for Susan! And now see
them; they will be the better man and wife for their trial."

"Has Susan then consented? I was almost afraid she never would consent.
How often have I been almost angry with her, poor lamb, when I have
heard her accuse herself of causing her sister's unhappiness, and
declare with sobs that she felt it a crime to think of William
Mainwaring as a husband."

"I trust I have reasoned her out of a morbid sensibility which, while
it could not have rendered Lucretia the happier, must have insured the
wretchedness of herself and William. But if Lucretia had not married,
and so forever closed the door on William's repentance (that is,
supposing he did repent), I believe poor Susan would rather have died of
a broken heart than have given her hand to Mainwaring."

"It was an odd marriage of that proud young lady's, after all," said
Mrs. Fielden,--"so much older than she; a foreigner, too!"

"But he is a very pleasant man, and they have known each other so long.
I did not, however, quite like a sort of cunning he showed, when I came
to reflect on it, in bringing Lucretia back to the house; it looks as if
he had laid a trap for her from the first."

"Ten thousand pounds,--a great catch for a foreigner!" observed Mrs.
Fielden, with the shrewd instinct of her sex; and then she added, in the
spirit of a prudent sympathy equally characteristic: "But I think you
say Mr. Parchmount persuaded her to allow half to be settled on herself.
That will be a hold on him."

"A bad hold, if that be all, Sarah. There is a better,--he is a learned
man and a scholar. Scholars are naturally domestic, and make good
husbands."

"But you know he must be a papist!" said Mrs. Fielden.

"Umph!" muttered the vicar, irresolutely.

While the worthy couple were thus conversing, Susan and her lover, not
having finished their conference, had turned back through the winding
walk.

"Indeed," said William, drawing her arm closer to his side, "these
scruples, these fears, are cruel to me as well as to yourself. If you
were no longer existing, I could be nothing to your sister. Nay, even
were she not married, you must know enough of her pride to be assured
that I can retain no place in her affections. What has chanced was not
our crime. Perhaps Heaven designed to save not only us, but herself,
from the certain misery of nuptials so inauspicious!"

"If she would but answer one of my letters!" sighed Susan; "or if I
could but know tha