o use. Our enemy
has so many resources unknown to me. How can a poor woman fight with a
shadow, that comes in a moment and strikes; and then is gone and leaves
his victim trembling?"

Then she slipped into the dressing-room and became hysterical, out of
her husband's sight and hearing.

Mary Wells nursed her, and, when she was better, whispered in her ear,
"Lose no more time, then. Cure him. You know the way."

CHAPTER XVII.

IN the present condition of her mind these words produced a strange
effect on Lady Bassett. She quivered, and her eyes began to rove in
that peculiar way I have already noticed; and then she started up and
walked wildly to and fro; and then she kneeled down and prayed; and
then, alarmed, perplexed, exhausted, she went and leaned her head on
her patient's shoulder, and wept softly a long time.

Some days passed, and no more strangers attempted to see Sir Charles.

Lady Bassett was beginning to breathe again, when she was afflicted by
an unwelcome discovery.

Mary Wells fainted away so suddenly that, but for Lady Bassett's quick
eye and ready hand, she would have fallen heavily.

Lady Bassett laid her head down and loosened her stays, and discovered
her condition. She said nothing till the young woman was well, and then
she taxed her with it.

Mary denied it plump; but, seeing her mistress's disgust at the
falsehood, she owned it with many tears.

Being asked how she could so far forget herself, she told Lady Bassett
she had long been courted by a respectable young man; he had come to
the village, bound on a three years' voyage, to bid her good-by, and,
what with love and grief at parting, they had been betrayed into folly;
and now he was on the salt seas, little dreaming in what condition he
had left her: "and," said she, "before ever he can write to me, and I
to him, I shall be a ruined girl; that is why I wanted to put an end to
myself; I _will,_ too, unless I can find some way to hide it from the
world."

Lady Bassett begged her to give up those desperate thoughts; she would
think what could be done for her. Lady Bassett could say no more to her
just then, for she was disgusted with her.

But when she came to reflect that, after all, this was not a lady, and
that she appeared by her own account to be the victim of affection and
frailty rather than of vice, she made some excuses; and then the girl
had laid aside her trouble, her despair, and given her sorrowful mind
to nursin