how the
Honourable Reginald Stanford would feel on his wedding-day, or if he
would feel at all, if they should find her (Rose) robed in white,
floating in the fish-pond drowned! The fish-pond was large enough; and
Rose moodily recollected reading somewhere that when lovely woman stoops
to folly, and finds too late that men betray, the only way to hide that
folly from every eye, to bring repentance to her lover, to wring his
bosom, is to--die!

The clock down stairs struck eleven. Rose could hear them dispersing to
their bedrooms. She could hear, and she held her breath to listen, Mr.
Stanford, going past her door, whistling a tune of Kate's. Of Kate's, of
course! He was happy and could whistle, and she was miserable and
couldn't. If she had not wept herself as dry as a wrung sponge, she must
have relapsed into hysterics once more; but as she couldn't, with a
long-drawn sigh, she resolved to go to bed.

So to bed Rose went, but not to sleep. She tossed from side to side,
feverish and impatient; the more she tried to sleep, the more she
couldn't. It was quite a new experience for poor Rose, not used to
"tears at night instead of slumber." The wintry moonlight was shining
brightly in her room through the parted curtains, and that helped her
wakefulness, perhaps. As the clock struck twelve, she sprang up in
desperation, drew a shawl round her, and, in her night-dress, sat down
by the window, to contemplate the heavenly bodies.

Hark! what noise was that?

The house was as still as a vault; all had retired, and were probably
asleep. In the dead stillness, Rose heard a door open--the green baize
door of Bluebeard's room. Her chamber was very near that green door;
there could be no mistaking the sound. Once again she held her breath to
listen. In the profound hush, footsteps echoed along the uncarpeted
corridor, and passed her door. Was it Ogden on his way upstairs? No! the
footsteps paused at the next door--Kate's room; and there was a light
rap. Rose, aflame with curiosity, tip-toed to her own door, and applied
her ear to the key-hole. Kate's door opened; there was a whispered
colloquy; the listener could not catch the words, but the voice that
spoke to Kate was not the voice of Ogden. Five minutes--ten--then the
door shut, the footsteps went by her door again, and down stairs.

Who was it? Not Ogden, not her father; could it be--could it be Mr.
Richards himself.

Rose clasped her hands, and stood bewildered. Her own