so few in the world to
care for him, that perhaps he was flattered by the grateful respect of
this humble stranger.

When his horse stopped, the cottager's daughter opened the door and
courtesied,--it was an invitation to enter; and he threw his rein over
the paling and walked into the cottage.

Mrs. Elton, who had been seated by the open casement, rose to receive
him. But Maltravers made her sit down, and soon put her at her ease. The
woman and her daughter who occupied the cottage retired into the garden,
and Mrs. Elton, watching them withdraw, then exclaimed abruptly,--

"Oh, sir, I have so longed to see you this morning! I so long to make
bold to ask you whether, indeed, I dreamed it--or did I, when you first
took me to your house--did I see--" She stopped abruptly; and though she
strove to suppress her emotion, it was too strong for her efforts,--she
sank back on her chair, pale as death, and almost gasped for breath.

Maltravers waited in surprise for her recovery.

"I beg pardon, sir,--I was thinking of days long past; and--but I wished
to ask whether, when I lay in your hall, almost insensible, any one
besides yourself and your servants were present?---or was it"--added the
woman, with a shudder--"was it the dead?"

"I remember," said Maltravers, much struck and interested in her
question and manner, "that a lady was present."

"It is so! it is so!" cried the woman, half rising and clasping her
hands. "And she passed by this cottage a little time ago; her veil was
thrown aside as she turned that fair young face towards the cottage. Her
name, sir,--oh, what is her name? It was the same--the same face that
shone across me in that hour of pain! I did not dream! I was not mad!"

"Compose yourself; you could never, I think, have seen that lady before.
Her name is Cameron."

"Cameron--Cameron!" The woman shook her head mournfully. "No; that name
is strange to me. And her mother, sir,--she is dead?"

"No; her mother lives."

A shade came over the face of the sufferer; and she said, after a
pause,--

"My eyes deceive me then, sir; and, indeed, I feel that my head is
touched, and I wander sometimes. But the likeness was so great; yet that
young lady is even lovelier!"

"Likenesses are very deceitful and very capricious, and depend more on
fancy than reality. One person discovers a likeness between faces most
dissimilar,--a likeness invisible to others. But who does Miss Cameron
resemble?"

"One now dead