Chapter XLII: The Letter

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive.”
SCOTT.

Gusty found himself in his own “caboose,” and opened the letter. Its contents were as follows:

From Rosalia Aguilar to Sophie Withers.

“MY DEAR AND ONLY SISTER:—Long before your eye follows these lines,
the hand that now traces them will have moulded into dust. I write now
propped up in bed, and my pen drops from my hand, and my hand falls
from the paper every instant—ah! how difficult to write with the life
in my bosom palpitating, sinking, fluttering into death! yet I must
write. There is a secret that I must leave revealed for you, although
for awhile it will yet be kept from you. Hear my confession. There is
a little child whom never having seen, you yet love from my
description, and from her supposed relationship to you. And you must,
for years to come, still believe in her kindred claim. That little
girl is no child of mine—no relative of yours. Listen! this is her
history.

“From the first year of my married life, I wished above all things for
a child—but when, in the passage of time, I knew that Heaven had
written me childless, I wished to _adopt_ an infant—one without
parents, friends, or relatives—an orphan from its very birth, whom I
would make all my own—whom I could pass, not only upon the world, but
upon my relatives, as my own; for I was morbidly sensitive upon the
subject of my childlessness, and felt my misfortune to be a
mortification of which I wish to keep even you ignorant. (Now, if I
continue to keep even you in ignorance, it is from a less selfish
motive, namely, the welfare of my adopted daughter.)

“Well, Sophie! such a child as I wished to find was not so easily to
be discovered; but the more difficult the attainment, the more
desirable was the object. I brooded over the plan continually. I used
to drive in my carriage to alms-houses, orphan asylums, &c., and
became a sort of amateur baby-fancier; only I never saw a baby that
struck my fancy. I never betrayed even to the matrons of these
institutions my secret purpose in visiting them so frequently. I
thought it was quite time enough to make known my wishes when their
object, namely an eligible child for adoption, should be found. I was
in the habit of visiting these asylums at least once a fortnight, and
I got the name of being very charitable, for I had to give alms to
account for my visits. I grew quite into the confidence of the matrons
and directors, although, living as I did, quite at the opposite end of
the city, they knew nothing of me beyond my ‘charities,’ as they
called them. One day, however, the matron of the almshouse met me at
the door, and conducting me into the parlor, told me that she had a
singular circumstance to reveal, and then gave me the following
particulars. ‘That late on the preceding night, a woman had been seen
wandering bare-footed, and with wild eyes, streaming hair, tattered
dress, and frantic manners, through the streets of the city. When
accosted by passengers she would answer wildly, or turn and flee. At
last, that morning, she was brought before a magistrate, who, seeing
her lunacy, had her sent to this asylum.’

“‘She was brought here about eleven o’clock,’ continued the matron;
‘she is a very remarkable looking young person, and I should think
within a very few days of her confinement. Will you see her?’ I
assented, and followed the matron to the ward in which the stranger
was placed. We entered a small room apart, and there I saw such a
wreck of a human being! an extremely emaciated figure sitting doubled
up on the foot of the low bed—from her thin limbs hung tattered
raiment, bearing the marks and stains of much travel and exposure. Her
elbows rested on her knees, and her talon-like hands supported her
wan, white face, which formed a death-like contrast to the brilliant
hair of mingled gold and silver threads that streamed down each side.
Her eyes were strained out straight before her, but fell as she saw
us. She was now enjoying—no, not enjoying, suffering a lucid interval.
I saw it in the set despair—the too rational despair of those terrible
eyes. I felt strongly and most painfully interested in her—I fully
believed her to be one of the too numerous victims of trust and
perfidy. I wished to talk to her—to learn, if possible, something of
her history—to do, if possible, something to alleviate her sufferings.
I could not, somehow, bring myself to speak to her confidentially in
the presence of the matron. I fancied that if I were left alone with
the poor stranger, I might win some information from her, and learn if
I could in any manner ameliorate her condition. I requested the matron
aside, to withdraw for a few minutes, to give me this opportunity. She
did so, and I went after her, closed the door behind her and returned,
drew the only chair in the room to the side of the bed, and sat down
in it very near her. She was sitting in the same attitude—her side
face was towards me—she did not notice me.

“‘I am very sorry to see you looking so unhappy,’ said I, softly as I
could speak, and watching her face steadily.

“She did not reply, but I saw the blue lips spring quivering apart,
and the white teeth glisten between them.

“‘Are you married?’ inquired I, after a long, painful pause.

“I immediately regretted my indiscreet question when I saw her turn
her gaze haughtily upon me, while something like scorn kindled on her
cheeks, writhed on her lips, flashed from her eyes, as she answered,
in a low and measured tone,

“‘Do you not _perceive_ that I am married?’

“I felt humbled—like a repulsed intruder—still I did wish so much to
benefit her that I ventured again.

“‘Can I do anything for you?’

“‘Yes!’

“‘Tell me what?’

“‘You can leave the room!’

“‘I will do so,’ said I, ‘certainly, as I do not wish, upon any
account to add to your discomfort,’ and rising, I left the chamber.

“The matron met me in the gallery, and in commenting upon my account
of my interview, she informed me that no one had been able to gain the
slightest intelligence of her past life, her friends, or her
condition, from her.

“I felt distressingly concerned for this woman. I drove over every day
to see her. She became accustomed to my visits—somewhat reconciled to
me—though her moods were variable; sometimes bitter and sullen, as I
had found her in my first interview; sometimes so wild and frantic as
to make restraint necessary; sometimes she was calm and rational. For
several days I made no further effort to elicit from her the story of
her sins, wrongs, or misfortunes. It was evident from every lineament
of her classic face and form, beautiful even in their extreme
emaciation, and from every tone and gesture in her voice and
manner—free from coarseness even in her sullenest or fiercest
mood—that she was a woman of high breeding—that she had fallen from a
lofty place.

“But it was not until my pity for the poor creature was changing into
love, and she saw it, that I could get her to take anything from me,
or accept any, even the most delicate, personal service.

“‘No,’ she would say, with a sardonic smile, ‘I will accept nothing; I
have a right to my place in this almshouse, because I have helped to
build and support these institutions.’

“Pity is allied to love on the one hand, and to contempt on the other;
and in proportion as it approaches love, it recedes from contempt.
When she saw that the arrogant and offensive element in my pity was
gone, she began to grow a little more grateful for the care I was
bestowing upon her. Once she said to me, in one of her few lucid
intervals—

“‘For months I have been a wanderer on the face of the earth; for
months I have never slept under a roof, or eaten anything cooked—the
forest has been my home—its bed of grass or under-growth my couch, its
foliage my curtains, the overhanging sky has been my roof, and its
millions of stars my lights: nuts and wild berries my food, water my
drink, and the side of some brook my dining-room. I had fled from the
cold pity and the colder alms of society to wild nature, the rough but
honest mother. And it was the coming on of winter, severe winter, and
the approach of the period of my accouchement, that drove me again
into the haunts of civilization for assistance.’

“The ‘mind and heart diseased’ might be detected in her most lucid
conversation. She was not one to reason with—I could only love her
into calmness and sanity. I brought over some of my own clothing, and
after soothing, coaxing, and caressing, administered with the most
delicate tact of which I was capable (for it was dangerous to let her
think that I considered her a child, or a fool who was to be
wheedled), I prevailed on her to take a bath, have her hair combed,
and put on comfortable clothing. It was a light blue, soft, warm,
French merino that I had brought her, and she looked so beautiful
after I had dressed her, that then I first conceived the idea of
bringing her home to my house. It was almost a selfish feeling in
me—she would occupy and interest me—nay, she had done so to the extent
of exorcising my familiar demon, ennui. Mr. Aguilar had sailed for
Liverpool, on mercantile business, a few weeks previous—it was too
late to consult him—I thought I would take this poor forlornity home,
and ask his permission when he returned. Fearful of alarming her
morbid pride, and her hatred of dependence, I did not name my project
to her then, but returned home full of it. I went busily to work and
prepared a chamber next to my own—I was so happy and interested in
fitting it up—I said to myself, as I superintended the arrangement of
the furniture, ‘Her emaciated and wearied limbs will repose so nicely
on this white, clean, downy bed; she will sit so nicely in this deep,
soft chair,’ and my own heart filled with a sort of delicious emotion,
that flowed through every vein, breathing through every pore, dilating
as a sponge filling with water, or a child growing as it sleeps. I
became deeply interested in preparing baby-linen, just as if it were
for myself. ‘Come,’ said I to myself, ‘I will be Pharaoh’s daughter,
and she shall be the mother of Moses.’ In the midst of these
occupations an evil thought came to me, and said, ‘You are doing all
this for—_whom?_—a fallen and guilty woman—a degraded outcast!’ And I
stopped in the middle of the floor aghast at the sudden recollection,
and terrified at the question of what Mr. Aguilar might say to this
contemplated act when he should hear of it. And as I stood, these
lines, read in my school days, came into my head—

“‘Vice is a monster of such hideous mien,
That to be hated needs but to be seen;
But seen too oft, familiar with its face—
We first endure, then _pity_, then embrace.’

“Yes, I had got to the pitying stage! I was in danger! in the whirl of
the maelstrom! I turned giddy, and dropped into the very easy chair I
was preparing for her. You used to say, Sophie, that I never prayed to
God until I got into trouble—which was as true then as it is now. I
was now in trouble—I did not wish to be disappointed of my
benevolence—my amusement, then, if you will call it so; and I did not
wish to see that poor creature suffer in the bleak chamber of the
wretchedly _un_provided almshouse. I was broken upon a wheel of
conflicting opinions and emotions. And I prayed to God, that if a
baleful, moral miasma was evolved from the presence of this poor
fellow-creature, His grace might be the purifying antidote to save me,
and I got up from this prayer loathing myself for a self-righteous
pharisee, standing afar off from the poor publican, and I saw how far
above the authority of the poets, philosophers and moralists, whom I
consulted and worshipped, was the perfect law of love—the law of
Christ that I had forgotten. Later in the day when this fervor had
subsided, as all fervor must, and when I looked at the _rationale_ of
the affair, it was suggested to me that if the poor creature were
guilty, she appeared impenitent—but I replied, ‘She is outcast,
beggared, and crazed—that is all I know—if she is guilty, it is known
to God; if she is also impenitent, she is mad; and has most likely
been driven so by cruelty and despair, and I will try to love her back
to sanity and to penitence. And in this case I have no right to judge
her—to pronounce her guilty. Still, Sophie, I must say, that between
old prejudices and new sympathy, between ill-regulated feelings and
unsettled opinions, I was very much in doubt as to the propriety of
what I was about to do in my husband’s absence. Inclination, as is but
too usually the case with me, weighed down the scale, and I went to
bring my protegé. I had some difficulty with her. I found her in a
very lucid state of mind. I congratulated her upon her calmness, and
she smiled a sad, strange smile, and said,

“‘Ah! you think me sane, rational _now_! But when I rave, rant and
scream! when I tear my hair and clothes! throw myself with violence on
the ground! call on God to strike me dead! and blaspheme because He
does not do it! _then_ you call me mad! phrensied! Alas! _then only_
am I sane, _then only_ conscious of my situation, of all I _have_
been, _am_, and _shall_ be; of my past, present, and future, in their
horrid reality; and my raving is but too reasonable! No, madam!’ she
said, with sorrowful bitterness, ‘it is _now_, _now_ that I am dull,
stupid, collapsed, _calm_ as you call it, that I am _really_ insane,
for I am now insensible to my condition in all its woe.’

“I asked for no explanation. I had given up that habit long ago. But
after a while I proposed my plan to her. She hesitated even when I
urged her with tears of sympathy.

“‘If I become an inmate of your house, it is right that you should
know my whole story, yet that I will never divulge.’

“‘No! no!’ said I, impatiently, alarmed, ‘I wish to hear nothing, will
hear nothing—I have nothing to do with your past—your future only
concerns me,’ for I was now beginning to fear her story as a
revelation of horrors that I should not have the courage to face.

“In short, Sophie, I took her home with me that very evening to the
chamber where I had had a fire already made for her reception, and I
spent the evening there with her.

“I kept her there two months. She grew calmer every day under my
nursing. At the end of two months her child was born, and from that
time it seemed to me that she sank every day. It is true that she
recovered from her accouchement, and was able to leave her room, but I
could see that a hectic fever had taken a deep hold of her system. I
was expecting Mr. Aguilar home every day literally with fear and
trembling. I devised a thousand excuses to make for what I had done,
and in the end hoped that the joy of meeting me again would lead him
to pardon the indiscretion of which I felt that he would accuse me.
Fanny Raymond (that was the name of my protegé), sometimes with her
quick, unusually quick perceptions, noticed my anxiety, and questioned
me about it. But I would smile and tell her that my sources of
uneasiness were like hers, incommunicable. In the midst of this, Mr.
Aguilar arrived. It was night when he came home. He did not see Fanny
that night. Early the next morning before we arose, I told him all
about it. He was deeply displeased; nothing but the circumstance of
our having just met, after an absence, could have saved me from a very
severe rebuke. He said that she must leave the house immediately. I
pleaded with him that it was the depth of winter—that she was dying of
consumption, or a broken heart, for they are often synonyms. He was
inexorable. I arose and dressed myself and wept very much, and then I
went to Fanny’s room and took up her child in its soft, white night
dress, and returning to my own chamber, went up to the bed and laid
the babe upon his bosom.

“‘What am I to do with the brat? Do you expect me to nurse it?’ said
he, as he rose up on his elbow.

“I was not afraid of his throwing it out of the window. He was
passionately fond of children. It was his weakness. He could not pass
a babe in its nurse’s arms in the street. That was one reason why I
was so anxious for children.

“‘It is a beautiful baby,’ said he, smoothing out its hair, that
looked like bright, pale yellow floss silk. ‘But here, take it! Why do
you bother _me_ with it?’

“The struggle in his mind was so evident.

“‘Because,’ said I, ‘its mother is dying—it has no relatives, I
suspect, and no one will claim it—you will adopt it I think—and I
hope, I pray, I do implore that you will let its poor heart-broken
mother pass the few days of life that remain to her under this roof
with her baby.’

“Useless all my prayers and tears. He was sternly determined to send
her off with the child back to the almshouse, he said. He admitted
that were the mother out of the question he would cheerfully keep the
child. At last I raised the infant and carried it into the next room.
Fanny was standing before the dressing-glass writing on the table. She
looked up as I came in. I never shall forget the expression of her
face in this world or the next, it was whiter than chalk, sterner than
marble. She came to me, took the child from my arms and laid it on the
bed without a word said, then turning to me she embraced me, kissed my
hands, pressed me to her bosom, and opening the door pushed me gently
out of her own, into my own room. _That was the last time I ever saw
Fanny Raymond._ An hour after that Mr. Aguilar and myself sat down to
the breakfast-table. I sent up word for Fanny to come down. The
servant returned with the news that she was out. I breakfasted without
any presentiment of what had occurred. After breakfast Mr. Aguilar
went to his counting-room and I ran up stairs to see Fanny and her
child. Fanny was not to be seen. The child lay in her cradle. Going up
to look at her I saw a folded note pinned to her bosom and directed to
me. I took it off, opened and read it, as well as I _could_ read the
scrawl. It was as follows:

“‘Mrs. Aguilar, your partitions are thin, or my senses very acute—at
all events, lying in my bed this morning, I have heard without
intending it, every word of your conversation with your husband. I
heard his stern but well meant decision, your generous defence and
benevolent pleading, and I blessed and bless you, kind angel, from
my breaking heart. “If the mother were dead ‘he’ would take the
child,” very well, so be it, the mother will die to secure a home
for her child—no weak hesitation or weaker regrets _now_. I go and
leave you my child. Take her, Mrs. Aguilar, and give her to your
husband as his daughter. Like the Jewish matron whom the Lord had
written childless, take the child of your handmaiden and rear it as
your own. She was born under your roof, she is yours. I will never
return to see or reclaim her. Do you know how much it has cost me to
write that? But I will not think! bear on, heart, a few days or
hours more. This child—you have been fearing all this time that she
was the offspring of guilt and shame, _she is not_. I said that I
would not tell you my story, and I will not, because it would
involve others. If I were guilty would I be likely to reveal my own
shame? If I were to say that I am innocent, should I be likely to
obtain credence? But this baby, I must tell the truth of her, she is
my husband’s child, for I have a husband, though I do not know how
long I may have one, nor is he in a condition to claim or take care
of his daughter or even of himself; nor does he suspect the
existence of this child, for I have been a fugitive from his house
five months before she was born. Therefore keep her yourself, she
will be a loss to no one but me who resign her. Give her your name,
it will make her more your own. Call her Rosalia Aguilar _Withers_.
Why Withers, do you ask? Well, no matter why, perhaps, because she
is the bud of a _wither_-ed tree.’”

“That was all! The mother had given up her child and fled, apparently
without a single regret, at least you would judge so from the _words_
of her letter; but that letter was nearly illegible with wild and
scrawling characters, and almost blotted out with tears. A lock of her
babe’s hair was cut off from its forehead, and one of its little socks
taken away, nothing else was missing. The poor mother had left
bareheaded and without outside covering, for her bonnet and shawl were
left behind. I was nearly wild with distress, and the poor forsaken
babe was wailing dismally for its mother, and I could not comfort it.
You know, Sophie, that though I am rather gentle, yet when other
people’s cruelties to their fellow creatures have very much distressed
and grieved me, that I end in getting very _angry_. Well, I sent a
footman to the counting-house for Mr. Aguilar, who answered my summons
immediately. It was the first time in all our married life that I had
ever had occasion to send for him, and he was alarmed. He came running
up stairs. I thrust the note into his hands, and it was _my_ turn to
look daggers at him while he read it, and it was _his_ turn to cower
before me.

“‘We must have her pursued, looked up, and taken care of,’ said he, in
a trembling voice.

“‘Oh, yes!’ said I, ‘now that she is drowned—you could find no room in
the house for her dying form, perhaps you will be able to find some
spot on God’s earth for her grave.’

“In short, Sophie, I went on in the insolent way in which, when I
became excited and reckless of consequences, I sometimes indulged
myself towards him, and which he always met with a dignified
forbearance that at last quite disarmed me.

“‘Do you take care of the child, my dear,’ said he, ‘while I take
measures to recover the unhappy mother,’ and he left the room.

“All search proved unavailing—we heard nothing of her for several
days, and then we heard that a person answering to her description had
been seen walking wildly on the bridge across the river, and the next
morning a handkerchief and a shoe were found floating, that when
brought to me I recognised as having belonged to her. These created a
suspicion that she perished by her own act. Well, Sophie, Mr. Aguilar
fell into very low spirits about it, and we redoubled our care of the
infant. We procured a wet-nurse, and spared no pains or expense in her
nurture and education. She is now four years old; she has been reared
in the very lap of love and luxury; but, Sophie, death is near me, at
least I fear so, and I must leave my poor dove, my delicate little
hothouse rose, to the rough ground and rude blast that make the life
of the orphan so hard. And, Sophie, I dare not yet let you know that
she is not my child in the flesh, as she is my child by adoption and
by an affection that could not be deeper than it is, had I brought her
into the world. She was born in my bed, reared in my lap, from the
time she was weaned she has slept with me every night. She is the
delight of my eyes, the rapture of my heart, she is so beautiful, so
angelic! But, Sophie, you will, perhaps, see _none_ of this unless you
think she is your _niece_, you will see only a little interloper who
has feloniously entered your sister’s home and heart and carried away
her affections and your inheritance, and so, Sophie, I will not for
some years permit you to know who she is. Not until her loveliness has
won a home in your love, of which prejudice and injustice cannot
deprive her. Oh, may God forgive me if this is sin.

“It occurs to me now, Sophie, that as your husband is named Withers,
there may be some connexion between the circumstance and the wild
fancy name of Withers bestowed by Fanny Raymond on her child. Still it
is not likely that there is, at least circumstances forbid me now to
investigate it.

“Sophie, this letter has been the work of a week, it has been written
in pain of body and pain of mind. To-morrow I must make my will. I
shall at the same time place this letter in the hands of Mr. Linton,
to be forwarded to you upon the date of the superscription, which will
be the eighteenth anniversary of Rosalia’s birthday, and before that
if necessary.

“Sophie, all is done—and the sands of life run very low. How much I
would give to die on your bosom, my only sister! but it may not be.
Stranger faces are around me—menial hands wipe the death dew from my
brow.

“Well! to-night perhaps my spirit may be freed and, cleaving the
distance between us, hover over your head as you sit chatting merrily
by your fireside, thinking of your gay city sister, dancing in some
brilliant ball-room. Then I will whisper to your spirit, a dream of
our loving infant years, and you shall fall into a sweet pensive
trance that shall last until your husband asks,

“‘What makes you so silent, Sophie?’

“And you will reply, ‘I was thinking of my sister Rose.’ And I shall
disappear in the thick facts around you. Shall it be so? Yes, Sophie!
if my freed spirit shall be _indeed_ free, it will seek you before it
seeks Heaven.

“I stopped, because weak tears blinded me—but a little child is
sitting on my bed, close to my pillow, and she is wiping with her
little dimpled hands, the damp dew from my brow, and her soft lips
kiss away the fast falling tears from my eyes—let _these_ tears be the
only draughts of sorrow that she drinks! Love my child, Sophie! Oh,
God, Sophie! if you want a guardian angel in heaven, love my child!

“ROSALIA AGUILAR.”

Gusty had finished the perusal of this letter. Gusty was no moralist—he was given to emotion rather than to reflection. Yet Gusty fell into deep thought, and the fruit of his reverie dropped in these words,

“Behold the great tangled thicket of sin and misery springing from one small seedling of error. Behold the terrible consequences of one small deception—consequences so nearly fatal! FATAL! Oh, Heaven, is there a word in earth’s, or in hell’s vocabulary, strong enough to express the horror of the fate into which this deception had nearly plunged its victim!”

And in deep thought, and with a brow of gloomy gravity, Gusty went over to the Cornucopia, to keep his appointment to dine. He did not get an opportunity of speaking to Sophie before dinner, for the officers were already assembled and waiting. As he entered one door, Sophie came in at another, and they sat down to the table. Sophie was the only lady at the board, and she was looking very pale and languid. Captain Wilde mentioned that this was her first appearance at the table since her long illness. Immediately after the dessert was placed upon the table, she arose and withdrew to her cabin. Lieutenant May made an apology, and followed her.

“You have read the letter, Gusty?”

“Yes.”

“And what do you think of it? Strange story, is it not?”

“Very.”

“I regret that Rosalia made any concealment from me. I do not know myself very well, but I do not think the knowledge of the facts would have affected my feelings towards Rosalia. The child that my sister loved as her own, would have been very dear to me for my sister’s sake as well as for her own, being as lovely as Rosalia.”

“Yes, I am very sure of that, Sophie; and I also exceedingly regret this concealment; it might have led to the most horrible end.”

“I do not see that.”

“No, perhaps not; still it strikes me as having been very wrong, and wrong doing is _always_ dangerous, and sooner or later it brings its retribution.”

“It _was_ wrong. I do not defend it. Still her motive was affection; her intention good. She judged me by the known characters of our neighbors, who are proverbially clannish—who intermarry, who have strong family prejudices, who would be likely to hate an alien by blood, where property is concerned, and that alien has been the means of disinheriting the family; it was the fear that I would look upon the child with dislike, which induced my sister to conceal her origin until now.”

“Still, I say people ought not to be so concerned for the results of things—people ought to do _right_, and leave the event to God. I am learning and proving the good of that every day. Why, Sophie! that’s what _I_ did when I got into a scrape for doing good. I said ‘God is above all,’ and I grabbed right hold of the promises! with a good _will_, and held on to them! and you see the upshot! _Why, I’m reinstated._”

“You are _what_, Gusty?”

“Oh, nothing! nothing! only the devil got me into a cursed scrape, and the Lord got me out of it, that’s all!”

“It strikes me, Gusty, that you are irreverent in your faith and gratitude.”

“Lord! just hear you! do you suppose now the Lord wants to be worshipped _all_ the time with tears, and groans, and prayers, with long faces, drawling voices, and melancholy psalms? _No!_ I believe He likes variety, or we should not see so much of it in His works. Besides, I think the cheerful incense of a jolly good fellow’s faith and worship must refresh the angels sometimes! See, Sophie! remember how David danced before the Ark. Listen! the Jewish historian says, ‘he danced with all _his_ might.’ And one can still better imagine the antics he cut, when they read that Michal, Saul’s daughter, ‘saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, and she _despised_ him in her heart!’ met him with scorn and biting sarcasm—exclaiming with provoking irony, ‘how _glorious_ was the King of Israel to-day!’ &c., &c.; you know the rest. Nonsense, Sophie, the Lord don’t want to be always worshipped with a solemn physiognomy; at least it is not my ‘_gift_’ so to worship Him. Listen, Sophie! this is my theory and practice:—If any fellow-creature wrongs or outrages me, I walk right on board of him! thrash him like a man! and then forgive him like an angel! If any inevitable misfortune falls upon me without human agency, I blame the devil liberally! And if any good befalls me, I praise the Lord with all my soul! There, that’s _my_ orthodoxy—and if any heretic don’t like it, he needn’t subscribe to it. Dear me, Sophie, when I _am_ thankful, I am thankful sure enough; my bosom is a jolly big ball-room, and my heart dances a tarantula all over it.”

“I do not know how you can be so thoughtlessly gay while the fate of Rosalia remains shrouded in mystery!”

“God love your gentle sober bosom, Sophie; I have been in the deliriums, in the agonies, in the blues, the horrors, and the dumps, about Rosalia, for six months past, until—I got your—never mind—well, anyway, now it is _all changed_, and I feel such a faith, such a profound and joyful conviction of her safety, that I cannot be anxious from _doubt_, but only from _impatience_! Cheer up, Sophie! I wish I could infuse some of my own confidence into you! Go or send to Genoa. I wish _I_ could get leave of absence! Rosalia will turn up soon! She is not dead: if she _had_ been—much inquiry as has been made for her, large rewards as have been offered for information about her, it would have been known. She has found friends somewhere! and they help to conceal her, that is all! God is above all!”

“_Conceal_ her! of what are you dreaming. Gusty?”

“There it is again! I shall let the cat out of the bag, if I stay here another minute. Good-bye, Sophie.”

“But what _did_ you mean?”

“Dear Sophie, nothing! my hour is up! I _must_ go—good-bye!”