was the warmth of that friendship, and thought that such a visit
was not probable. At three o'clock the postman brought a letter
which Linda herself had dropped into the box of the post-office
that morning, soon after leaving the house. She had known when,
in ordinary course, it would be delivered. Should it lead by any
misfortune to her discovery before she could escape, that she could
not help. Even that, accompanied by her capture, would be as good a
mode as any other of telling her aunt the truth. The letter was as
follows:--

Thursday Night.

DEAREST AUNT,--I think you hardly know what are my
sufferings. I truly believe that I have deserved them, but
nevertheless they are insupportable. I cannot marry Peter
Steinmarc. I have tried it, and cannot. The day is very
near now; but were it to come nearer, I should go mad, or I
should kill myself. I think that you do not know what the
feeling is that has made me the most wretched of women since
this marriage was first proposed to me. I shall go away
to-morrow, and shall try to get to my uncle's house in
Cologne. It is a long way off, and perhaps I shall never get
there: but if I am to die on the road, oh, how much better
will that be! I do not want to live. I have made you
unhappy, and everybody unhappy, but I do not think that
anybody has been so unhappy as I am. I shall give you
a kiss as I go out, and you will think that it was the
kiss of Judas; but I am not a Judas in my heart. Dear
aunt Charlotte, I would have borne it if I could,--Your
affectionate, but undutiful niece,

LINDA TRESSEL.

Undutiful! So she called herself; but had she not, in truth, paid
duty to her aunt beyond that which one human being can in any case
owe to another? Are we to believe that the very soul of the offspring
is to be at the disposition of the parent? Poor Linda! Madame
Staubach, when the letter was handed to her by Tetchen, sat aghast
for a while, motionless, with her hands before her. "She is off
again, I suppose," said Tetchen.

"Yes; she has gone."

"It serves you right. I say it now, and I will say it. Why was she so
driven?" Madame Staubach said never a word. Could she have had Linda
back at the instant, just now, at this very moment, she would have
yielded. It was beginning to become apparent to her that God did not
intend that her prayers should be successful. Doubtless the fault was
with herself. She had l