University of Virginia Library

THE MIDNIGHT QUEEN;
OR,
LEAVES FROM NEW-YORK LIFE

BY GEO. LIPPARD, ESQ.

1. CHAPTER I.

[Note to the Reader.—The leaf of “New-York
Life,” which we are about to unclose in the
narrative entitled “The Midnight Queen,” is a
dark and bitter page torn from the book of society.
Too dark, too bitter for fiction, it can only be excused
from the fact, that it is a true history, written
principally by the main personage of the narrative,
in her own way—a sad and harrowing autobiography.
The quiet atmosphere which imbues
the first portions of the narrative will not appear
tame or uninteresting, when it is contrasted with
the dark realities of the sequel. The moral of the
“Midnight Queen,” if it can be stated in a few
words, may be thus condensed:—The utter perversion
of the best faculties of the heart by the fear
of poverty and its fathomless miseries, conjoined
with the love of wealth for its enjoyments and luxuries.]

“My childhood's home! Oh! is there
in all the world a phrase so sweet as this
—“My childhood's home?” Others
may look back to childhood, and be
stung with bitter momories, but my
childhood was the heaven of my life. As
from the hopeless present I gaze back
upon it, I seem like a traveller half way
up the Alps, surrounded by snow, and
clouds, and mist, looking back upon the
happy valley, which, dotted with homes,
and rich in vines and flowers, smiles in
the sunshine far below.

My childhood's home was very beautiful.
It was a two-storied cottage, situated
upon an eminence, its white front
and rustic porch half hidden by the
horse-chesnut trees, which in the early
summer had snowy blossoms among
their deep-green leaves. Behind the cottage
arose a broad and swelling hill,
which, fringed with gardens at its base,
and crowned on its summit by a few
grand old trees, standing alone against
the sky, was in summer time clad along
its entire extent with a garment of golden
wheat. Beneath the cottage flowed
the Neprehaun, a gentle rivulet, which
wound among abrupt hills—every hill
rich in foliage, and dotted with homes
—until it lost itself in the dark waves of
the Hudson. Yes, the Hudson was
there, grand and beautiful, and visible
always from the cottage porch, the Palisades
rising from its opposite shore into
heaven, and the broad bay of Tapoan Zee
glistening in sunlight to the north.

Oh! that scene is before me now. The
cottage with its white front, half hidden
by broad green leaves intermingled with
white blossoms—the hill which rose behind
it, golden with wheat—the Neprehaun
below, winding among the hills,
now in sunshine, now in shadow—the
Hudson, with its vast bay, and the sombre
wall, which rose into the sky from
its western shore; it is before me now,
with the spring blossoms, the voices,
the sky, the very air of my childhood's
days.

In this home I found myself at the age
of thirteen. I was the pupil and the
charge of the occupant of the cottage, a
retired clergyman, the Rev. Thomas Walworth,
who, having grown gray in the
active service of his Master, had come
there to pass his last days in the enjoyment
of competence and peace. Even
now, as in the day when I left him forever,
I can see his tall form bent with
age, and clad in black, his mild pale face,
with hair as white as snow—I can hear
that voice, whose very music was made
up of the goodness of a heart at peace
with God and man. When I was thirteen,
myself, the good clergyman and
an aged woman—the housekeeper—were
the only occupants of the cottage. His
only son was away at college. And
when I was sixteen, my mother, who
had placed me in the care of the clergyman
years before, came to see me. I
shall never forget that visit. I was
sitting on the cottage porch—it was
a June day—the air was rich with
fragrance and blossoms; my book was
on my knee, when I heard her step in

the garden walk. She was tall and very
beautiful, and richly clad in black, and
her dark attire shone with diamonds.
Very beautiful, I say, although there
were threads of silver in her brown hair,
and an incessant contraction of her dark
brows, which gave a look of anxiety or
pain to her face.

As she came up the garden walk,
pushing aside her veil of dark lace, I
knew her, although I had not seen her
for three years. Her presence was
strange to me, yet still my heart
bounded as I saw her come.

“Well, Frank,” she said, as though it
was but yesterday since I had seen her,
“I have come to see you”—she kissed
me warmly on the lips and cheeks—
“Your father is dead! my child.”

A tear stood in her dark eye, a slight
tremor moved her lip—that was all. My
father dead! I can scarcely describe
the emotions which these words caused.
I had not seen my father for years.—
There was still a memory of his face
present with me, coupled with an indistinct
memory of my early childhood,
passed in a city of a foreign land, and a
dim vision of a voyage upon the ocean.
and at my mother's words, there came
up the laughing face and sunny hair of
my brother Gulian, who had suddenly
disappeared, about the time my parent
returned from Paris, and just before I
had been placed in the charge of the
good clergyman. These mingling memories
arose at my mother's words, and
although the good clergyman stood more
to me in the relation of a father than my
own father, still I wept bitterly as I
heard the words, “Your father is dead!
my child.”

My mother, who seemed to me like
one of those grand rich ladies of whom
I had read in story books, seated herself
beside me on the cottage porch.

“You are getting quite beautiful,
Frank,” she said, and lifted my sun-bonnet,
and put her hand through the curls
of my hair, which was black as jet.
“You will be a woman soon.” She
kissed me, and then, as she turned
away, I heard her mutter these words,
which struck me painfully, although then
I could not understand them—“A woman!
with your mother's beauty for
your dowry, and your mother's fate for
your future!”

The slight wrinkle between her brows
grew deeper as she said these words:

“You will be a woman, and must have
an education suitable to the station you
will occupy,” continued my mother,
drawing me gently to her, and surveying
me earnestly. “Now, what do they
teach you here?

She laughed as I gravely related the
part which good old Alice, the housekeeper,
took in my education. Old Alice
taught me all the details of housekeeping;
to sew, to knit, the fabrication of
good pies, good butter, and good bread;
the mystery of the preparation of various
kinds of preserves; in fact, all the details
of housekeeping, as she understood
it. And the good old dame, with her
high cap, clear bright little eye, sharp
nose, and white apron string with a
bundle of keys, always concluded her
lessons with a mysterious intimation,
that saving the good Mr. Walworth
only, all the men in the world were
monsters more dangerous than the bears
which ate up the bad children who
mocked at Elijah.

Laughing heartily, as she heard me
gravely enter into all these details—
which I concluded with, “You see,
mother, I'm quite a housekeeper already!”—she
continued:

“And what does he teach you, my
dear?”

The laughter which animated her face
was succeeded by a look of vague curiosity,
as I began my answer. But as I
went on, her face became sad, and there
were tears in her eyes.

My father (as I had learned to call the
good clergyman) taught me to read, to
write and cypher. He gradually disclosed
to me, (more by his conversation
than through the medium of books,) the
history of past ages, the wonders of the
heavens above me, the properties of the
plants and flowers that grew in my
path. And oftentimes, by the bright
wood fire in winter, or upon the porch
under the boughs, in the rich twilight of
the summer evening—while the stars
twinkled through the leaves, or the Hudson
glistened in the lights of the rising
moon—he had talked to me of God—
of His love for all of us, His providence
watching the sparrow's fall, His mercy
reaching forth its almighty arms to the
lowest of earth-stricken children—of

the other world, which stretches beyond
the shores of the present, not dim and
cloud-shadowed, but rich in the sunlight
of eternal love, and living with the
realities of a state of being in which
there shall be no more sickness, or
pain, and tears shall be wiped from
every eye, and all things be made new
—of the holy mother watching over her
holy child, while the stars shone in upon
his humble bed in the manger—of that
child, in early boyhood, sitting in the
Temple, confounding grave men, learned
in the logic of the world, by the simple
intuition of a heart filled with the presence
of God—of the way of life, led by
that mother's child, when thirty years
had set the seal of the divine manhood
on his brow—how, after the day's hard
travel, he stopped to rest at the cottage
home of Martha and Mary—how he took
up little children and blessed them—
how the blind began to see, the deaf to
hear, the dead to live, at sound of his
voice—how, on the calm of evening, in a
modest room, he took his Last Supper
with the Twelve, John resting on his
bosom, Judas scowling in the background—how,
amid the cedars of Gethsemane,
at dead of night, while his disciples
slept, he went through the unalterable
agony alone, until an angel's hand
wiped the sweat of blood from his brow,
—how he died upon the felon's tree, the
heaven black above him, the earth beneath
him dark with the vast multitude,
—and how, on the clear Sabbath morn,
he rose again, and called the faithful woman
who had followed him to the sepulchre
by the name which his mother
bore, spoken in the old familiar tone,
“Mary!”—how he walked the earth in
bodily form eighteen hundred years ago,
shedding the presence of God around
him; and even now, he walked it still in
a spiritual body, shedding still upon sin-stricken
and sorrowing hearts, the presence
and love of God the Father. Lessons
such as these the good clergyman,
my father as I called him, taught me,
instructing me always to do good and
lead a life free from sin, not from fear of
damnation or hell, but because goodness
is growth, a good life is happiness. A
flower shut out from the light is damned;
it cannot grow. An evil life here or
hereafter is in itself damnation; for it
is want of growth, paralysis or decay of
all the higher sentiments and nobler faculties.

As, in my own way, and with such
words as I could command, I recounted
the manner in which the good clergyman
educated me, my mother's face grew sad
and tearful. She did not speak for some
moments; her gaze was downcast, and
through her long dark eyelashes tears
began to steal.

“A dream,” she muttered,—“only a
dream! Did he know mankind, and
know but a portion of their unfathomable
baseness, he would see the impossibility
of making them better; would feel
the necessity of an actual hell, black as
the darkest that a poet ever fancied.”

As she was thus occupied in her own
thoughts, a step—a well-known step—
resounded on the garden walk, and the
good clergyman advanced from the
wicket gate to the porch. Even now, I
see that pale face, with the white hair
and large clear eyes!

He advanced and took my mother cordially
by the hand, and was much affected
when he heard of my father's death.
My mother thanked him warmly for
the care which he had taken of her
child:

“This child will be a woman soon, and
she must be prepared to enter upon life
with all the accomplishments suitable to
the position which she will occupy,” continued
my mother. “I wish her to remain
with you, until she is ready to enter
the great world. But she must have
proper instruction in music and dancing.
She must not be altogether a wild country
girl when she goes into society. But,
however, my dear Mr. Walworth, we
will talk of this alone.”

Young as I was I could perceive that
there was a mystery about my mother,
her previous life or present position,
which the good clergyman did not feel
himself called upon to penetrate.

She took his arm, and led him into the
cottage, and they conversed for a long
time alone, while I remained upon the
porch, buried in a sort of dreamy reverie,
and watching the white clouds as they
sailed along the summer sky.

“I shall be absent two years.” I
heard my mother's voice, as, leaning on
the good clergyman's arm, she again came
forth upon the porch. “See that when
I return, in place of this pretty child, you

will present to me a beautiful and accomplished
lady.”

She took me in her arms and kissed
me, while Mr. Walworth exclaimed:

“Indeed, my dear Madam, I can never
allow myself to think of Frances leaving
this home, while I am living. She has
been with me so long, is so dear to me,
that the very thought of parting with her
is like tearing my heart-strings.”

He spoke with undisguised emotion;
my mother took him warmly by the
hand, and again thanked him for the care
and love which he had lavished on her
child.

At length she said “Farewell!” and
I watched her as she went down the garden
walk, to the wicket gate, and then
across the road, until she entered a bye-path
which wound among the hills of the
Neprehaun into the valley below. She
was lost to my sight in the shadows
of the foliage. She emerged to view
again far down the valley, and I saw her
enter her grand carriage, and saw her
kerchief waving from the carriage window,
as it rolled away.

I watched, O how earnestly I watched,
until the carriage rose to sight, on
the summit of a distant hill, beyond the
spire of the village church. Then, as it
disappeared, and bore my mother from
my sight, I sat down and wept bitterly.

Would I had never seen her face
again!

2. CHAPTER II.

A year passed away.

It was June again. One summer
evening I took the path which led from
the garden to the summit of the hill
which rose behind the cottage. As I
pursued my way upward, the sun was
setting, and at every step I obtained a
broader glimpse of the river, the dark
Palisades, and the bay white with sails.
When I reached the summit, the sun was
on the verge of the horizon, and the sky
in the west all purple and gold. Seating
myself on the huge rock, which rose on
the summit, surrounded by a circle of
good old trees, I surrendered myself to
the quiet and serenity of the evening
hour. The view was altogether beautiful.
Beneath me sloped the broad hill, clad
in wheat, which already were changing
from emerald to gold; farther down,
my cottage home, half hidden among
trees; then, beneath the cottage, the
houses of the village dotted the hills
among which wound the Neprehaun.
The broad river and the wide bay, heaving
gently in the fading light, and the
dark Palisades rising blackly against
the gold and purple sky. A lovelier view
cannot be imagined. And the air was
full of summer; scented with breath of
vines and blossoms, and new-mown hay.
As I surrendered myself to thoughts
which rose unbidden, the first star came
tremulously into view, and the twilight
began to deepen into night. I was thinking
of my life—of the past—of the future.
A strange vision of the great world struggled
into dim shape before the eye of my
mind.

“A year more, and I will enter the
great world!” I ejaculated. A hand was
laid lightly on my shoulder—I started to
my feet with a shriek.

“What, Frank, don't you know me?”
said a half-laughing voice; and I beheld
beside me a youth of some nineteen or
twenty years, whose face, shaded by dark
hair, was touched by the last flush of the
declining day. It was Ernest, the only
son of the good clergyman. I had not
seen him for three years. In that time,
he had grown from boyhood into young
manhood. He sat beside me on the rock,
and we talked together as freely as when
we were but little children. Ernest was
full of life and hope; his voice grew deep,
his dark eyes large and lustrous, as he
spoke of the prospects of his future.

“In one year, Frank, I will graduate,
and then—then—the great world lies before
me!” His gaze was turned dreamily
to the West, and his fine features drawn
in distinct profile against the evening
sky.

“And what part, Ernest, will you play
in the great world?”

“Father wishes me to enter into the
ministry, but”—and he uttered a joyous,
confident laugh—“whatever part I play I
know that I will win!”

He uttered these words in the tone
of youth and hope that has never been
darkened by a shadow, and then turning
to me—

“And you, Frank, what part will you
play in the great world?” he said.

“I know not; my career is in the
hands of my only parent, who will come

next year to take me hence. My childhood
has been wrapt in mystery; and
my future—Oh! who can foretell my
future?”

He gazed at me, for the first time, with
an earnest and searching gaze. His eyes,
large and gray, and capable of the most
varied expression, became absent and
dreamy.

“You are very beautiful!” he said, as
though thinking aloud. “O, very beautiful!
You will marry rich—yes, wealth
and position will be yours at once.”

And as the moon, rising over the brow
of the hill, poured her light upon his
thoughtful face, he took my hand and
said. “Frank, why is it that certain natures
live only in the future or the past
—never in the present? Look at ourselves,
for instance. Yonder, among the
trees, bathed in the light of the rising
moon, lies the cottage home in which we
have passed the happiest, holiest hours
of life. Of that home we are not thinking
now, we are only looking forward to
the future, and yet the time will come,
when, immersed in the conflict of the
world, we will look back to that home
with the same yearning that one stretched
upon the couch of hopeless disease
looks forward to his grave!”

His voice was low and solemn; I never
forgot his words. We sat for many minutes
in silence. At length, without a
word, he took my hand, and we went
down the hill together, by the light of
the rising moon. We climbed the
style, passed under the garden boughs,
and entered the cottage, and found the
good old man, seated in his library among
his books. He raised his eyes, as we
come in, hand joined in hand, and a look
of undisguised pleasure stole over his
face.

“See here, father!” said Ernest, laughingly.
“When I went to college, I left
my little sister in your care. I now return
and discover that my little sister
has disappeared, and left in her place the
wild girl whom I found wandering to-night
among the hills. Don't you think
there is something like a witch in her
eyes?”

The old man smiled and laid his hand
on my dark hair.

“Would to Heaven!” he said, “that
she might never leave this quiet home.”
And the prayer came from his heart.

Ernest remained with us until fall.
Those were happy days. We read, we
talked, we walked, we lived with each
other. More like sister and sister, than
brother and sister, we wandered arm in
arm to the brow of the hill as the rich
summer evening came on,—or crossed
the river in early morning and climbed the
winding road that led to the brow of the
Palisades,—or sat at night under the
trees by the river's bank, watching the
stars as they looked down into the calm
water. Sometimes at night we sat in
the library, and I read, while the old
man's hand rested gently on my head,
and Ernest sat by my side. And often
upon the porch, as the summer night
wore on, Ernest and myself sang together
some old familiar hymn, while
“father” listened in quiet delight. Thus
three months passed away, and Ernest
left for college.

“Next year, Frank, I graduate,” he
cried, his thoughtful face flushed with
hope, and his gray eyes full of joyous
light—“and then for the battle with the
world!”

He left, and the cottage seemed blank
and desolate. The good clergyman felt
his absence most keenly.

“Well, well!” he would mutter, “a
year is soon round, and then Ernest will
be with us again!”

As for myself, I tried my books, my
harp, took long walks alone, busied myself
in household cares, but I could not
reconcile myself to the absence of Ernest.

Winter came, and one night a letter
arrived from Ernest to his father, and in
that letter, one for Frank! How eagerly
I took it from “father's” hand, and hurried
to my room; that room which I remember
yet, so vividly, with its window
opening on the garden, and the picture
of the Virgin Mary on the snow-white
wall. Unmindful of the cold, I sat down
alone, and perused the letter—O how
eagerly! It was a letter from a brother
to a sister, and yet beneath the calm
current of a brother's love there flowed
a deeper and a warmer love. How joyously
he spoke of his future, and how
strangely he seemed to mingle my name
with every image of that future! I read
his letter over and over, and slept with
it upon my bosom. And I dreamed, O
such air-castle dreams, in which a whole

life-time seemed to pass away, while Ernest
and Frank, always young, always
happy, went wandering, hand in hand,
under skies without a cloud. But I
awoke in fright and terror. It seemed
to me that a cold hand—like that of a
corpse—was laid upon my bosom, and
somehow I thought that my mother was
dead, and that it was her hand. I
started up in fright and tears, and lay
shuddering until the rising sun shone
gaily through the frosted window-pane.
Another year had nearly passed away.

It was June again, and it was towards
evening, that I stood upon the cottage
porch, watching—not the cloudless sky
and glorious river, bathed in the setting
sun—but watching earnestly for the
sound of a footstep. Ernest was expected
home. He had graduated with
all the honors—he was coming home.
How I watched and waited for that
welcome step! At last the wicket gate
was opened, and Ernest's step resounded
on the garden walk. Concealing myself
among the vines which covered one of
the pillars of the porch, I watched him
as he approached, determining to burst
upon him in a glad surprise, as soon as
he reached the steps. His head was
downcast, he walked with slow and
thoughtful steps; his long black hair fell
wild and tangled on his shoulders. The
joyous hue of youth on his cheek had
been replaced by the pallor of long and
painful thought. The hopeful boy of the
last year had been changed into the
moody and ambitious man. As he came
on, although my heart swelled to bursting
at sight of him, I felt awed and
troubled, and forgot my original intention
of bursting upon him in a merry
surprise. He reached the porch—he ascended
the step—and I glided silently
from behind the pillar and confronted
him. O how his face lighted up as he saw
me! His eyes, no longer glassy and abstracted,
were radiant with a delight too
deep for words!

“Frank!” he said, and silently pressed
my hand.

“Ernest!” was all I could reply, and
we stood in silence—both trembling,
agitated—and gazing into each other's
eyes.

The good clergyman was happy that
evening, as he sat at the supper table
with Frank on one hand and Ernest on
the other. And old Alice, peering at us
through her spectacles, could not help
remarking—“Well, well! only yesterday,
children, and now such a handsome
couple!”

After supper, Ernest and I went to the
rock on the summit of the hill, where we
had met the year before. The scene
was the same—the river, the bay, the
dark Palisades, and the vast sky, illumined
by the rising moon—but somehow
we seemed changed. We sat apart from
each other on the rock, and sat for a
long time in silence. Ernest, with downcast
eyes, picked in an absent way at
some flowers which grew in the crevices
of the rock. And I—well, I believe I
tied the strings of my sun-bonnet into
all sorts of knots. I felt half disposed
to laugh and half disposed to cry.

At last I broke the silence—

“You have fulfilled your words, Ernest,”
I said, “you have graduated with
all the honors—as last year you said
you would—and now a bright career
stretches before you. You will go forth
into the great world—you will battle,
you will win!”

“Frank,” said he, stretching forth his
hand, “do you see yonder river, as it
flows broad and rapid in the light of the
rising moon? You speak of a bright
career before me—now I almost wish
that I was quietly asleep beneath those
waves.”

The sadness of his tone and look went
to my heart.

“You surprise me, Frank. Now,”
and I attempted a laugh, “you have not
fallen in love since last year, have
you?”

He looked up and surveyed me from
head to foot. I was dressed in white—
my hair fell in curls to my shoulders.
In a year I had passed from the girl into
the woman. I was taller, my form more
roundly developed. And as he gazed
upon me, I was conscious that he was
remarking the change which had taken
place in my appearance, and that his look
was one of ardent admiration.

“Do you think that I have fallen in
love since last year?” he said slowly,
and with a meaning look.

I turned away from his gaze and exclaimed—

“But you are moody, Ernest. Last
year you were so hopeful—now so melancholy.

You can, you will succeed in
life!”

“That I can meet with what the
world calls success, I do not doubt,” he
replied. “There is the career of the
popular preacher, armed with a white
handkerchief and a velvet Gospel—of
the lawyer, growing rich with the rent
paid to him by crime, and devoting all the
powers of his immortal soul to prove that
black is white and white is black—of the
merchant, who sees only these words
printed upon the face of God's universe,
`Buy cheap and sell dear.' Careers such
as these, Frank, are before me, and I am
free to choose, and doubt not but that I
could succeed in any of them. But to
achieve such success, I would not spend
—I do not say the labor of years—no—
I would not spend the thought of a single
hour.”

“But the life of a good minister of the
Gospel, Ernest, living in some quiet
country town, dividing his time between
his parishioners and his books, and
dwelling in a house like the cottage
yonder—what say you to such a life,
Ernest?”

He raised his eyes, and again surveyed
me earnestly. “Ambitious as I am, I
would sacrifice every thought of ambition
for a life such as you picture, but
upon one condition.” He paused.

“And that condition?” I said, in a
low voice.

3. CHAPTER III.

“Ask your own heart,” was his reply,
uttered in a tremulous voice.

I felt my bosom heave—was agitated,
trembling I knew not why—but I made
no answer.

There was a long and painful pause.

“The night is getting chill,” I said at
length, for want of something better to
say; “father is waiting for us; let us go
home.”

I led the way down the path, and he
followed moodily, without a word. As
he helped me over the stile, I saw that
his face was pale, his lips tightly compressed.
And when he came into the
presence of his father, he replied to the
old man's kind questions in a vacant and
abstracted manner. I bade him “good-night!”
at last; he answered me, but
added in a low tone, inaudible to the old
man, “Young, and rich, and beautiful,
you are beyond the reach of—a country
clergyman.”

The next morning, while we were at
breakfast, a letter came; it was from my
mother; to-morrow she would come and
take me from the cottage!

The letter dropt from the old man's
hand, and Ernest, rising abruptly from
the table, rushed from the room.

And I was to leave the home of my
happiest hours, and go forth into the
great world! The thought fell like a
thunderbolt upon every heart in the cottage.

After an hour, Ernest met me on the
porch; he was very pale.

“Frank,” said he kindly, “to-morrow
you will leave us for ever. Would you
not like to see once more the place yonder”—he
pointed across the river to the
Palisades—“where we spent so many
happy hours last summer?” He spoke
of that dear nook, high up among the
rocks, encircled by trees, and canopied
by vines, where we had indeed spent
many a happy hour.

I made no reply, but put on my sun-bonnet
and took his arm, and in a little
while we were crossing the river, he
rowing while I sat in the stern. It was
a beautiful day. We arrived at the opposite
shore, at a point where the perpendicular
wall of the Palisades is for a mile
or more broken by a huge and sloping
hill, covered with giant forest trees. Together
we took the serpentine path,
which, winding towards all points of the
compass, led to the top of the Palisades.
The birds were singing, broad forest
leaves and hanging vines quivered in the
sun, the air was balmy, and the day the
very embodiment of the freshness and
fragrance of June. As we wound up the
road, (whose brown gravelled surface contrasted
with the foliage,) we saw the sunlight
streaming in upon the deep shadows
of the wood, and heard from afar the lulling
music of a waterfall. Departing
from the beaten road, we wandered
among the forest trees, and talked together
as gladly and as familiarly as in
other days. There we wandered for
hours, now in sunlight, now in shadow,
now resting upon the brow of some moss-covered
rock, and now stopping beside a
spring of clear cold water, half-hidden by
thick green leaves. As noon drew near,
we ascended to the top of the forest

hill, and, passing through a wilderness of
tangled vines, came suddenly upon a rude
farm-house, one story high, built of logs,
whose dark surface contrasted with the
verdure of the garden and the foliage
of the overshadowing tree. It was the
same as in the year before. There was
the well-pole rising above its roof and
the well-bucket moist with clear cold
water, and in the doorway stood the farmer's
dame, who had often welcomed us
to her quiet home.

“Bless me!” how handsome my children
have grown!” she cried; “and how's
the good dominie? Come in, come in,
the folks are all away in the fields; come
in, and rest you, and have some pie and
milk, and”—she paused for breath—“and
some dinner.”

The good dame would take no denial,
and we sat down to dinner with her. I
can see the scene before me now,—the
carefully sanded floor, the old clock in
the corner, the cupboard glistening with
the burnished pewter, the neatly spread
table, the broad hearth, covered with
green boughs, and the open windows,
with the sunbeams playing through the
encircling vines; and then the good
dame, with her high cap, round, good-humored
face, and spectacles resting on
the bridge of her hooked nose. As we
broke the homemade bread with her, we
were as gay as larks.

“Well, I do like to see young folks enjoy
themselves,” said the dame. “You
don't know how often I have thought of
you since you were here last summer. I
have said, and I will say it, that a handsomer
brother and sister I never yet did
see.”

“But you mistake,” said Ernest; “we
are not brother and sister.”

“Only cousins,” responded the dame,
surveying us attentively; “well I'm glad
of it. For there is no law agin cousins
marrying, and you'd make such a handsome
couple.” And she laughed until
her sides shook.

Leaving the farm-house, we bent our
way to the Palisades again. We had
been gay and happy all the morning;
now we became thoughtful. We entered
a narrow path, and presently came
upon the dear nook where we had spent
so many happy hours. It was a quiet
space of green sward and velvet moss,
encircled, on all sides save one, by the
trunks of giant forest trees; the oak, the
tulip, the poplar and the sycamore—
which arose like rugged columns, their
branches forming a roof far overhead.
Half way between the sward and the
branches, hung a display of vines, swinging
in the sunlight, and showering blossoms
and fragrance in the summer air.
Light shrubbery grew between the massive
trunks of the trees, and in one part
of the glade a huge rock arose, its summit
projecting over the sward, and forming
a sort of canopy, or shelter, for a
rustic seat fashioned of oaken boughs.
Looking upward through the drapery of
vines and the roof of boughs, only one
glimse of blue sky was visible. Toward
the east the glade was open, and over the
tops of the forest trees, (which rose from
the glen beneath,) you saw the river, the
distant village and my cottage home
shining in the sun. At the foot of the
oak, which formed one of the portals of
the glade, was a clear cold spring, resting
in a basin of rock, and framed in
leaves and flowers. Altogether, the
dear nook of the forest was worthy of
June.

For a moment we surveyed the quiet
scene—thought of the many happy hours
we had spent there, in the previous summer—and
then, turning our faces to the
east, we stood hand linked in hand, gazing
over forest trees and river, upon our
far-off cottage home.

“Does it not look beautiful as it shines
there in the sun?” I said.

Ernest at first did not reply, but turned
his gaze full upon me. His face was
flushed and there was a strange fire in
his eyes.

“To-morrow you leave that home for
ever!” he exclaimed; and I trembled, I
knew not why, at the sound of his voice.
“I will never see you again.” He dropped
my hand and turned his face away
I saw his head fall on his breast, and saw
that breast heave with agitation. Urged
by an impulse I could not control, I
glided to his side, put my hand upon his
arm, and looked up into his face.

“Ernest,” I whispered.

He turned to me, for a moment regarded
me with a look of intense passion,
and then caught me to his heart. His
arm was around me, my bosom heaved
against his breast, his kiss was on my
lips—the first kiss since childhood, and

O how different from the kiss which a
brother presses on a sister's lips!

“Frank, I love you! Many beautiful
women have I seen, but there is that in
your gaze, your voice, your very presence,
which is heaven itself to me. I
cannot live without you, and cannot,
cannot think of losing you without madness.
Frank, be mine, be my wife! Be
mine, and the house which shines yonder
in the sunlight shall be ours! Frank,
for God's sake, say you love me!”

He sank at my feet and clasped my
knees with his trembling hands. O, the
joy, the rapture of that moment! As I
saw his face upraised to mine, I felt that
I loved him with all my soul, that I
could die for him. Reaching forth my
hands, I drew him gently to his feet,
and fell upon his breast and called him
“husband!” Would I had died there,
on his bosom, even as his lips met mine,
and the words “my wife!” trembled on
my ear! Would I had at that moment
fallen dead upon his breast!

Even as he gathered me to his bosom
the air all at once grew dark; looking
overhead we saw a vast cloud rolling up
the heavens—dark as midnight, yet
fringed with sunlight. Onward, on it
rolled; the air grew darker, darker; an
ominous thunder-peal broke over our
heads, and rolled away among the gorges
of the hills. Then the glade grew
dark as night. We could not see each
other's faces. For a moment our distant
home shone in sunlight, and then the
eastern sky was wrapt in clouds, the
river hidden by driving rain. Trembling
with fright I clung to Ernest's neck; he
bore me to the bench in the shadow of
the rock; another thunder-peal, and a
flash of lightning that blinded me. I
buried my face in his bosom to hide my
eyes from that awful glare. The tempest
which had arisen so suddenly—even as
we exchanged our first vows—was now
upon us and in power. The trees rocked
to the blast. The distant river was now
dark, and now one mass of sheeted flame.
Peal on peal the thunder burst over our
heads, and as one peal died away in distant
echoes, another more awful seemed
hurled upon us from the very zenith.
And amid the darkness and glare of that
awful storm, I clung to Ernest's neck,
my bosom beating against his heart, and
we repeated our vows, and talked of
our marriage, and laid plans for our future.

“Frank, my heart is filled with an
awful foreboding,” he said, and his voice
was so changed and husky that I raised
my head from his bosom, and even in
the darkness sought to gaze upon his
face. A lightning flash came and was
gone, but by that momentary glare I
saw his countenance agitated in every
lineament.

“What mean you, Ernest?”

“You will leave our home to-morrow
and never return—never! The sunshine
which was upon us, as we exchanged our
vows, was in a moment succeeded by the
blackness of the awful tempest. A bad
omen, Frank, a dark prophecy of our
future. There is only one way to turn
the omen of evil into a prophecy of
good!”

He drew me closer in his arms and
bent his lips to my ear—“Be mine, and
now! Be mine! Let the thunder-peal
be our marriage music—this forest glade
our marriage couch!”

I was faint, trembling, but I sprang
from his arms, and stood erect in the
centre of the glade. My dark hair fell
to my shoulders. A flash of lightning
lit up my form, clad in snow-white. As
wildly, as completely as I loved him, I
felt my eyes flash with indignation.

“Words like these to a girl who has
been reared under your father's roof?”

He fell at my feet—besought my forgiveness
in frantic tones—and bathed
my hands with his tears.

I fainted in his arms.

When I unclosed my eyes again, I
found myself pure and virgin in the
arms of my plighted husband. The
clouds were parting, the tempest was
over, and the sun shone out once more.
Every leaf glittered with diamond drops.
The last blast of the storm was passing
over the distant river and through the
driving clouds; I saw the sunlight shining
once more upon our cottage home.

“Forgive me, Frank! forgive me!” he
cried, bending passionately over me.

“See!—your bad omen has been
turned into good!” I cried joyfully.

“First, the sunshine; then, the storm;
but now the sun shines clear again”—
and I pointed to the diamond drops glittering
in the sun.

“And you will be true to me, Frank?”

“Before Heaven, I promise it; in life,
in death, for ever!”

4. CHAPTER IV.

It was towards the close of the afternoon
that we took our way from the
glade through the forest to the river
shore. We crossed the river, and passed
through the village. Together we ascended
the road that led to our home,
and at the wicket gate, found a splendid
carriage, with liveried servants.

The good clergyman stood at the gate,
his bared forehead and white hairs bathed
in the sunshine; beside, darkly dressed,
diamonds upon her rich attire, my
mother. Old Alice stood weeping in
the background.

“Come, Frank, your things are packed,
and we must be away,” she said abruptly,
as though we had seen each
other only the day before. “I wish to
reach our home in New-York before
night. Go in the house, dear”—she
kissed me—“and get your bonnet and
shawl. Quick! my love.”

Not daring to trust myself to speak—
for my heart was full to bursting—I
hurried through the gate, and along the
garden walk.

“How beautiful she has grown!” I
heard my mother exclaim. One look
into the old familiar library room, one
moment in prayer by the bed in which
I had slept since childhood.

Placing the bonnet on my curls, and
wrapping my shawl around me, I hurried
from my cottage home. There were a
few moments of agony, of blessings, of
partings and tears. Old Alice pressed
me in her arms, and bid me good-bye.
The good old clergyman laid his hands
upon my head, and, lifting his streaming
eyes to heaven, invoked the blessing of
God upon my head.

“I give your child to you again!” he
said, placing me in my mother's arms,
“May she be a blessing to you, as for
years past she has been the blessing and
peace of my home!”

I looked around for Ernest—he had
disappeared.

I entered the carriage, and sunk sobbing
on the seat.

“But I am not taking the dear child
away from you for ever,” said my mother,
bending from the carriage window. “She
will come and see you often, my dear
Mr. Walworth, and you will come and
see her. You have the number of our
town residence on that card. And bring
your son, and good Alice with you,
and” —

The carriage rolled away.

So strange and unexpected had been
the circumstances of this departure from
my home, that I could scarce believe
myself awake.

I did not raise my head, until we had
descended the hill, passed the village,
and gained a mile or more on our way.

We were ascending a long slope, which
led to the summit of a hill, from which,
I knew, I might take a last view of my
childhood's home

As we reached the summit of the hill,
my mother was looking out of one window
toward the river, and I looked out
of the other, and saw, beyond the church-spire
and over the trees, the white walls
of my home.

Ernest was by the carriage. “Frank!”
whispered a low voice. There was a
look exchanged, a word, and he was
gone—gone into the trees by the roadside.

He left a flower in my hand. I placed
it silently in my bosom.

“Frank! How beautiful you have
grown!” said my mother, turning from
the window, and fixing on me an ardent
and admiring gaze. And the next moment
she was wrapt in thought, and the
wrinkle grew deeper between her brows.

Before I resume my own history, I
must relate an incident in the life of Ernest,
which had an important bearing on
his fate. (This incident I derive from
MSS. written by Ernest himself.) Soon
after my departure from the cottage-home,
he came to New-York with his
father, and they directed their steps to
my mother's residence—as indicated on
the card which she had left with the
clergyman. But to their great disappointment
they discovered that my mother
and myself had just left town for
Niagara Falls. Six months afterward
Ernest received a long letter from me,
concluding with these words: “To-morrow
myself and mother take passage for
Europe in the steamer. We will be absent
for a year or more.”

Determined to see me at all hazards,
he hurried to town, but—too late! The
steamer had sailed; her flag fluttered in
the air, far down the bay, as standing on
the Battery Ernest followed her course,
with an almost maddened gaze. Sorrowfully
he returned to the country, and
informed his father of my sudden departure
for Europe.

“Can she have forgotten us?” said the
old man.

“O father, this letter!” replied Ernest,
showing the long letter which I had written,
“this will show you that she has not
forgotten us, but that her heart beats
warmly as ever—that she is the same.”

And he read the letter to the good old
man, who frequently interrupted him
with: “God bless her! God bless my
child!”

Soon afterwards Ernest came to New-York
and entered his name in the office
of an eminent lawyer. Determining to
make the law his profession, he hoped to
complete his studies before my return
from Paris. He lived in New-York, and
began to move in the circles of its varied
society. Among the acquaintances which
he made were certain authors and artists,
who, once a month, in company with a
few select friends, gave a social supper at
a prominent hotel.

At one of these suppers Ernest was a
guest. The wine passed round, wit
sparkled, and the enjoyment of the festival
did not begin to flag even when midnight
drew near.

While one of the guests was singing, a
portly gentleman, (once well known as a
man of fashion, the very Brummel of the
side-walk,) began to converse with Ernest
in a low voice.

He described a lady—a young widow
with a large fortune—who at that time
occupied a large portion of the interest
of certain circles in New-York. She was
exceedingly beautiful. She was witty,
accomplished, eloquent. She rivalled in
fascination Ninon and Aspasia. Nightly,
to a select circle, she presided over festivals
whose voluptuousness was masked
in flowers. Her previous history was
unknown, but she had suddenly entered
the orbit of New-York social life—of a
peculiar kind of social life—as a star of
the first magnitude. His blood heated
by wine, his imagination aroused by the
description of his fashionable friend, Er
nest manifested great curiosity to behold
this singular lady.

“You shall see her to-night—at once,”
whispered the fashionable gentleman.
“She gives a select party to-night. Let
us glide off from the company unobserved.”

They passed from the company, took
their hats and cloaks—it was a clear,
cold winter night—and entered a carriage.

“I will introduce you by the name of
Johnson—Fred Johnson, a rich southern
planter,” said the fashionable gentleman.
“You need not call me by my real name;
call me Lawson.”

“But why this concealment?” asked
Ernest, as the carriage rolled on.

“O, well, never mind,” added Lawson,
(as he desired to be called,) and then
continued: “We'll soon be near her mansion,
or palace, is the more appropriate
word. You will find some of the first
gentlemen and finest ladies of New-York
under her roof. I tell you she'll set you
half wild, this `Midnight Queen!'”

“`Midnight Queen?'” echoed Ernest.

“That's what we call her. A `midnight
queen' indeed; as mysterious and
beautiful as the midnight moon shining
in an Italian sky.”

They arrived in front of a lofty mansion,
situated in one of the most aristocratic
parts of New-York. Its exterior
was dark and silent as the winter midnight
itself.

“A light hid under a bushel—outside
dark enough, but inside bright as a new
dollar,” whispered Lawson, ascending
the marble steps and ringing the bell.

The door was opened for the space of
six inches or more.

“Who's there!” said a voice from
within.

Lawson bent his face close to the aperture,
and whispered a few words inaudible
to Ernest. The door was opened
wide and carefully closed and bolted behind
them, as soon as they crossed the
threshold. They stood in a vast hall,
lighted by a hanging lamp.

“Leave hats and cloaks here, and
come.” Lawson took Ernest by the
hand and pushed open a door.

They entered a range of parlors, brilliantly
lighted by two chandeliers, as
brilliantly furnished with chairs, and sofas,
and mirrors, and adorned with glowing

pictures and statues of white marble.
A piano stood in a recess, and in the last
parlor of the three a supper-table was
spread. These parlors were crowded by
some thirty guests, men and women,
some of whom, seated on the chairs and
sofas, were occupied in low whispering
conversation, while others took wine at
the supper-table, and others again were
grouped round the piano, listening to
the voice of an exceedingly beautiful
woman.

Ernest uttered an ejaculation. Never
had he seen a spectacle like this—never
seen before, grouped under one roof, so
many beautiful women. Beautiful women,
richly dressed, their arms and
shoulders bare, or veiled only by mist-like
lace, which gave new fascination to
their charms. It did not by any means
decrease the surprise of Ernest, when he
discovered that some of the ladies—those
whose necks and shoulders glowed most
white and beautiful in the lights—wore
masks.

“What is this place?” he whispered
to Lawson, as, apparently unheeded by
the guests, they passed through the parlors.

“Hush! not so loud!” whispered his
companion. “Take a glass of wine, my
boy, and your eyesight will be clearer.
This place is a quiet little retreat, in
which certain gentlemen and ladies of
New-York, by no means lacking in wealth
or position, endeavor to carry the Koran
into practice, and create, even in our cold
climate, a paradise worthy of Mahomet.
In a word, it is the residence of a widowed
lady, who, blessed with fortune,
and all the good things which fortune
brings, delights in surrounding herself
with beautiful women and intellectual
men. How d'ye like that wine? There
are at least a hundred gentlemen in New-York
who would give a cool five hundred
to stand where you do now, or even
cross the threshold of this mansion. I'm
an old stager, and have brought you here
in order to enjoy the effect which a scene
like this produces on one so inexperienced
as you. But you must remember one
law, which governs this place and all
who enter it.”

“That condition?”

“All that is said or done remains a
secret forever within the compass of
these walls; and you must never recog
nize, in any other place, any person whom
you have first encountered here. This
is a matter of honor, Walworth.”

“And where is the `Midnight Queen?'”

“She is not with her guests, I see; but
I will give you an answer in a moment,”
and Lawson left the room.

Drinking glass after glass of champagne,
Ernest stood by the supper-table,
a silent spectator of that scene, whose
voluptuous enchantment gradually inflamed
his imagination and fired his
blood. He seemed to have been suddenly
transported from dull matter-of-fact,
every-day life, to a scene in some
far oriental city, in the days of Haroun
Alraschid; and he surrendered himself
to the enchantment of the place, like one
for the first time enjoying the intoxication
of opium.

Lawson returned, and came quietly to
his side.

“Would you like to see the `Midnight
Queen' alone—in her parlor?” he whispered.

“Of all things in the world. You
have roused my curiosity. I am like a
man in a delicious dream.”

“Understand me. She is chary of her
smiles to an old stager like me; but I
think that there is something in you that
will interest her. She awaits you in her
apartments. You are a young English
lord, on your travels—(better than a
planter)—Lord Stanley Fitzgerald. With
that black dress and sombre face of yours,
you will take her wonderfully.”

“But can I indeed see her?”

“Leave the room—ascend the stairs:
at the head of the stairs a light shines
from a door which is slightly open.
Take a bold heart and enter.”

Inflamed by curiosity, by the wine
which he had drunk, and the scene
around him, Ernest did not take time
for second thought, but left the room,
ascended the stairs, and stood before the
door, from whose aperture a belt of light
streamed out upon the dark passage.
There for a moment he hesitated, but
that was all. He stood spell-bound by
the scene. If the parlors below were
magnificently furnished, this apartment
was worthy of an empress. There were
lofty walls hung with silk hangings, and
adorned with pictures; a couch with a
silken canopy; mirrors that glittered
gently in the rich voluptuous light—in

a word, every detail of luxury and extravagance.

In the centre of all stood the Midnight
Queen—in one hand she held an open
letter. Her back was turned to Ernest,
as he lingered near the threshold. Her
neck and shoulders were bare, and he
could remark at a glance their snowy
whiteness and voluptuous outlines, although
her dark hair was gathered in
glossy masses upon the shoulders, half
hiding the face from view. A dark dress,
rich in its simplicity, left her arms bare,
and did justice to the rounded proportions
of her form.

She turned and confronted Ernest,
even as he, the blood bounding in his
veins, advanced a single step.

At once they spoke:

“My Lord Stanley, I believe”—

“The Midnight Queen”—

The words died on their lips. They
stood as if suddenly frozen to the floor.
The beautiful face of the Midnight Queen
was pale as death, and as for Ernest, the
glow of the wine had left his cheek—his
face was livid and distorted.

Moments passed and neither had power
to speak.

“O my God, it is Frank!” the words
at last burst from the lips of Ernest, and
he fell like a dead man at her feet.

Yes, the Midnight Queen and Frances
Van Huyden, his betrothed wife—six
months ago resting on his bosom, and
whispering “husband” in his ear, and
now—the wife of another! A widow!
or one utterly fallen from all virtue and
all hope!

Having thus given the incident from
the life of Ernest, as far as possible from
the very words of his MSS., let me continue
my history from the hour when in
company with my mother I left the cottage
home of the good clergyman. After
the incident just related, nothing in my
life can appear strange.

5. CHAPTER V.

I was riding in my carriage with my
mother towards New-York.

“You are indeed very beautiful, Frank,”
said she, once more regarding me attentively.
“Your form is that of a mature
woman, and your carriage (I remarked
it as you passed up the garden walk) excellent.
But this country dress will not
do. We will do better than all that
when we get to town.”

It was night when the carriage left the
avenue and rolled into Broadway. The
noise, the glare, the people hurrying by,
all frightened me. At the same time,
Broadway brought back a dim memory
of my early childhood in Paris. Turning
from Broadway, the carriage at length
stopped before a lofty mansion, the windows
of which were closed from the side
walk to the roof.

“This is your home,” said my mother,
as she led me from the carriage up the
marble steps into the hall, where, in the
light of a globular lamp, a group of servants
in livery awaited us.

“Jenkins!”—my mother spoke to an
elderly servant in dark livery, turned up
with red—“let dinner be served in half
an hour.”

Then turning to another servant, not
quite so old, but wearing the same livery,
she said:

“Jones! Miss Van Huyden wishes to
take a look at her house before we go to
dinner. Take the light and go before
us.”

The servant, holding a wax candle,
placed in a huge silver candlestick, went
before us and showed us the house, from
the first to the fourth floor. Never before
had I beheld such magnificence, even
in my dreams. I could not restram ejaculations
of pleasure and surprise at every
step—my mother keenly regarding me,
sometimes with a faint smile, and sometimes
with the wrinkle growing deeper
between her brows. A range of parlors
on the lower floor were furnished with
everything that the most extravagant
fancy could desire, or exhaustless wealth
procure. Carpets that gave no echo to
the step, sofas and chairs cushioned with
velvet, and (so it seemed to me) framed
in gold, mirrors extending from the ceiling
to the floor, pictures, statues, and
tables with tops either of marble or
ebony, the walls lofty, and the ceiling
glowing with a painting which represented
Aurora and the Hours winging
their way through a summer sky.

“Whose picture, mother?” I asked,
pointing to a picture of a singularly handsome
man, with dark hair and beard, and
eyes remarkable at once for their brightness
and expression.

“Your father, dear,” answered my

mother, and again the mark between her
brows became ominously perceptible.
“There is your piano, Frank—you'll find
it something better than the one which
you had at the good parson's.”

The servant led the way up the wide
stairway, thickly carpeted, to the upper
rooms. Here the magnificence of the
first floor was repeated on a grander and
more luxurious scale. We passed through
room after room, my eyes dazzled by
new signs of wealth and luxury at every
step. At last we paused on the thick
carpet of a spacious bed chamber, whose
appointments combined the richest elegance
with the richest taste. It was
hung with curtains of light azure. An
exquisite and touching picture of the
Virgin Mary confronted the toilette table
and mirror. A bed, with coverlet
white as snow, satin-covered pillows and
canopy of lace, stood in one corner. And
wherever I turned, there were signs of
neatness, taste and elegance. I could
not too much admire the apartment.

“It is your bed-room, my dear,” said
my mother, silently enjoying my delight.

“Why,” said I laughingly, “It's grand
enough for a queen.”

“And are you not a queen?” answered
my mother; “and a very beautiful one?”

Turning to the servant, who stood
staring at me with eyes big as saucers,
she said—

“Tell Mrs. Jenkins, the housekeeper,
to come here.” Jones left the chamber,
and presently returned with Mrs. Jenkins,
a portly lady, with a round, good-humored
face.

“Frank, this is your housekeeper.”
Mrs. Jenkins simpered and courtesied,
shaking at the same time the bundle of
keys at her waist. “Mrs. Jenkins, this
is your young mistress, Miss Van Huyden.
Give me the keys.”

She took the keys from the housekeeper,
and placed them in my hands.

“My dear, this house, and all that it
contains, are yours. I surrender it to
your charge.”

Scarcely knowing what to do with
myself, I took the keys—which were
heavy enough—and handing them back
to Mrs. Jenkins, hoped that she would
continue to superintend the affairs of
my mansion, as heretofore. All of
which pleased my mother, and made
her smile.

“We will go to dinner without dressing,”
and my mother led the way down
stairs to the dining-room. It was a
large apartment, in the centre of which
stood a luxuriously furnished table, glittering
with gold plate. Servants in livery
stood like statues behind my chair
and my mother's. How different from
the plain fare and simple style of the good
clergyman's home! Nay, how widely
contrasted with the rude dinner in a log
cabin, to which Ernest and myself sat
down a few hours ago!

In vain I tried to partake of the rich
dishes set out before me. I was too
much excited to eat. Dinner over, coffee
was served, and the servants retired.
Mother and I were left alone.

“Frank, do you blame me,” she said,
looking at me carefully, “for having you
reared so quietly, far away in the country,
in order that at the proper age, strong
in health, and rich in accomplishment
and beauty, you might be prepared to
enter upon the engagements and duties
suitable to your station?”

How could I blame her?

I spoke gratefully, again and again,
of the wealth and comfort which surrounded
me, and then, forgetting it all,
broke forth into impassioned praise of
my cottage home, of the good clergyman,
of old Alice, and—Ernest.

Something which came over my mother's
face at the mention of Ernest's
name, warned me that it was not yet
time to speak of my engagement to her.

That night I bathed my limbs in a
perfumed bath, laid my head on a silken
pillow, and slept beneath a canopy of
lace, as soft, and light, and transparent,
as the summer mist through which you
can see the blue sky and the distant
mountain. And resting on the silken
pillow, I dreamed—not of the splendor
with which I was surrounded, nor of the
golden prospects of my future—but of
my childhood's home, and the quiet
scenes of other days. In my sleep, my
heart turned back to them. Once more
I heard the voice of the good old man.
I heard the shrill tones of Alice, as the
sun shone on my frosted window-pane
on a clear cold winter morn. Then the
voice of Ernest, calling me “wife,” and
pressing me to his bosom in the forest
nook. I awoke with his name on my
lips, and—

My mother stood by the bedside gazing
upon me attentively, a smile on her
lips, but the wrinkle darkly defined
between her brows. The sun shone
brightly through the window curtains.

“Get up! my dear;” she kissed me,—
“You have a busy day before you.”

And it was a busy day! I was handed
over to the milliners and dressmakers,
and whirled in my carriage from
one jeweller's shop to another. It was
not until the third day that my dresses
were completed,—according to my mother's
taste,—and not until the fourth
that the jewels which were to adorn my
forehead, my neck, my arms and bosom,
had been properly selected. Wardrobe
and diamonds worthy of a queen!—and
was I happy? No. I began to grow
homesick for my dear quiet home, on the
hill-side above the Neprehaun.

It was on the fourth day, in the afternoon,
that my mother desired my presence
in the parlor, where she wished to
present me to a much esteemed friend,
Mr. Wareham,—Mr. Wallace Wareham.

“An excellent man,” whispered my
mother, as we went down stairs together,
“and immensely rich.”

I was richly dressed in black, my
neck, my arms and shoulders bare. My
dark hair, gathered plainly aside from
my face, was adorned by a single snow-white
flower. As I passed by the mirror
in the parlor, I could not help feeling
a sort of womanly pride, or—vanity;
and my mother whispered, “Frank, you
excel yourself to-day.”

Mr. Wareham sat on the sofa, in the
front parlor, in the mild light of the curtained
window. He was an elderly gentleman,
somewhat bald, and slightly
inclined to corpulence. He was sleekly
clad in black, and there was a gold chain
across his satin vest, and a brilliant
diamond upon his ruffled bosom. He
sat in an easy, composed attitude, resting
both hands on his gold-headed cane.
At first sight he impressed me, as an
elderly gentleman, exceedingly nice in
his personal appearance, and that was
all. But there was something peculiar
and remarkable about his face and look,
which did not appear at first sight.

I was presented to him; he rose and
bowed; and took me kindly by the
hand.

Then conversing in a calm, even tone,
which soon set me at ease, he led me
to talk of my childhood,—of my home
on the Neprehaun,—of the life which I
had passed with the good clergyman. I
soon forgot myself in my subject, and
grew impassioned—perchance, eloquent.
I felt my cheeks glow and my eyes
sparkle. But all at once I was brought
to a dead pause, by remarking the singular
expression of Mr. Wareham's face.

I stopped abruptly, blushed, and at a
glance surveyed him closely.

His forehead was high and bald, and
encircled by slight curls of black hair,
streaked with gray, its expression eminently
intellectual. But the lower part
of his face was heavy, almost animal.
There was a deep wrinkle on either side
of his mouth; and as for the mouth
itself, its upper lip was thin, almost
imperceptible, while the lower one was
large, projecting, and of a deep red, approaching
purple; thus presenting a singular
contrast to the corpse-like pallor
of his cheeks. His eyes, half hidden under
the bulging lids, when I began my
description of my childhood's home, all
at once expanded, and I saw their real
expression and color. They were large,
the eyeballs exceedingly white, and the
pupils clear gray, and their expression
reminding you of nothing that you had
ever seen or heard of, but simply made
you afraid. And as the eyes expanded,
a slight smile would agitate his upper
lip, while the lower one protruded,
disclosing a set of artificial teeth, white
as milk. It was the sudden expansion
of the eyes, the smile on the upper lip
and the protrusion of the lower one,
that made up the peculiar expression
of Mr. Wareham's face—an expression
which made you feel as though you
had just awoke from a grotesque yet
frightful dream.

“Why do you pause, daughter?” said
my mother, observing my confusion.

“Proceed, my child,” said Mr. Wareham,
devouring me from head to foot,
with his great eyes, at the same time
rubbing his lower lip against the upper,
as though he was tasting something
good to eat. “I enjoy these delightful
reminiscences of childhood. I doat on
such things.”

But I could not proceed—I blushed
again, and the tears came into my eyes.

“You have been fatigued by the bustle

of the last three days,” said my mother,
kindly. “Mr. Wareham will excuse
you,” and she made me a sign to
leave the room.

Never was a sign more willingly
obeyed. I hurried from the room, and
as I closed the door, I heard Mr. Wareham
say in a low voice—

“She'll do. When will you tell her?”

6. CHAPTER VI.

That night, as I sat on the edge of
my bed, clad in my night-dress, my
dark hair half gathered in a lace cap,
and half falling on my shoulders, my
mother came suddenly into the room,
and, placing her candle on the table,
took her seat by me on the bed. She
was, as I have told you, an exceedingly
beautiful woman, in spite of the threads
of silver in her hair, and the ominous
wrinkle between her brows. But as she
sat by me, and put her arm about my
neck, toying with my hair, her look was
infinitely affectionate.

“And what do you think of Mr. Wareham,
dear?” she asked me, and I felt
that her gaze was fixed keenly on my
face.

I described my impressions frankly,
and with what language I could command,
concluding with the words, “In
short, I do not like him. He makes
me feel afraid.”

“O, you'll soon get over that,” answered
my mother. Now he takes a
great interest in you. Let me tell you
something about him. He is a foreign
gentleman, immensely rich; worth hundreds
of thousands, perhaps a million.
He has estates in this country, in England
and France. He has travelled over
half the globe; on further acquaintance
you will be charmed by his powers of
observation, his fund of anecdote, his
easy flow of conversational eloquence.
And then he has a good heart, Frank!
I could keep you up all night in repeating
but a small portion of his innumerable
acts of benevolence. I met him
first in Paris, years ago, just after he
had unhappily married. And since I first
met him, he has been my fast friend.
He is a good, a noble man, Frank; you
will, you must like him.”

“But then his eyes, mother! and that
lip! and I cast my eyes meekly to the
floor.

“Pshaw!” returned my mother, with
a start, “Don't allow yourself to make
fun of a dear personal friend of mine.”
She kissed me on the forehead. “You
will like him, dear,” and bade me good-night!

And on my silken pillow I slept and
dreamed—of home—of the good old man
—of Ernest and the forest nook—but
all my dreams were haunted by a vision
of two great eyes and a huge red lip—
everywhere, everywhere they haunted
me, the lip now projecting over the clergyman's
head, and the eyes looking over
Ernest's shoulder. I awoke with a start
and a laugh.

“You are in good spirits, my child,”
said my mother, who stood by the bed.

“I had a frightful dream, but it ended
funnily. All night long I've seen nothing
but Mr. Wareham's eyes and lip;
but the last I saw of them, they were
flying like butterflies a few feet above
ground. Eyes first, and lip next, and
old Alice chasing them with her broom.”

“Never mind; you will like him,”
rejoined my mother.

I certainly had every chance to like
him. For three days he was a constant
visitor at our house. He accompanied
mother and myself in a drive along
Broadway, and out on the avenue. I
enjoyed the excitement of Broadway,
and the fresh air of the country, but—
Mr. Wareham was by my side, talking
pleasantly, even eloquently, and looking
all the while as if he would like to eat
me. We went to the opera, and for the
first time, the fairy world of the stage
was disclosed to me. I was enchanted
—the lights, the costumes, the music,
the circle of youth and beauty, all wrapt
me in a delicious dream, but—close by
my side was Mr. Wareham, his eyes
expanded and his lip protruding; I
thought of the Arabian Nights, and was
reminded of a well-dressed ghoul. I began
to hate the man. On the fourth day
he brought me a handsome bracelet,
glittering with diamonds, which my mother
bade me accept, and on the fifth
day I hated him with all my soul. There
was an influence about him, which repelled
me and made me afraid.

It was the sixth night in my new
home, and, in my night-dress, I was

seated on the edge of my bed, the candle
near, and my mother by my side. She
had entered the room with a serious and
even troubled face. The wrinkle was
marked deep between her brows. Fixing
my lace cap on my head, and smoothing
my curls with a gentle pressure of her
hand, she looked at me long and anxiously,
but in silence.

“O, mother,” I said, “when will we
visit `father,' and good old Alice, and
—Ernest? I am so anxious to see my
home again!”

“You must forget that home,” said
my mother, gravely. “You will shortly
be surrounded by new ties and new
duties. Nay, do not start and look at
me with so much wonder! I see that I
must be plain with you. Listen to me,
Frank! Who owns this house?”

“It is yours.”

“The pictures, the gold plate, the furniture,
worthy of such a palace?”

“Yours, all yours, mother.”

“Who purchased the dresses and the
diamonds which you wear?—dresses
and diamonds worthy of a queen.”

“You did, mother, of course.” I hesitated.

“Wrong, Frank! all wrong!” and her
eyes shone vividly, and the mark between
her brows grew blacker. “The
house which shelters you, the furniture
which meets your gaze, the dresses which
clothe you, and the diamonds which
adorn your person, are the property of—
Mr. Wareham.”

It seemed to me as if the floor had
opened at my feet. “O, mother, you
are jesting!” I faltered.

“I am a beggar, child, and you are a
beggar's daughter. It is to Mr. Wareham
that we are indebted for all that we
enjoy. For years he has paid the expenses
of your education. And now,
that you have grown to young womanhood,
he shelters you in a palace, surrounds
you with splendor that a queen
might envy; and, not satisfied with
this,”—

She paused and fixed her eyes upon
my face. I knew that I was frightfully
pale.

“Offers you his hand in marriage.”

For a moment, the light, the mirrors,
the roof itself swam round me, and I
sank, half fainting, into my mother's
arms.

“O, this is but a jest, a cruel jest, to
frighten me,—say, mother, it is a jest?”

“It is not a jest; it is sober, serious
earnest;” and she raised me sternly
from her arms. “He has offered his
hand, and you will marry him.”

I flung myself on my knees at the
bedside, clasped her hands, and as my
night-dress fell back from my shoulders
and bosom, I told her, with my sobs and
tears, of my love for Ernest, and my engagement
with him.

“Pshaw! A poor clergyman's son!”

“O, let us leave this place, mother,” I
cried, still pressing her hands to my bosom.
“You say that we are poor. Be
it so. We will find a home together, in
the home of my childhood. Or if that
fails us, I will work for you,—I will toil
from sun to sun, and all night long,—
beg,—do anything rather than marry
this man. For, mother—I cannot help
it—but I do hate him with all my soul.”

“Pretty talk, very pretty!” and she
tore her hand from my grasp. “But
did you ever try poverty, my child? Did
you ever know what the word meant,—
POVERTY! Did you ever work sixteen
hours a day at your needle for as many
pennies? Walk the streets at dead of
winter in half-naked feet, and go for two
long days and nights without a mouthful
of food? Did you ever try it, my child?
That's the life which poor widows and
their pretty daughters live here in New-York,
my dear.”

“But Ernest loves me; he will make
his way in life—we will be married
—you will share our home, dear mother.”

These words rendered her perfectly
furious. She started up and uttered a
frightful oath, and it was the first time I
had ever heard an oath from a woman's
lips. Her countenance for a moment
was fiendish. She assailed me with a
torrent of reproaches, concluding thus,—

“And this is your gratitude for the
care, the anxiety, the very agony of a
mother's anxiety, which I have endured
on your account for years? In return
for all, you condemn me to—poverty.
But it shall not be. One of us must
bend, and that one will not be me. I
swear, girl—” her brows were knit, she
was lividly pale, and she raised her right
hand to Heaven, “that you shall marry
this man!”

“And I swear,”—I bounded to my
feet, my bosom bare, and the blood boiling
in my veins; perchance it was the
same blood which gave my mother her
fiery temper,—“I swear that I will not
marry him, as long as there is life in me.
Do you hear me, mother? Before I
marry that miserable wretch, whose very
presence fills me with loathing, I will
fall a corpse at your feet!”

My words, my attitude, took her by
surprise. She surveyed me silently, but
was too much enraged to speak.

“O, that my father was living!” I
cried, the fit of passion succeeded by a
burst of tears—“he would save me from
this hideous marriage.”

My mother quietly drew a letter from
her bosom, and placed it open in my
hand.

“Your father is living. That letter is
the last one I have received from him.
Read it, my angel.”

I took it—it was very brief—I read it
at a glance. It was addressed to my
mother, and bore a recent date. These
were its contents:

It was a letter from a convict in Auburn
prison—and that convict was my
father!

7. CHAPTER VII.

“It is false—my father died years
ago!” I cried in very agony. “This is
not from my father.”

“It is from your father.” answered
my mother, “and, unless I send him the
clothes which he asks for, you will see
him in less than three weeks in his convict
rags.”

“Oh! mother, are you human? A
mother to taunt her own daughter with
her father's shame—”

My temples throbbed madly, and my
sight failed. All that mortal can endure
and be conscious. I had endured. I sank
on the floor, and had not my mother
caught me in her arms. I would have
wounded my forehead against the marble
table.

All night long, half waking, half de
lirions, I tossed on my silken couch,
mingling the name of my convict father
and of Ernest in my broken exclamations.
Once I was conscious for a moment,
and looked around with clear
eyes. My mother was watching over
me. Her face was bathed in tears. She
was human after all. That moment
past, the delirium returned, and I struggled
with horrible dreams until morning.

When I awoke next morning, my mind
was clear again, and, even as I unclosed
my eyes, and saw the sunlight shining
gaily through the curtains, a fixed purpose
took possession of my soul. It
was yet early morning. There was no
one save myself in the chamber. Perchance,
worn out by watching, my mother
had retired to rest. I quietly arose
and dressed myself—not in the splendid
attire furnished by my mother, but in
my plain white dress, bonnet and shawl
which I had brought with me from my
cottage home.

“It is early. No one is stirring in the
mansion. I can pass from the hall door
unobserved. Then it is only sixteen
miles to home—only sixteen miles—I
can walk it.”

And, at the very thought of meeting
“father” and Ernest again, my heart
leaped in my bosom. Determined to
escape from the mansion at all hazards,
I drew my veil over my face, my shawl
across my shoulders, and hurried to the
door. I opened it, my foot was on the
threshold—when I found myself confronted
by the portly form of Mrs. Jenkins.
“Pardon me, Miss,” she said, placing
herself directly before me—“Your
mother gave me directions to call her as
soon as you awoke.”

“But I wish to take a short walk and
breathe a little of the morning air,” I
answered, and attempted to pass her.

“The morning air is not good for
young ladies,” said another voice, and
my mother's face appeared over the
housekeeper's shoulder. “After a while
we will take a ride, my dear. For the
present, you will please retire to your
room.”

Startled at the sound of my mother's
voice, I involuntarily stepped back—the
door was closed, and I heard the key
turn in the lock.

I was a prisoner in my own room.
There I remained all day long my

meals were served by the housekeeper
and my maid Caroline. My mother did
not appear. How I passed that day, a
prisoner in my luxurious chamber, cannot
be described. I sat for hours, with
my head resting on my hands, and my
eyes to the floor. What plans of escape,
mingled with forebodings of the future,
crossed my brain! At length I took
pen and paper, and wrote a brief note to
Ernest, informing him of my danger, and
begging him, as he loved me, to hasten
at once to town and to the mansion.
This note I folded, sealed and directed,
properly.

“Caroline,” said I to my maid, who
was a pleasant-faced young woman of
about twenty, with dark hair and eyes,
“I would like this letter to be placed in
the post-office at once. Will you take
charge of it for me?”

“I'll give it to Jones,” she responded;
“he's going down to the post-office right
away.”

“But, Caroline,” I regarded her with
a meaning look, “I do not wish any one
to know that I sent this letter to the
post-office. Will you keep it a secret?”

“Not a livin' mortal shall know it—
not a livin' mortal”—and taking the letter
she left the room. After a few minutes
she returned with a smiling face,
“Jones has got it and he's gone!”

I could scarce repress a wild ejaculation
of joy. Ernest will receive it to-night—he
will be here to-morrow—I
will be saved!”

The day wore on and my mother
did not appear. Toward evening Caroline
came into my room, bearing a new
dress upon her arm—a dress of white
satin, richly embroidered and adorned
with the costliest lace.

“O, Miss, aint it beautiful!” cried
Caroline, displaying the dress before
me. “And the bonnet and veil to match
it will be here to night, an' your new
di'merdo. It is really fit for a queen.”

It was, indeed, a magnificent dress.

“Who is it for?” I asked.

“Now come, aint that good! `Who
is it for?' And you lookin' so innocent
as you ask it; as if you did not know
all the while that it is your bridal dress,
and that you are to be married airly in
the mornin', after which you will set off
on your bridal touer.”

“Caroline, where did you learn this?”
I asked, my heart dying within me.

“Why, how can you keep such things
secret from the servants? Aint your
mother been gettin' ready for it all day,
and aint the servants been flyin' here
and there, like mad, and Mr. Wareham's
been so busy all day, and lookin' so
pleased? Laus, Miss, how can you expect
to keep such things from the servants?”

I heard this intelligence conveyed in
the garrulous manner of my maid, as a
condemned person might hear the reading
of his death-warrant. I saw that
nothing could shake my mother in her
purpose. She was resolved to accomplish
the marriage at all hazards. In
the morning I was to be married, transferred
body and soul to the possession
of a man whom I hated in my very
heart.

But I resolved that he should not
possess me living. He might marry
me, but he should only place the bridal
ring upon the hand of a corpse.

The resolution came in a moment.
How to accomplish it was my next
thought.

Approaching Caroline in a guarded
manner, I spoke of my nervousness and
loss of sleep, and of a phial of morphine
which my mother kept by her for a nervous
affection.

“Could you obtain it for me, Caroline?
and without mother seeing you, for she
does not like me to accustom myself to
the use of morphine. I am sadly in want
of sleep, but I am so nervous that I cannot
close my eyes. Get it for me,” (I
put my arms about her neck,) “that's a
dear, good girl!”

“Laus, miss! how kin one resist your
purty eyes! It is in the casket on the
bureau, is it? Just wait a moment.”
She left the room and presently returned.
She held the phial in her hand.

I took it eagerly, pretended to place
it in the drawer of a cabinet which stood
near the bed, but, in reality, hid it in my
bosom.

“Now, mother, you may force on the
marriage,” I mentally ejaculated; “but
your daughter has the threads of her
own destiny in her hand.”

How had I accustomed myself to the
idea of suicide? It came upon me not
slowly, but like a flash of lightning. It

was in opposition to all the lessons I had
learned from the good clergyman. “But,”
the voice of the tempter, seemed whispering
in my ear, “while suicide is a
crime, it becomes a virtue when it is committed
to avoid a greater crime.” It is
wrong to kill my body, but infinitely
worse to kill both body and soul in the
prostitution of an unholy marriage.

As evening drew on I was left alone.
I bathed myself, arranged my hair, and
then attired myself in my white night
robe. And then—as the last glimpse
of day came faintly through the window
curtains—I sank on my knees by the
bed, and prayed. O how in one vivid
picture the holy memories of the past
came upon me in that awful moment!

“Ernest, I will meet you in the better
world!”

I drank the contents of the phial and
rose to my feet. At the same instant
the door opened and my mother appeared,
holding a lighted candle in her hand.
She saw me in my white dress—was
struck perchance by the wildness of my
gaze—and then her eye rested upon the
extended hand which held the phial.

“Well, Frank, how do you like your
marriage dress?” she began, but stopped,
and changed color as she saw the phial.

“O mother,” I cried, “with my last
breath I forgive you, and pray God that
you may be able to forgive yourself.”

I saw her horror-stricken look, and I
fell insensible at her feet.

8. CHAPTER VIII.

Are we the victims of circumstance,
or are we, in every case, the authors of
our own fortune, or of our own ruin?
the causes of our own misery and crime?
A question hard to answer—and yet
which a myriad times ten thousand
hearts have died in attempting to solve.

Are there none who, from no fault of
their own, are suddenly hurled from a
life of calm innocence into an abyss of
shame that has no hope; of crime that
has no lower deep?

Are there none who, without a single
effort of their own, with no dark circumstance
to grapple with, not one temptation
to avoid, rise to the highest point
of what the world calls success, and die
at least in peaceful beds, rich in wealth
and honors?

Fate and free will are problems never
to be solved this side of the grave, but
for myself, from the depths of my agony,
I cannot crush the cry which rises to
my lips, “What was there in my childhood,
all purity and innocence, to deserve
the unutterable misery of my after
life?” But to my history:

When I awoke again—but I cannot
proceed. There are crimes done every
day, which the world knows by heart,
and yet shudders to see recorded even
in the most carefully veiled phrase. But
the crime of which I was the victim was
too horrible for belief. Wareham the
criminal, my own mother the accomplice,
the victim a girl of fifteen, who had been
reared in purity and innocence afar from
the world.

When I awoke again—for the potion
failed to kill, I found myself in my room
and Wareham by my side, surveying me
as a ghoul might look upon the dead
body which he has stolen from the
grave. The phial given to me by the
maid did not contain a fatal poison, but
merely a powerful anodyne, which sealed
my senses for hours in sleep, and,
combined with the re-action of harrowing
excitement, left me for days in a
state of half-dreamy consciousness. I
awoke—my sight was dim, my senses
dulled, but I knew that I was lost,
lost! Oh, how poor and tame that
word, to express the living damnation
of which I was the victim! The events
of the next twenty-four hours I can but
vaguely remember. I was taken from
the bed, arrayed in the bridal costume,
and then led down stairs into the parlor.
There was a marriage celebrated there
(as I was afterwards told). Yes! it was
there that a minister of the Gospel, book
in hand, sanctified with the name of
marriage the accursed bargain of which
I was the victim—marriage, that sacrament
that makes of home, God's holiest
altar, the truest type of heaven—marriage
was in my case made the cloak of
an unspeakable crime.

I can remember that I said some
words which my mother whispered in
my ear, and that I signed my name to a
letter which she had written. It was
the letter which Ernest received, announcing
my attention to visit Niagara.
As for the letter which I had written to
him on the previous day, it never went

farther than from the hands of Caroline
to those of my mother. I was hurried
into a carriage, Wareham by my side,
and then on board of a steamboat, and
have a vague consciousness of passing up
the Hudson river. I did not clearly recover
my senses until I found myself at
Niagara Falls, leaning on Wareham's
arm, and pointed at by the crowd of
visitors at the Falls as “the beautiful
bride of the millionaire.”

From the Falls, we passed up the
Lakes, and then retraced our steps, visited
the Falls again, journeyed to Montreal,
and then home by Lake Champlain
and the Hudson river. My mother did
not accompany us. We were gone
three months, and as the boat glided
down the Hudson, the trees were already
touched by autumn. As the boat drew
near Tapaan bay I concealed myself in
my state-room. I dared not look upon
my cottage home.

We arrived at home towards the close
of a September day. My mother met
me at the door, calm and smiling. She
gave me her hand—but I pushed it
quietly away. Wareham led me up the
steps. I stood once more in that house,
from which I had gone forth like one
walking in her sleep. And that night,
while in our chamber, Wareham and
myself held a conversation, which had
an important bearing on his life and
mine.

I was sitting alone in my chamber,
dressed in a white wrapper, and my hair
flowing unconfined upon my shoulders;
my hands were clasped and my head
bent upon my breast. I was thinking
of the events of the last three months—
of all that I had endured from the man
whose very presence in the same room
filled me with loathing. My husband
entered, followed by Jenkins, who placed
a lighted candle, a bottle of wine, and
glasses on the table, and then departed.

“What! is my pretty girl all alone,
and in a thinking mood?” cried Wareham,
seating himself by the table and
filling a glass with wine. “And pray,
my love, what is the subject of your
thoughts?”

And, raising his glass to his lips, he
surveyed me from head to foot with
that gloating gaze which always gave a
singular light to his eyes. His face was
slightly flushed on the colorless cheeks.
He had already been drinking freely,
and was now evidently under the influence
of wine.

“You have a fine bust, my girl,” he
continued, as though he was repeating
the `points' of a horse—“a magnificent
arm, a foot that beats the Medicean Venus
all hollow, and limbs,” (he paused
and sipped his wine, protruding his nether
lip, which now was scarlet red,)
“such limbs! I like the expression of
your eyes, there's fire in them. And
your clear brown complexion, and your
moist red lips, and”—he sipped his wine
again—“altogether an elegant-built female.”

And he rose and approached me. I
also rose, my eyes flashing and my bosom
swelling with suppressed rage.

“Wareham, I warn you not to touch
me,” I said in a low voice. “For three
months I have been your prey. I will
be so no longer. Before the world you
may call me wife, if you choose—you
have bought the right to do that,—but
I inform you, once for all, that hence
forth we are strangers. Do you understand
me, Wareham? I had as lief be
chained to a corpse, as to submit to be
touched by you.”

He fell back startled, his face manifesting
surprise and anger, but in an instant
his gaze was upon me again, and
he indulged in a low burst of laughter.

“Come, I like this! It is a pleasant
change from the demure, pious-girl
of three months ago, into the full-blown
tragedy queen,”—he sank into a chair
and filled another glass of wine. “Be
seated, Frank, I want to have a little
talk with my pet.”

I resumed my seat.

“You give yourself airs under the impression
that you are my wife—joint
owner of my immense fortune—my rich
widow in perspective. Erroneous impression,
Frank. I have a wife living in
England.”

The entirely malignant look which
accompanied these words, convinced
me of their sincerity. For a moment I
felt as though an awful weight had
crushed my brain, and by a glance at
the mirror, I saw that I was frightfully
pale. But, recovering myself by a strong
exertion of will, I answered him in these
words:—

“Gentlemen who allow themselves

more than one wife at a time, are sometimes
(owing to an unfortunate prejudice
of society) invited to occupy a department
in the State Prison.”

“And so you think you hold a rod
over my head?” He drank his wine.
“But I have only one wife, Frank. The
gentleman who married you and me, was
neither a clergyman nor officer of the
law, but simply a convenient friend.
Our mock marriage was not even published
in the papers.”

Every word went like an icebolt to
my heart. I could not speak. Then as
his eye glared, with a mingled look of
hatred and of brutal passion, he sipped
his wine as he surveyed me, and continued:

“You used the word `bought,' some
time ago. You were right. `Bought'
is the word. You are simply my purchase.
In Constantinople these things
are easily managed. They keep an open
market of fine girls there; but here we
must find an affable mother and pay a large
price—sometimes even marry the dear
angels. I met your mother in Paris
some years ago, and have been intimately
acquainted with her ever since. When
she first spoke of you, you were a child,
and I was weary of the world—jaded,
sick of its pleasures—by which I mean
its women. An idea struck me! What
if this pretty little child, now being educated
in innocence and pious ways, and
so forth, should, in the full blossom of
her beauty and piety—say at the ripe
age of sixteen—become the consoler of
my declining years? And so I paid the
expenses of your education (your father
consenting that I should adopt you;
but very possibly understanding the
whole matter as well as your mother),
and you were accordingly educated for
me. And when I first saw you three
months ago, it was your very innocence
and pious way of talking which gave an
irresistible effect to your beauty, and
made me mad to possess you at all hazards.”

It is impossible to depict the bitter
mocking tone in which these words were
spoken.

“I settled this mansion, the furniture
and so forth, upon your mother, with
ten thousand dollars. That was the
price. You see how much you have cost
me, my dear.”

“But I will leave your accursed mansion”—I
felt, as I spoke, as though my
heart was dead in my bosom,—“I am
not chained to you in marriage. I am
at least free.” I started to my feet and
moved a step toward the door.

“But where will you go? Back to
your elderly clerical friend, with every
finger levelled at you, and every voice
whispering, `There goes the mistress of
the rich Englishman!' Back to your
village lover, to palm yourself upon him
as a pure and spotless maiden?”

I sank into the chair and covered my
face with my hands.

“Or will you begin the life of a poor
seamstress, working sixteen hours a day
for as many pennies, and at last take to
the streets for bread!”

His words cut me to the quick. I saw
that there was no redemption in this
world for a woman whose innocence has
been sacrificed.

“But think better of it, my dear!
Your mother shall surround you with
the most select and fashionable company
in New-York; she shall give splendid
parties; you will be the presiding genius
of every festival. As for myself, dropping
the name of husband, I will sink
into an unobtrusive visitor. When you
see a little more of the world, you will
not think your case such a hard one after
all.”

My face buried in my hands, I had not
one word of reply. Lost—lost! utterly
lost!

9. CHAPTER IX.

My mother soon afterward gave her
first party. It was attended by many
of the rich and the fashionable of both
sexes; and there was the glare of light,
the presence of beautiful women, and the
wine-cup and the dance. The festival
was prolonged till daybreak, and another
followed soon. The atmosphere was new
to me. At first I was amazed, then intoxicated,
and then—corrupted. Anxious
to bury the memory of my shame, to forget
how lost and abandoned I was, to
drown every thought of my childhood's
home, and of Ernest, who never could be
mine, soon, from a silent spectator, I became
a participant in the revels, which,
night after night, were held beneath my
mother's roof. The persons who mingled

in these scenes were rich husbands,
who came accompanied by other men's
wives—wives who had sacrificed themselves
in marriage, for the sake of wealth,
to husbands twice their age; and these
came with the husbands of other women.
In a word, all that came to the mansion
and shared in its orgies, were either the
victims or the criminals of society—of a
bad social world, which on every hand
contrasts immense wealth and voluptuous
indulgence with fathomless poverty
and withering want, and which too often
makes of a marriage but the cloak for
infamy and prostitution.

—I shared in every revel, and lost myself
in their maddening excitement. I
was admired, flattered, and elevated, at
last, to the position of presiding genius
of these scenes. I became the “Midnight
Queen.” But let the curtain fall.

One night I noticed a new visitor—a
remarkably handsome gentleman—who
sat near me at the supper-table, and
whose hair and eyes and whiskers were
as black as jet. He regarded me very
earnestly, and with a look which I could
not define.

“Don't think me impertinent,” he
said; and then added, in a lower voice,
“for I am your father, Frank. Don't
call me Van Huyden—my name is Tarleton
now.”

Fearful that I might one day encounter
Ernest, I wrote him a long letter,
breathing something of the tone of my
early days—for I forgot for awhile my
utterly hopeless condition—and informing
him that mother and myself were
about to sail for Europe, I wished him
to believe that I was in a foreign land.

And one night, while the revel was
progressing in the rooms below, Wareham
entered my room, and interested
me in the description which he gave of
a young lord, who wished to be introduced
to me.

“Young, handsome, and pale as if from
thought. The very style of man you
admire, my pet.”

“Let him come up,” I answered, and
Wareham retired.

I stood before the mirror as the young
lord entered, and as I turned I saw the
face of my betrothed husband, Ernest
Walworth.

Upon the horror of that moment I
need not dwell.

He fell insensible to the floor, and was
carried from the room, and the house, to
the carriage, by Wareham, who had led
him to the place.

I have never seen the face of Ernest
since that hour.

I received one letter from him—one
only—in which he set forth the circumstances
which induced him to visit my
house, and in which he bade me “farewell!”

He is now in a foreign land. The
bones of his father rest in the village
church-yard. The cottage home is desolate.

Wareham died suddenly, about a year
after our “marriage.” The doctors said
that his death was caused by an overdose
of morphine, administered by himself
in mistake. He died in our house;
and as mother and myself stood over his
coffin, in the darkened room, the day before
the funeral, I noticed that she regarded
first myself, and then the face of
the dead profligate, with a look full of
meaning.

“Don't you think, dear mother,” I
whispered, “that the death of this good
man was very singular?”

She made no reply, but still her face
wore that meaning look.

“Wouldn't it be strange mother, if
your daughter, improving on your lessons,
had added another feature to her
accomplishments—had, from the Midnight
Queen”—I lowered my voice—
“become the Midnight Poisoner?”

I met her gaze boldly—and she turned
her face away.

He died without even a dog to moan
for him, and his immense wealth was inherited
by a deserted and much-abused
wife, who lived in a foreign land.

Immense wealth in him bore its natural
flower—a life of shameless indulgence
ending in a miserable death.

I did not shed very bitter tears at his
funeral. Hatred is not the word to express
the feeling with which I regard his
memory.

Soon afterwards my mother was taken
ill, and wasted rapidly to death. Hers
was an awful death-bed. The candle
was burning to its socket, and mingled
its rays with the pale moonlight which
shone through the window-curtains. Her
brown hair, streaked with gray, falling
to her shoulders, her form terribly emaciated,

and her eyes glaring in her
shrunken face, she started up in her bed
and clutched my hands in hers, and—
begged me to forgive her.

My heart was stone. I could not frame
one forgiving word. As her chilled hands
clutched mine, she rapidly went over the
dark story of her life—how, from an innocent
girl, she had been hardened into
the thing she was—and again, her eyes
glaring in my face, she sought my forgiveness.

“I forgive you, mother,” I said slowly,
and she died.

My father was not present at her
death, nor did he attend her funeral.

As for myself—what has the future in
store for me?

O, for rest! O, for forgiveness! O, for
a quiet sleep beneath the graveyard sod!

And with that aspiration for rest, forgiveness,
peace—uttered with all the
yearning of a heart sick to the core of
life, and all that life can inflict or give—
ended the manuscript of Frances Van
Huyden, the Midnight Queen.

—We will now proceed to give the
events of her life after the period comprised
in her autobiography.

10. CHAPTER X.

[Explanatory Note.—Many scenes we might
introduce from the life of the “Midnight Queen,”
but from that dark and troubled history we will
select but a single incident, the most important
of her life.

To understand this incident, the position of her
father, Colonel Tarleton, otherwise known as Charles
Van Huyden, must be clearly understood.

For nearly twenty-one years from the infancy of
Frances, he had lived with but one object—to remove
from public view one of the children of a deceased
brother, to obtain control of the other, and
thus achieve possession of that brother's immense
wealth. For this he planned and plotted; for this
he committed the forgery which consigned him to
the State Prison; for this he had even become a
silent party to the degradation of his daughter. One
heir of his brother's fortune removed, the other in
his power, he began to see, over all the crimes of
his life, the great motive of all his crimes ripen into
success—he began to see Frank, the Midnight Queen,
his daughter, in possession of almost boundless
wealth. The day came at last. Frank, in his presence,
had administered poison to one of the heirs.
This was in the morning. Tarleton left her house,
to complete his other scheme, to obtain possession
of the remaining heir. And evening drew near—
the evening which was to find all his schemes triumphant,
and Frank the heiress of incredible wealth.
Let us look into her sad home, in this evening
hour.]

It was toward evening when, amid the
crowd of Broadway—that crowd of mad
and impetuous life—there glided like a
spectre through the mazes of a voluptuous
dance, a man of sober habit, pallid
face and downcast eyes. Beautiful women,
wrapped in soft attire, passed him
every moment, brushed him with their
perfumed garments, but he heeded them
not. There was the free laugh, the buzz
of voices, and the tramp of footsteps all
about him, but he did not raise his eyes
nor bend his ear. Gliding along in his
dark habit, he was as much alone on that
thronged pathway as though he walked
the sands of an Arabian desert. A man
of hollow cheeks, features boldly marked,
and eyes large and dark, and shining with
the fire of disease, or with the restlessness
of a soul that had turned upon itself,
and was gnawing ever and ever at
its own life-strings.

His habit—a long black coat, single
breasted, and with a plain white band
about the neck—indicated that he was a
Catholic priest.

He was a priest. Struck down in his
early manhood by an irreparable calamity,
he had looked all around the horizon
of his life for—peace. Repose, a quiet
life, an obscure grave, became the objects
of his soul's desire, instead of the ambitions
which his young manhood had cherished.

As there was not peace within him, so
he searched the world for it, and in vain.

He sought it in a money-bound Protestant
church, behind whose pulpit bible,
like a toad upon an altar, (too often,)
Mammon, holy Mammon squats in bank-note
grandeur. And there he found
money and much cant, and abundance of
sect, but no peace.

To the Catholic church he turned.
Won by the poetry of that church—we
use the word in its awful and intense
sense—for poetry and religion are one—
he sought repose in its bosom. Did he
find peace?

Yes, when veiling his eyes from * * *
he opened the gospels, and from their
pages saw kindle into life and love, the
face of him whom creeds may ministerpret
or defame, but whose name forever,
to suffering humanity, is—“Consolation.”

As he passed thus along Broadway,
buried in his thoughts, and utterly unconscious
of the scene around him, he
felt a hand press his own. He awoke
from his thoughts, stopped and looked

around. The crowd was hurrying by,
but the person who pressed his hand had
disappeared. Was that pressure of the
hand a mere freak of the imagination?
No; for the hand of the unknown had
left within the hand of the priest, a
neatly folded letter, upon which, in a fair
and delicate hand, was written his own
name.

Stepping aside from the crowd, he
opened and read the letter. It was very
brief, but its contents called a glow to
the pale cheek of the priest.

He at once retraced his steps, and
passed down Broadway, with a rapid and
eager step. Hurrying through the gay
crowd, he turned in a few moments into
a street leading to the North river. The
sun was setting, and cast the shadow of
his slender form, long and black, over
the pavement, as he paused in front of a
stately mansion. He once more examined
the letter, and then surveyed the
mansion.

“It is the same,” he said, and ascended
the lofty steps and rang the bell.
“Truly, the office of a priest is a painful
one,” the thought crossed his mind, “he
sees so much misery that he has not the
power to relieve—misery under the rags
of the hovel, and despair under the velvet
of the palace.”

A male servant in livery answered the
bell, and glanced somewhat superciliously
at the faded attire of the priest. But
he inclined his head in involuntary respect
as the priest said simply—

“I am Father Luke.”

“This way, sir. You are expected,”
answered the servant, and he led Father
Luke along a lofty hall, and into a parlor,
over whose rich furniture shone dimly
the light of the setting sun. “Remain
here, sir, and I will announce your coming.”

He left the priest alone. Father Luke
placed his hat upon a table, and seated
himself in a chair. In a moment, resting
his cheek upon his hand, and turning his
eyes to the light (which shone through
the curtained windows) he was buried
in thought again. His singular and remarkable
face stood forth from the background
of shadow, like a portrait from
another age. His crown was bald, but
his forehead was encircled by dark hair,
streaked with silver. As the light shone
over that broad brow, and upon the great
eyes, dilating in their sunken sockets,
he seemed not like a practical man of the
nineteenth century, but like one of those
penitents or enthusiasts, who, in a dark
age, shut up the fires of their agony, of
tempted hope or undying remorse, within
the shadows of a cloister.

“This way, sir,”—it was the voice of
the servant, who touched him respect
fully on the shoulder as he spoke.

Father Luke arose and followed him
from the room, and up a broad stairway,
and along a corridor. “At the end of
this passage you will find a door. Open
it and enter. You are expected there.”

Passing from the corridor, lighted by
the window in its extremity, the priest
entered a narrow passage, where all was
dark, and pursued his way, until his progress
was terminated by a door. He
opened the door and crossed the threshhold,
but upon the very threshold stood
spell-bound in surprise.

It was a large apartment, with lofty
walls, and instead of the cheerful rays of
the declining sun, it was illuminated by
a lamp with a clouded shade, which, suspended
from the centre of the ceiling, shed
around a soft and mysterious light.

The walls were not papered nor panelled,
but covered with hangings of a dark
color. One part of the spacious chamber
was occupied by a couch, with a high canopy,
and curtains whose snowy whiteness
stood out distinctly from the dark background.
A wood fire was burning under
the arch of the old-fashioned fireplace;
and a mirror, in a frame of dark walnut,
reflected the couch with its white canopy,
and a table covered with a white cloth,
which stood directly underneath the
hanging lamp. Upon the white cloth
was placed a crucifix, a book, a wreath of
flowers.

The place was perfectly still, and the
soft rays of the lamp, investing all its details
with mingled light and shadow, gave
an atmosphere of mystery to the scene.

Father Luke stood on the threshold,
hesitating whether to advance or retreat,
when a low voice broke the stillness:

“Come in, sir; I have waited for you.”

And, for the first time, Father Luke
took notice of the presence of the speaker.
It was a woman, who, attired in black, sat
in a rocking chair near the table, her
hands folded over her breast. Her head
and face were covered by a thick veil of

white lace, which fell to her shoulders,
contrasting strongly with her sombre attire.

Father Luke entered and seated himself
in a vacant chair which stood near
the table. Resting his arm on the table,
(he sat directly beneath the lamp, in a
circle of shadow,) and shading his eyes
with his hand, he silently surveyed the
woman, over whom the light fell in full
radiance. There was dark hair, there
were bright eyes beneath that veil of
lace, a young, richly moulded form,
beneath that garb of sable—but in vain
he endeavored to trace the features of
the unknown.

“You received a letter?” said the lady
in a low voice.

“As I was passing up Broadway, a
few moments since, a letter was placed
in my hand, bidding my presence at this
house, on an errand of life and death.”

She started at the sound of that sonorous
and hollow voice, and, through her
veil seemed to survey him earnestly.

I am glad that you have come. I
thank you with all my soul. Although
not a member of your church, I have
heard of you for a long time, and heard
of you as one who, having suffered much
himself, was especially fitted to render
consolation to the heart-broken and despair-stricken.
Now, I am heart-broken
and despairing;” she paused; “I am dying”—

“Dying?” he echoed.

“And I have sent for you, believing
you to be an honest man, not to hear
confession of my sins, for they are too
dark to be told or be forgiven; but to
ask you a simple question, which I implore
you to answer not as a priest but
as a man—to answer not with the set
phrases of your vocation, but frankly and
fully, even as you wish to have peace
yourself in the hour of death”—

“And that question”—the priest's
head bent low upon his breast, and he
surveyed her earnestly with his eyes hidden
beneath his down-drawn brows.

“Do you believe in any hereafter? Do
you believe in another world? Does the
death of the body end the story? Or,
after the death of the body, does the soul
rise and live again, in a new, a diviner
life?”

“My sister,” said the priest, with much
emotion, “I know that there is a hereaf
ter—I know that the death of the body
is not the end of all, but simply the first
step in an eternal pilgrimage”—

“This you say as a man, and not as a
priest—this is your true thought, as you
wish to have peace in the hour of your
death?”

“Even so,” said Father Luke.

“Thank you, O, bless you with all my
soul. One question more—O, answer
me with the same frankness—in the next
world shall we meet and know the friends
whom we have loved in this?”

“We shall meet, we shall know, we
shall love them in the next world, as certainly
as we ever met, knew and loved
them in this,” was the answer of Father
Luke, given with all the force and earnestness
of undeniable sincerity. Do you
think we gather affections to our heart,
only to bury them in the grave?”

The lady rose from her chair.

“I thank you once more, and with all
my soul. Your words come from your
heart. They confirm the intuitions of
my own heart. For the consolation
which those words afford, accept the
gratitude of a dying woman. And now,”
she extended her hand, “and now, farewell!”

The priest, who, through this entire
interview, had never ceased to regard her,
with his eyes almost hidden by his down-drawn
brows—struggling all the while to
repress an agitation which increased
every moment, and well-nigh mastered
him—the priest also rose with these
words on his lips:

“You dying, sister? You seem young
and full of life, and with the prospect of
long years before you.”

It was either the impulse of madness,
or the force of a calm conviction, which
induced her to reply—

“In one hour I will be dead!”

The priest silently took her offered
hand, and at the same instant emerged
from the circle of shadow into the full
glow of the light. There was something
like magic in the pressure of their
hands.

And the woman lifted her veil, disclosing
a beautiful face, which, already
touched with the pallor of death, was
lighted by dark eyes, whose brightness
was almost supernatural.

Lifting her gaze heavenward, she said,
as though thinking aloud—

“In another world, Ernest, I will meet,
I will know, I will love you!”

But ere the words had passed her lips
—yes, as the slowly lifted veil disclosed
her face—the priest sank back, as though
stricken by a blow from an iron hand,
uttering a wild and incoherent cry—
sunk back as though the grave had
yielded up its dead, and confronted him
with a form, linked with holy, and yet
accursed memories.

“O, Frank, is it thus we meet!” he
cried, and fell on his knees, and buried
his face in his hands.

11. CHAPTER XI.

The sound of his voice at once lifted
the scales from her eyes—she knew him,
and the vague consciousness of his presence,
which had agitated her for the past
few moments, became certainty. She
knew that in Father Luke, who knelt
before her, she beheld Ernest Walworth,
her plighted husband. Sad and terrible,
indeed, must have been the change
which had fallen upon his countenance,
that she did not know him, when he first
sat before her in the shadow.

Trembling in every nerve, and yet
strong with the energy of a soul that
had taken its farewell of this life, she
gave utterance to her feelings in a single
word—his own name—pronounced in
the soft low tones of other days.

“Ernest!”

“O, Frank, Frank, is it thus we
meet?” he cried in wild agony, as he
raised his face. “You—you—the only
woman that I ever loved—you, whose
very memory has torn my heart since
that fatal hour when I met you in the
accursed haunt of death.”

“Ernest, you will sit by me as I die,
you will press your hand in forgiveness
on my forehead, my last look shall encounter
yours—”

She opened her dark robe, and disclosed
the snow-white dress which she
wore beneath it. That dress was a
shroud. Yes, the beautiful form, the
bosom which had once been the home
of a pure and stainless love, and which
had beat with the throb of sensual passion,
were now attired in a shroud.

“Behold me, attired for the grave!”
she said—and the tears started to her
eyes! “This morning, resolved to quit
this life, which for me has been a life of
unutterable shame and despair, I prepared
for my departure. Everything is
ready. Come, Ernest, and behold the
preparations for my bridal.” She pointed
to the couch; he rose and followed
her. “I am in love with death, and will
wed him ere an hour is gone.”

She drew aside the curtains, and upon
the white coverlet Ernest beheld a dark
object—a coffin covered with black cloth,
and glittering with a silver plate.

“Everything is ready, Ernest, and I
am going. Nay, do not weep, do not attempt
to touch my hand. I am but a
poor, polluted thing, a wreck, a miserable,
miserable wreck! My touch would
pollute you. I am not worthy your
tears.”

Ernest hid his face in the hangings of
the couch. He writhed in agony.

“You shall not die! you must be
saved!” he wildly exclaimed.

She walked across the floor with an
even step, and in a moment she was
seated in the rocking-chair, with Ernest
before her, his face hidden in his hands.
Her face grew paler every moment; her
eyes brightened; and the shroud which
enveloped her bosom began to quiver
with the last pulsations of her dying
heart. As the veil mingled its fleecy
folds with her raven hair, she looked
very beautiful; yes, beautiful with the
touch of death.

And as Ernest, choked with his agony,
sat before her, hiding his face, she talked
in a calm, even tone:

“Oh, life! life! you have been a
bitter draught to me, and now I'm about
to leave you! All day I have been
thinking of my shame, of my crimes—I
have summoned up every act of my life,
the images of the past have walked before
me, in a sad funeral procession. O,
Thou who didst forgive the Magdalene?
Thou who hadst compassion on the poor
wretch whose cross arose beside thine
own—Thou who dost know all my life,
my temptations and my crimes—forgive!
forgive! It is a wandering child, sick of
wandering, who now, O Thou All-merciful!
gathers up the wreck of a miserable
life, and lays it, with all its sins and
shames, at Thy feet!”

As she uttered this simple, yet awful
prayer, Ernest did not raise his face.

The agony which shook him was too
deep for words.

Her voice grew faint and fainter, as
she went on in a vague and rambling
way—

“And I was so innocent once, and did
not know what sorrow was, and felt such
gladness at the sight of the sky, of the
stars, of the flowers—at the very breath
of spring upon my cheek! O, I wonder
if the old home stands there yet; and
the nook in the forest; don't you remember
it, Ernest? I was so happy,
so happy, then! And now I am dying
—dying! but you are near. You forgive
me, Ernest, do you not?”

“Forgive you!” he echoed, raising his
face, and spreading forth his clasped
hands; God's blessing and His consolation
be upon you now and forever. And
His curse,” a look of hatred, which
stamped every lineament of his face, revealed
the intensity of his soul, “and
His curse be upon those who brought
you to this!”

As he spoke, the death-damps began
to glisten on her forehead; a glassy look
began to veil the intense brightness of
her eyes.

“Your hand—sit by me”—she said
faintly, I shall sleep soon.”

He drew his chair to her side, and
softly put his hand upon her forehead—
it was cold as marble.

“It is good to go thus—with Ernest
by me—and in token of forgiveness, too,
with his hand upon my forehead—”

Her words were here interrupted by
a footstep and a voice—

“Frank! Frank! where are you? I
have triumphed—triumphed! The one
child is out of my way, and the other is
in my power!”

It was Colonel Tarleton, who rushed
to the light, his face lividly pale, and disfigured
with wounds, his right arm carried
in a sling. He had not seen his
daughter since the hour when he left
her home, before the break of day; and
now, faint with loss of blood, and yet
strong in the consciousness of his triumph,
he rushed into the death-room of
his child.

“I have had a hard time, Frank, but
the game is won! The estate is ours!
The other son of Gulian Van Huyden is
in my power—”

The words died on his lips. He be
held the dark form of the stranger, and
the face of his dying child. The young
form clad in a shroud, the countenance
pale with death, the large eyes, whose
brightness was veiled in a glassy film—
he saw this sad picture at a glance, but
could not believe the evidence of his
senses.

“Why, Frank, what's all this?” he
cried, as, with his pale face marked by
wounds, he stood before his daughter.

She slowly raised her eyes, and regarded
him with a sad smile:

“The poison, father—I drank it myself—
he went forth from this house, safe
from all harm—”

Her voice failed.

Tarleton uttered a frightful cry, and
fell like a dead man on the floor, his face
against the carpet. The reality of the
scene had burst upon him; in the hour
of his triumph he saw his schemes—the
plans woven through the long course of
twenty-one years, and darkened by hideous
crimes—leveled in a moment to the
dust.

Frank slowly turned her head, and
fixed her glassy eyes upon the face of
Ernest. O, the intensity of that long
and yearning gaze!

“I am weary and cold,” she gasped,
but it is light yonder.”

And that was all. Her eyes became
fixed—she laid her head gently on her
shoulder and fell asleep.

She was dead.

Ernest knelt beside her, and with his
eyes flashing from their sunken sockets,
he clasped his hands, and uttered a
prayer for the dead.

The prayer was said, and Ernest rose
—his face all fixed as marble his eyes
all tearless; and in an absent way placed
his hand upon the head of the dead woman,
smoothed her dark hair, put his
kiss upon her clammy forehead, and
closed those eyes which had looked
their last upon this world. And she
sat there, in her death-chair, cold and
dead, but very beautiful, this sad child
of shame. Ernest, resting his hands upon
the arm of the chair, hid his face from
the light. Was he praying—was he endeavoring
to pierce the shadows of the
other world, and follow the wrecked spirit
to that throne where justice is more
tender than the tenderest mercy of
man?

A voice broke the dead stillness, and
a livid face was uplifted from the floor—

“It's an infernal dream, Frank, all a
dream! The estate is ours! One heir
by this time is dead—the other in
my power! You could not, no! no!—
you could not have put the poison to
your lips, instead of to his for whom it
was designed; you could not have been
so mad. The estate is ours! This talk
about your dying is all a dream—all—.”

He saw, at the same glance, even as he
wildly raved, the bended head of Ernest,
and the pale dead face of the Midnight
Queen.

Baffled schemer! Of all the plots and
crimes of twenty-one years, behold the
end! The game which you have played
was a dark one, but altogether cunning
and full of wisdom, worldly wisdom—
but it was only cunning, only full of
worldly wisdom—and now, you see that
death and fate are triumphant. Bow
your head, baffled schemer! and hide
your livid face from the light, while your
dead daughter sits erect in the death-chair.

“Why thus sadly bring this story to
a close? Why not rather save your heroine
from temptation and crime—link
her hand in that of Ernest—crown them
with the joys of wedded love, shed upon
them the baptism of the holy light of
home?” Because, reader, it is not a sto

ry, but a narrative. Look around the
world. In how many cases do you find
virtue triumphant and vice defeated? It
is well, right well, that beyond the darkness
of this life there is mercy and justice,
and the songs of angels; that there,
for the trampled heart of the tempted
and the fallen, is—consolation.

On some Sabbath day, when the
smoke of the incense and the music of
high mass fill the cathedral of * * *
you may note among the faces which
encircle the altar—even as the host is
lifted over the heads of the kneeling
thousands—one face which strikes you,
not so much with its deathly pallor, its
hollow cheeks, and eyes burning feverishly
in their sunken sockets, as with its
look of utter and irrevocable despair.
It is the face of one who, when life, and
more than life, was blasted at the core,
still had that noblest courage of all—the
courage to live on—Father Luke, once
called Ernest Walworth.

And—

On some June day, if you will thread
the path that winds up among the Palisades—in
sight of Tappan Bay—you may
pick a summer flower from an obscure
grave, which rests in the shadows of a
forest-nook, its simple headstone bearing
no other record than the name—
“Frank.”