at any moment. In such an event, the property would descend to Valentine. Meanwhile, Valentine's Lon-done Lon-done xtravagances were not suspected by the girl, and she believed him to be possessed pos-sessed of a comfortable fortune cf something some-thing like twenty thousand pounds a sum not much in excesSj to be sure, of what he would have had, had he invested his money to advantage and lived within his income. She was a handsome girl, of about the same age as Valentine, and with a manner man-ner and temperament exceedingly alluring allur-ing to a young fellow whose blood flows warmly in his veins, and who finds the interminable leisure cf a voyage to the antipodes hang very heavy on Ids hands. She permitted him to acquire the conviction convic-tion that he was anything but indifferent to her; in fact, to use the colloquial phrase, she set her cap at him; and Valentine, Val-entine, who spoke of himself without reserve re-serve as a poor man, and who was not aware that she disbelieved all his assertions asser-tions on that head, and interpreted them as politic attempts to conceal his real wealth and prospects Valentine was completely fascinated by the charm of her person and conversation, and so far committed himself with her, that by the time the voyage was ended he felt that he could not do less than offer her marriage. mar-riage. She consented, and the ceremony was performed on their reaching New Zealand. Zea-land. But she stipulated that the marriage mar-riage was to remain for the time being a secret; for she had come on to visit some relatives of hers and was unwilling, foi reasons satisfactory to herself, that they should know anything of the hope she privately entertained of becoming Lady Martin, Valentine, on his side, offered pily married, U the dreariest of miseries to the man rnismated. One misfortune, however, he did- not look for; one danger he did not fear; one emotion of all others he was confident con-fident he could not feel. And yet tins emotion, this danger, this misfortune misfor-tune were precisely those to which he was destined to fall a victim. He could not foresee the meeting with- Pauline Nolen, nor the effect that she would produce pro-duce on liim. Up to that time his un-happincss un-happincss had been chiefly negative the ordinary disappointment and disillusion; now he had to deal with a positive pain the impossibility of being unite to the only woman he had ever loved. It was like tantalizing a prisoner for life with scenes of freedom and felicity. "I am talking a lot about myself," he remarked one day to Percy, as they were sitting smoking together on the deck, "but it isn't entirely egotism either. I have a motive in it, connected with you." : "What have I to do with it?" "Y'ou and Brown aro about the only friends I have in tho world. I want ycu to know what my life has been and what my situation is in order that you may be able to act intelligently in case anything happens to me." "Come, Val, you're not contemplating a premature end, are you?" ; "Oh, my health is good, and I am in good sh&3 generally never better. I am speaking of accidents, which are liable to happen to the best regulated gentlemen. In case of my sudden taking tak-ing off occurring whilo I am in your company, I want you to be competent to act as my agent, representative or executor; execu-tor; I want to give you my unrestricted power of attorney, iu short. And to that end," he added, taking a wallet from his pocket, "I have written out a paper which empowers you to use the requisite authority, and also indicates what I would like to have done in case certain other things happened. Here's the document; docu-ment; put it in your pocket, and don't bother yourself to look at it unless circumstances cir-cumstances should make it necessary." "If I had anything to leave or to manage," man-age," said Percy, taking the paper which Valentino iianded him, "I would retaliate retal-iate by appointing you my sole legatee and executor; but all I possess aro my clu.ues and the receipted billsyoupaid for mo. However, if . I die, you must say those whom it may concern that I maintained main-tained to the last that I did not steal Mrs. Tunstall's money. Send my love to my mother and Pauline, and, if I die on shore, get me buried if possible.- I can't be serious about it," he went on, with a laugh, "and yet I have had a presentiment presenti-ment over since we started that I shall never see tho end of this voyage. Of course, presentiments are all nonsense, and I don't in the least believe in this one; but it i3 there all the same. So, if it comes out true, I shall say, 'I told you so!' At least, you will know I would have said it if I could!" "I'll remember," replied Valentine. "A3 for presentiments, I believe they do come out true, though my theory of existence ex-istence assures ine they must be coincidences. coinci-dences. I have no presentiment regarding regard-ing myself, only a business like solicitude solici-tude that, when I am gone, my dregs shall, not occasiou any avoidable inconvenience." incon-venience." Just then the second officer sauntered up and nodded to windward. "Looks pretty nasty up there," said he. to the nearest of them," said Percy. "We are safe enough. This steamer can stand anything." "There comes the captain." obser ed Valentine, without noticing Percy a remark. re-mark. In fact the captain emerged from his cabin and mounted the bridge; he cast a glance at the cloud and then gave some orders in a low tone. They were followed fol-lowed by an immediate activity ou the part of the watch on deck. The sailors moved rapidly about, and seemed to be occupied in stowing under hatches cr otherwise making fast various barrels, cases and other loose objects that had hitherto been kept on deck. Meanwhile the captain had got out a telescope ar.d was contemplating the cloud through it with great earnestness. Presently he passed the glass to the officer who stood by him on the bridge, and who also took a careful observation; then they conversed con-versed together in an undertone and occasionally oc-casionally issued a new order to the crew. There were no sails set cn the 6teamer; but tSe sheets and halliards were hauled taut and securely belayed, and everything was made fast and battened bat-tened down in such a way that nothing short of a hurricane could dislodge it. "The old man understands his business," busi-ness," remarked Valentine, and I fancy he thinks that it may need all he knows to pull us through. Look at the cloud now!" Valentine again turned his eyes toward the southwest. The small cloud had suddenly become very much larger, and was now seen to be connected with u mass of dark vapor that was rapidly crowding upon that section of tho horizon, hori-zon, and of whih it was the pioneer. This vapor was of an extraordinary darkness, dark-ness, or rather blackness; it had not tho blue shade that is often seen in storm clouds, but was of tho hue of the densest factory smoke, with yellow and greenish-streaks greenish-streaks upon iijhere and there. The rim or upper margin of the oncoming blackness black-ness continued to advance with such astonishing as-tonishing rapidity that after only a few moments it lud blotted itself upon all that quarter of tha horizon, and now seemed to have embodied the forerunning forerun-ning cloud, or to have incorporated itself with it. Looking more closely at it, its edges and surface appeared wildly commoted, com-moted, flakes and shreds of vapor, like black fleece, being torn off from the general mass, and whirled around, cr snatched in various directions, so swiftly that the eye could scarcely follow their movements. The green and yellow-streaks yellow-streaks were multiplied and other colors col-ors were represented until tho inky surface assumed an aspect of liideous iridescence. iri-descence. Meanwhila the northern and eastern portions of the sky and sea remained re-mained unchanged in their sultrycalm, except that, the light of the setting sun being cut off, their aspect had a strange feverish ghastlmess, unlike tho tints of nature. A hot, faint air drew past the vessel in the direction of the black canopy, can-opy, as if it were sucked thither by some malign attraction. Presently the ears of the observers began to bo conscious of a singular minor sound, somewhat resembling resem-bling that produced by the wind on a telegraph wire, only infinitely more hollow, hol-low, deep a.tM reverberating. It resounded re-sounded all over the level surface of tho pallid sea, and appeared to be echoed back from the horizon and the vault above, as if the heavens were a metallic by these signs could it be known that the vessel was still above the water, still being swept onward. Whither, and to what fate, none could foretell. The sea was at first leaten flat by the wind, though great pieces of v.'e.ter were stripped from the surface and dashed through the air; by and by, however, waves began to form, but irregularly, some rolling low, some reaching aloft and stalking gigantic. One of these, hurryingthrough the blackness, mounted the steamer's stern and traversed her deck to the bow s, carrying with it the funnel, tho remaining mast and every thing on board that offered resistance. That wave struck the forecastle with a report like the bursting of a siege gun, stove through the oaken planks, and dashed a hundred tons of water through, the opening. All therein were drowned and crushed to pieces, and the bodies of several were whirled out again and carried car-ried like rags off into the waste of the tornado. Heavily the ship rose from the blow; it seemed as if she could never rise again. But up she came, and the weight of water went booming aft, breaking down partitions and deluging cabins and state rooms. More than fifty men were killed or disabled by that single sin-gle buffet, and tho survivors believed that the end of all of them could be not many minutes distant. But it so happened that no catastrophe of equal terror followed. The ship drove on, sometimes threatening to broach to, yet maintaining her steerage way beyond all expectation, on tho whole; and when some time had passed how long, no one ever knew tho hurricane fell faint, and in a breath or two, as it seemed, died quito away. The darkness lightened, and straight overhead appeared a patch of sky half veiled by wheeling shreds of mist. They were in the center of the tornado; and now tho waves leaped up with a rebound so breakneck and astounding astound-ing that all sense of vertical and horizontal hori-zontal was lost, and the vessel reared and pitched liked a maddened bronco. This phase of the battle between ship and storm bade fair to be more dangerous than the opening experience; but, however how-ever that might be, it did not last long. The inky cloud shut down again; again rose the shriek of rushing winds, coming now from the opposite point of the om-pass, om-pass, and once more the dismantled and bruised hulk sprang forward on her fearful fear-ful race, galvanized, as it were, into preternatural pre-ternatural activity by a force not her own. Stripped baro as she was, and weighted by the water she had taken on board, she moved moro steadily than at first. Nor could tho nerves of thoso who still manned her continue to respond re-spond as before to the call of. horror. hor-ror. The worst was past for them, even should death itself be in store. None knew at that time who were living and who were dead; each held on to whatever what-ever support w as nearest him and waited in darkness and uncertainty for what might come. The engine fires had been put out, and all the men available were taking turns at the wheel, in a desperate and unequal struggle to keep her before the wind. Some felt that it would be a relief if the ship would founder and go down. But she swept on, outstripping death itself. Suddenly . one of the passengers, pas-sengers, w ho had been alternately praying pray-ing and blaspheming in the cabin, broke out in a yell of mad laughter, and rushed Up the companion way and out on the slope, and these rectangular objects showed themselves thickly in that direction. direc-tion. "They don't look unlike houses," remarked re-marked the quartermaster, peering earnestly earn-estly t!u-ough the gloom. "I don't know any toast hereabouts that has rock3 liko: that." "If they were houses," said the second officer, who stood near, with Ids arm broken, "we should be,iu the midst of a town, and no small town either." "Hark! what's that?" All listened. There was the sound of a halloo, clearly repeated, ami in a moment mo-ment it was answered from a further distance. Then iu several directions, near and far, were heard calls, cries and Jl lamentations. Tho listeners nitered murmurs mur-murs of surprise and perplexity. Just then a great mass of cloud in tho east broke away, and tho full moon shone forth with surpassing brilliance, shedding over the scene a light which, in comparison w ith the previous darkness, dark-ness, seemed as bright as day. It revealed re-vealed an extraordinary spectacle. Beyond tho stem of tho steamer extended ex-tended tho tossing waters of a largo bay, strewn with wreckage and an indescribable indescrib-able medley of floating objects. In front and on either side were the streets e.:ij I houses of a half destroyed town. Tho steamer had been carried over tha sea wall and lay beyond tho wharves, between be-tween tho ruins of a hotel and a large warehouse. A little way off was what had been a publio pleasure garden or casino; it looked as if a gigantic roller had been passed over it. In a terrace higher up a heavy iron gun stuck out like a half driven bolt; it had been whipped out of a vessel in the bay and borne nearly half a mile, passing completely through a house on the way. Nearly every houso left standing was unroofed; many wero torn from their foundations and thrown topsy turvy. The iron shaft of a street lamp was bent over and twisted like a corkscrew. In the center of a small fort to tho west of the town was a brig, with one mast still standing. A floating wharf just outside tho sea wall was sunk; a steamer was on top of it, and on top of tha steamer, lying crosswise, wero tho remains of a three masted merchant ship. A largo provision storo had been blown to pieces and the 6tores whirled about in all directions over tho town and adjacent ad-jacent lands. In tho bay, now rapidly rap-idly becoming calmer, appeared tho masts of a score of sunken vessels, .sticking up like reeds iu a swamp. Among them floated casks, blocks,. spars, boxes, quantities of oranges, and cocoanuts, fragments of trees, the,-rafters the,-rafters and beams of houses; and bobbing about everywhere were the drowned and. mutilated corpses of hundreds of men and women. But these wero not to re main long visible. Ever and anon thew w ould be a swirl in tho water, a jerk and a splash, and a shark would glide away with a human arm or leg in hi3 jaws. The banquet was an unusually rich one, and the banqueters wero assembling in. thousands. "Well," said the quartermaster, as hi eyes rapidly traversed the scene, "I've, heard of miracles, but this is the nearest to one that ever I saw. Of all the things that might have happened, this is the unlikeliest; we get caught in a hurricane, and blown north and south, wo don't know where, nor whether we were under water or above it; and here at last wa , A R T I N came back about 7 o'clock. Ho had secured a stateroom state-room with two good berths; he had paid Perey's bills at the tradesmen's trades-men's and at his lodging house, and from the latter lat-ter place he had brought the trunk containing the young man's worldly posses-, sions, which were fortunately not numerous, and consisted chiefly of suits of clothes and underwear. They went to a quiet restaurant and had dinner, and then returned to Martin's, and spent the rest of the evening in packing pack-ing up his effects. Percy said nothing to his friend about Pauline's unexpected and hurried visit that evening, not on account of any predetermined pre-determined purpose, but because the interview in-terview had affected him too deeply to. make it an easy topic of conversation; because, knowing Martin's feeling towards to-wards her, he was uncertain whether it would lie expedient to mentiou her at present; and, further, because he doubted whether Martin would approvo of his course in admitting Pauline to a knowledge of their plans. In revealing the secret to her, Percy had acted on the spur of the moment; but he felt that the impulse was a wise one, and subsequent reflection had -not caused him to regret re-gret it. They went to bed at midnight thor- |