good doctor stays. Of course, such of the servants as are at
all likely to prove troublesome, through possessing a trifle more
brains than is usually alloted to an idiot, will be kindly told that,
rather than endanger their lives, the household will dispense with
their valuable services. Then a nurse, perhaps two, will come down
from the city, and the plotters have the game in their own hands."

Here the girl paused, and leaned back in her chair as if her story
were done.

"And then?" exclaimed Hagar.

"And then!" echoed her companion, bending forward and resting her hand
upon the old woman's wrist; "and then madame will recover--but John
Arthur will remain an invalid and a prisoner! It will be said in the
village that the fever has affected his brain, and his unpopularity,
arising from the fact that he has always shunned and scorned the
village folk, will insure them against intrusive investigators.
Auntie, they have hatched a pretty plot."

"But," objected Hagar, "they will have to stay at Oakley, if he is to
be a prisoner. They won't dare leave him with keepers and--"

"True," the girl interrupted. "I don't know how they will manage the
rest; but having settled this much, madame and her 'brother' paused at
the end of the path. I saw her as she looked up into his face, and
this is what she said: 'When he is once a prisoner, what could be more
natural than that a crazy, sick old man should _die_ some day?' Then
the man replied, 'Nothing;' and they both returned to the house,
without another word."

For some moments silence reigned in Hagar's dwelling. The old woman
seemed either unable, or unwilling, to utter a word of comment upon
the story to which she had been so attentive a listener.

Celine at length arose and said, as she began pacing to and fro before
the old woman. "Well, have you anything to say to this?"

"Yes," quietly.

"Then why don't you speak out? Are you horribly shocked?"

"No."

"No? Well, so much the better!"

Hagar arose, pushed back her chair, crossed the room, and, pulling
back the curtain, looked out into the night. Then turning her
inscrutable old face upon the girl she said, quite calmly:

"Why should not others measure out to John Arthur the same bitter
draught that he filled for your mother, years ago? Bah! it is only
retribution!"

"True," said the girl, sternly. Then, in a guarded tone: "And you
would make no attempt to overturn their finely laid plans?"

"I? _No!_" fier