:

"And jes that minute they happened either to see or to hear me, I don't
know which. Anyways, they looks up, and--whew! they jumps apart as if a
fire-cracker had gone off between 'em! Well, I tells my lady as her
child is sick, and she jumps up, impatient like, to go and look after
him. And I comes away too. And that was just about ten minutes before
you got home yourself."

"Deceived! Betrayed! Scorned! Laughed at!" bitterly exclaimed Sybil.

"And that's all. And now look here, honey! Don't you go to taking on
about this here piece o' business! And don't you get mad long o' your
husband on any woman's account, whatever you do! Come down on the woman!
That's what you do. It is all _her_ fault, not hizzen! _He_ couldn't
help himself, poor innocent creetur! Lor! honey, I don't know much about
married life, bein' of a single woman myself; but I have heard my mother
say as men are mons'rous weak-minded poor creeturs, and need to be
guided by their wives; and if they an't ruled by their wives, they are
sure to be by some other woman! And it stands to reason it is more
respectable to be ruled by their wives! And so, honey, my advice to you
is, to send that bad woman about her business, and take that innocent
man firmly in hand."

And so Miss Tabby babbled on, no longer heeded by Sybil, who soon
slipped away and hid herself in one of the empty spare rooms.

CHAPTER XIII.

MORE THAN THE BITTERNESS OF DEATH.

He to whom
I gave my heart with all its wealth of love,
Forsakes me for another.--MEDEA.

"Oh my heart! my heart!" moaned Sybil, as she sank down upon the floor
of that spare-room, the door of which she had bolted, to secure herself
from intrusion.

"Oh, my heart! my heart!" she wailed, pressing her hand to her side like
one who had just received a mortal wound.

"Oh, my heart! my heart!" she groaned, as one who complains of an
insupportable agony. And for some moments she could do no more than
this. Then at length the stream of utterance flowed forth, and--

"He loves me no longer! my husband loves me no longer!" she cried in
more than the bitterness of death. "He loves that false siren in place
of me, his true wife. He gives her all the tender words, all the warm
caresses he used to lavish on me. His heart is won from me. I am
desolate! I am desolate, and I shall die! I shall die! But o