o future Phoenix shall
arise. O," he exclaimed, "this sacrifice is too great, too great!
and for nothing! Even had she perished on the destined altar, an
accepted sacrifice, it were too great! But I tore her from home
and friends, and life itself, for this,--for nothing! O Destiny,
thou art a subtle adversary, and infinite are thy devices for our
overthrow! But I never reckoned on such an impediment as this
heart-weakness."

Then approaching me, he laid a hand upon my shoulder, and said:
"As the representative of the young, hopeful, living world she
is about to leave, I called you here that you and she might look
your last upon each other. Go now, and though your present emotion
accords duly with the part I have assigned you, see that you do
not play false to it hereafter by letting this woful event impress
you with too deep or too lasting a sorrow."

Then to my Ideal, so strangely found and lost, I looked and murmured
an adieu, and returned among my companions, reverenced as one who
had been in a hallowed place.

It was the third evening after this, to me, memorable visit. Streaks
of sable, with golden edges, barred the face of the setting sun,
and promised to our hopes a change of weather. But this indication,
important as it was after the long calm, was evidently not that which
the whole ship's crew, officers and men, were now discussing,--as the
converged attention of the scattered groups on the closed entrance
of that silent, mysterious cabin testified.

"I know," said O'Hanlon, answering to an objection from some one
in the group where he stood, "it would be like invading a sanctuary
to intrude there; but the conviction sometimes comes over me that
we have, all hands of us, from the captain down, acted in regard
to this matter with the incapacity of men in a nightmare. Fear is
a condition under which a true man should not breathe a moment
without contest; and yet I know we have been all, more or less
consciously, under its influence since this man came on board.
Out upon us! I will, for myself at least, break through this dream
of terror at once, by a tap at yonder door."

"It's the captain's place, not ours," said Smith, "to investigate
this affair. Don't be too impulsive; you will get yourself into
serious trouble."

"This is no matter of ordinary discipline," said the other; "the
captain has a more substantial awe of this man than you or I,--and
for more substantial reasons. He was aware of his wealth