y, in the New World. Not improbably, this circumstance
wrought a very material change in the public estimation; and, had the
mother and child remained here, little Pearl, at a marriageable period
of life, might have mingled her wild blood with the lineage of the
devoutest Puritan among them all. But, in no long time after the
physician's death, the wearer of the scarlet letter disappeared, and
Pearl along with her. For many years, though a vague report would now
and then find its way across the sea,--like a shapeless piece of
drift-wood tost ashore, with the initials of a name upon it,--yet no
tidings of them unquestionably authentic were received. The story of
the scarlet letter grew into a legend. Its spell, however, was still
potent, and kept the scaffold awful where the poor minister had died,
and likewise the cottage by the sea-shore, where Hester Prynne had
dwelt. Near this latter spot, one afternoon, some children were at
play, when they beheld a tall woman, in a gray robe, approach the
cottage-door. In all those years it had never once been opened; but
either she unlocked it, or the decaying wood and iron yielded to her
hand, or she glided shadow-like through these impediments,--and, at
all events, went in.

On the threshold she paused,--turned partly round,--for, perchance,
the idea of entering all alone, and all so changed, the home of so
intense a former life, was more dreary and desolate than even she
could bear. But her hesitation was only for an instant, though long
enough to display a scarlet letter on her breast.

[Illustration: Hester's Return]

And Hester Prynne had returned, and taken up her long-forsaken shame!
But where was little Pearl? If still alive, she must now have been in
the flush and bloom of early womanhood. None knew--nor ever learned,
with the fulness of perfect certainty--whether the elf-child had gone
thus untimely to a maiden grave; or whether her wild, rich nature had
been softened and subdued, and made capable of a woman's gentle
happiness. But, through the remainder of Hester's life, there were
indications that the recluse of the scarlet letter was the object of
love and interest with some inhabitant of another land. Letters came,
with armorial seals upon them, though of bearings unknown to English
heraldry. In the cottage there were articles of comfort and luxury
such as Hester never cared to use, but which only wealth could have
purchased, and affection have imagined for her.