ur master,
Marah; why not make me a happy one?'

"'I expect,' she murmured, 'to marry you.'

"'And then?' I could not help it; the words sprang to my lips
involuntarily.

"Her eyes opened wide; she literally flashed them upon me. I felt their
lightnings play all about my doubtful nature, and scorch it.

"'I will be your wife,' she uttered gravely.

"I fell at her feet. I kissed the hem of her robe. In that moment I
adored her. 'O best and fairest!' I cried, 'I will make you happy. I
will fill your hopes to the full. You shall ride in a carriage, and your
will shall be a law to those who smile in scorn upon you now, and you
will be--'

"'Mistress Felt, of most honorable degree,' she finished, with the half
laughing disdain she could never keep long out of her words.

"And thus I became again her slave, and lived in that sweet, if servile,
condition till the hour of our nuptials came, and I went to conduct her
to the church where, in sight of half the town, she was to be made my
wife. Shall I ever forget that morning? It was a December day, but the
heavens were blue and the earth white, and not a cloud bespoke a rising
storm. As for me, I walked on air, all the more that I knew Urquhart was
out of town and would not be present at the wedding. He had gone away on
some behest of Miss Dudleigh's immediately after the last interview I
have mentioned, and would not come back, or so I had been told, till
after Miss Leighton had been Mistress Felt for a week. So there was
nothing to mar my day or make my entrance into Miss Dudleigh's house
anything but one of promise. I saw Miss Dudleigh first. She was
standing in the vast colonial hall when I entered, and in her gala
robes, and with the sunshine on her head, she looked almost happy. Yet
she was greatly changed from her old self, and I felt much like pouring
out my soul to her and bidding her to break a tie that would never bring
her peace, or even honor. But I feared to shatter my own hopes. Selfish
being that I was, I dreaded to have her made free, lest-- What? My
thoughts did not interpret my fears, for at that moment a sunbeam struck
down the stairs and through my heart, and, looking up, I saw Marah
descending, and thought and reason flew to greet her.

"She had been robed by her cousin's bounteous hand, and her dress of
stiff yellow brocade burned in the morning light with almost as much
brilliance as the sunshine itself. Folded across her bust was the
wonderful s