scene upon which he looked was something worse than a death-chamber.

"Ask him if he did not see this poniard in her room while she lay
unburied in the house."

Rachael turned her eyes upon her brother--those great, pleading eyes,
which were fast taking an expression of pathetic agony, like those of a
hunted doe.

"And you--and you!" she said, with a cry of pain that thrilled the heart
of her wretched husband. "Has all the world turned against me? Old
woman, what have I ever done to you that you should hunt me down so?"

Hepworth Closs came forward and threw an arm around his sister's waist.

"What is it, Rachael? Who is hunting you down?" he said, tenderly. "No
one shall hurt you while I am near."

She turned, threw her arms around his neck, and covered his face with
passionate kisses. Then she turned to Lord Hope, held out her pale hands
imploringly; and cried out in pathetic anguish:

"Oh, do not believe it! Do not believe it!"

But Lord Hope stepped back, and turned away his face. She knew that this
motion was her doom.

"Let me look at the poniard," she said, with unnatural gentleness. "I
have a right to examine the proofs brought against me."

Hannah Yates gave her the dagger. She looked at it earnestly a moment,
laid one hand upon her heart, as if its beating stifled her, then lifted
the other and struck.

"Now, my husband, will you kiss me? I have given them blood for blood,
life for life!"

She fell in a heap at her husband's feet, and while death glazed over
her eyes, reached up her arms to him.

He fell upon his knees, forgetting everything but the one dreadful fact
that she was his wife, and dying. His face drooped to hers, for the lips
were moving, and her eyes turned upon him with pathetic anxiety.

"It was love for you that led me to it--only that--Oh, believe--beli--"

"I do! I do!" he cried out, in fearful anguish. "God forgive me, and
have mercy on you!"

She struggled, lifted up her arms, drew his lips close to hers, and over
them floated the last icy breath that Rachael Closs ever drew.

Then the young girl, who had loved this woman better than anything on
earth, sank to the floor, and took that pale head in her lap, moaning
over it piteously.

"My poor mamma! my darling mother! Speak to me! Open your eyes! It is
Clara--your own, own child! Her eyelids close--her lips are falling
apart! Oh! my God, is she dead?"

She looked piteously in the face of Hepworth Closs, who had knelt