ed a preposterous assertion beside this plausible one, by
reason of the lofty demeanour of the Lady Caroline and the unassuming
habits of the late villager. There being no inheritance in question, not
a soul took the trouble to go to the city church, forty miles off, and
search the registers for marriage signatures bearing out so humble a
romance.

In a short time Milly caused a decent tombstone to be erected over her
nominal husband's grave, whereon appeared the statement that it was
placed there by his heartbroken widow, which, considering that the
payment for it came from Lady Caroline and the grief from Milly, was as
truthful as such inscriptions usually are, and only required pluralizing
to render it yet more nearly so.

The impressionable and complaisant Milly, in her character of widow, took
delight in going to his grave every day, and indulging in sorrow which
was a positive luxury to her. She placed fresh flowers on his grave, and
so keen was her emotional imaginativeness that she almost believed
herself to have been his wife indeed as she walked to and fro in her garb
of woe. One afternoon, Milly being busily engaged in this labour of love
at the grave, Lady Caroline passed outside the churchyard wall with some
of her visiting friends, who, seeing Milly there, watched her actions
with interest, remarked upon the pathos of the scene, and upon the
intense affection the young man must have felt for such a tender creature
as Milly. A strange light, as of pain, shot from the Lady Caroline's
eye, as if for the first time she begrudged to the young girl the
position she had been at such pains to transfer to her; it showed that a
slumbering affection for her husband still had life in Lady Caroline,
obscured and stifled as it was by social considerations.

An end was put to this smooth arrangement by the sudden appearance in the
churchyard one day of the Lady Caroline, when Milly had come there on her
usual errand of laying flowers. Lady Caroline had been anxiously
awaiting her behind the chancel, and her countenance was pale and
agitated.

'Milly!' she said, 'come here! I don't know how to say to you what I am
going to say. I am half dead!'

'I am sorry for your ladyship,' says Milly, wondering.

'Give me that ring!' says the lady, snatching at the girl's left hand.

Milly drew it quickly away.

'I tell you give it to me!' repeated Caroline, almost fiercely. 'Oh--but
you don't know why? I am in a gri