ied with a gentle delicacy that
was almost a shock to me as showing from what heights to what depths a
woman can fall. Enough that nothing passed between us beyond what I have
intimated, and that in all she said she gave me no news of Luttra.

"Next day I started for the rambling old house in Vermont, if haply
in the spot where I first saw her, I might come upon some clue to her
present whereabouts. But the old inn was deserted, and whatever hope I
may have had in that direction, perished with the rest.

"Concerning the contents of that bureau-drawer above, I can say nothing.
If, as I scarcely dare to hope, they should prove to have been indeed
brought here by the girl who has since disappeared so strangely, who
knows but what in those folded garments a clue is given which will lead
me at last to the knowledge for which I would now barter all I possess.
My wife--But I can mention her name no more till the question that now
assails us is set at rest. Mrs. Daniels must--"

But at that moment the door opened and Mrs. Daniels came in.

CHAPTER XIV. MRS. DANIELS

She still wore her bonnet and shawl and her face was like marble.

"You want me?" said she with a hurried look towards Mr. Blake that had
as much fear as surprise in it.

"Yes," murmured that gentleman moving towards her with an effort we
could very well appreciate. "Mrs. Daniels, who was the girl you harbored
in that room above us for so long? Speak; what was her name and where
did she come from?"

The housekeeper trembling in every limb, cast us one hurried appeal.

"Speak!" reechoed Mr. Gryce; "the time for secrecy has passed."

"O," cried she, sinking into a chair from sheer inability to stand, "it
was your wife, Mr. Blake, the young creature you--"

"Ah!"

All the agony, the hopelessness, the love, the passion of those last few
months flashed up in that word. She stopped as if she had been shot, but
seeing the hand which he had hurriedly raised, fall slowly before him,
went on with a burst,

"O sir, she made me swear on my knees I would never betray her, no
matter what happened. When not two weeks after your father died she came
to the house and asking for me, told me all her story and all her love;
how she could not reconcile it with her idea of a wife's duty to live
under any other roof than that of her husband, and lifting off the black
wig which she wore, showed me how altered she had made herself by that
simple change--in her case more