shawl and bonnet with little comfort in her the pale lips dropping apart, -a solemn, mind on that subject to support her under speechless creature, abstracted already out the returning pangs of anxiety about Susan, of this world and all its influences. The which overwhelmed her again as she opened light that streamed over her for the moment the door of the sick-room. The two troubles made no difference to Susan. There was united in her heart and aggravated each nothing here powerful enough to rouse the other, as with a sick throb of expectation soul which horror and passion had driven she went in to Susan's bedside. Perhaps into one terrible corner of memory, obliterthere might be “a change” - for better or ating all the rest of her life. Dr. Rider for worse, something might have happened. looked at her with eyes in which the impaThe doctor might find something more con- tience of powerless strength overcame even clusive to-night in that languid, pallid face. his professional reserve. He wrung the widThe noiseless room struck her with a chill ow's hand, which she laid on his arm in a of misery as she went to her usual place, trembling appeal to him to tell her the worst. carrying the active life of pain and a troubled “The worst is that she is dying before our heart into that melancholy atmosphere from eyes, and that she might be saved," he said, which life seemed to have fled. With a fal- leading the poor mother to the other end of tering voice she spoke to Susan, who showed the room. "All her heart and soul are conno signs of hearing her except by a feeble, centrated upon that time when she was away half-lifting of her heavy eyelids and restless from you: unless we can rouse her by somemotion of her frame. No change! Never thing that will recall that time, she will never any change! or at least, as the nurse imag-know you more. Think! is there nothing ined, until The widow's heart heaved that would wake her up even to remember

with a silent sob of anguish-anguish sharp and acute as it is when our misery breaks suddenly upon us out of a veil of other thoughts, and we feel it intolerable. This sudden pang convulsed Mrs. Vincent's much-tried heart as she wiped the bitter tears out of her eyes and looked at her child, thus gliding, in a hopeless apathy and unconsciousness, out of the arms that strained themselves in vain to hold her. After so much as she had borne in her troubled life, God knows, it was hard. She did not rebel, but her heart lifted up a bitter cry to the Father in heaven.

It was just then, while her anxious ear caught the step of the doctor on the stair, that Mrs. Vincent was aware also of a carriage driving rapidly up to the door. Preoccupied as she was, the sound startled her. A passing wonder who it could be, and the vague expectation which influences the mind at the great crises of life, when one feels that anything may happen, moved her dimly as she rose to receive the doctor. Dr. Rider came in with his noiseless step and anxious face; they shook hands with each other mechanically, she gazing at him to see what his opinion was before it could be formed he looking with solicitous serious eyes on the sick-bed. The light was dim, and Dr. Rider held it up to see his patient. There she lay, moving now and then with the restlessness of weakness, the pale large eyelids half closed,

Even while listening to the doctor's dreadful suggestion, Mrs. Vincent had been aware of the opening of the door down-stairs, and of a sound of voices. She was trembling so that she could scarcely stand, principally, no doubt, on account of this strange demand which he made upon her strength, but with a nervous expectation besides which she could not explain even to herself. But when, out of that confuse commotion below, there rose faint but audible the sound of a voice calling "Susan! Susan!" the two anxious people started apart, and turned a wondering momentary gaze upon each other, involuntarily asking what was that? what did it mean? Then the doctor rushed to the door, where the widow followed him as well as her trembling limbs would permit. She saw him dash down-stairs, and herself stood grasping the railing, waiting for what was about to happen, with her

ears of the patient. She lifted her heavy eyelids, and looked round with half-awakened eyes. "Call her again, again!" said the doctor, in an intense whisper, which seemed to thrill through the room. The girl, who was engaged with a much more

tice of the doctor. She knew nothing about Susan's danger-she was bent on gaining succor for herself. "Susan!-tell her to look at me—at me! Susan! I care for no

heart so beating and fluttering in her breast | san; she is not here." Then Dr. Rider led that she could scarcely breathe for it. She her round to the bedside, closely followed by could make nothing of the rapid interroga- the widow, and, lifting a candle, threw its tion that went on down-stairs. She heard light fully upon the stranger. "Is it Suthe voice of the doctor in hasty questions, san ?" said the girl. "Will she not speak and the slow, agitated, somewhat confused to me?-is she dead? Susan, O Susan, utterance of a strange voice, which appeared Susan!" It was an outcry of childish imto answer him; and once or twice through patience and despair, rising louder than any these sounds, came the strange cry, "Susan! voice had risen in that room for many a day. Susan!" which went to the widow's heart. Then she burst forth into tears and sobs. Who could this be that called upon Susan" Susan !—she will not speak to me, she will with so pathetic a repetition ? It seemed a not look at me!" cried the stranger, drawvery long interval to Mrs. Vincent before ing her arm out of the doctor's hold, and the doctor re-appeared, and yet so short clasping her hands together. There was a was the time, that the door by which the slight movement in the bed: not the restless new-comers, whoever they were, had en- tossing with which, her nurse was familiar, tered, was still open, admitting some strange but a trembling shiver came over that dying familiar sounds from the street into the be- frame. The sound had reached to the dull wildering maze of wonder and expectation. Mrs. Vincent held fast by the rails to support herself, when she saw the doctor returning up the stair, leading by the hand a girl whom he grasped fast, and carried along with him by a kind of gentle but strong compulsion. It was she who was calling engrossing interest of her own, took no noSusan, gazing round her with large dilated blue eyes, looking everywhere for something she had not yet found. A beautiful girl, more beautiful than anything mortal to the widow's surprised and wondering eyes. Who body but you!" said the lovely, helpless was she? The face was very young, sadly creature, with strange, half-articulate cries, simple, framed by long curling locks of fair pressing closer to the bed. "You are to hair, and the broad circle of a large flapping take care of me." Mrs. Vincent pressed Leghorn hat and blue veil. A bewildered forward with pangs of anxiety, of terror, half-recognition came to Mrs. Vincent's of hope, and of a mother's tender jealousy, mind as this blue veil waved in her face in the wind from the open door; but excitement and anxiety had deprived her of speech: she could ask no questions. "Here is the physician," said Dr. Rider, with a kindred excitement in his voice. He went into the room before her, leading the girl, behind whom there followed slowly a confused and disturbed woman, whose face Mrs. Vincent felt she had seen before. The mother, half jealous in her wonder, pressed in after the doctor to guard her Susan even from experiments of healing. "Doctor, doctor, who is it?" she said. But Dr. Rider held up his hand imperatively to silence her. The room was imperfectly lighted with candles burning dimly, and a faint glow of firelight. "Susan!" cried the eager child's voice, with a weary echo of longing and disappointment. "Susan!-take me to Su

through all, as these strange entreaties filled
the room. She, too, cried aloud, as she
perceived the awakening in that pallid face,
the faint movement as if to raise herself up,
which indicated a conscious effort on the
part of Susan. The clouds were breaking
on that obscured and hopeless firmament.
The light which trembled in the doctor's
hand, caught a gleam of understanding and
life in Susan's eyes, as her mother flew to
raise her up, obeying the suggestion of that
unhoped-for movement. "Susan! you said
you would take care of me!" cried the young
stranger, throwing herself upon the bedside
and grasping at the weak arm which once
had protected her. The touch of her hands
awoke the slumbering soul. Slowly the
light grew in Susan's eyes.
not moved for days except in the restless
tossings of languor, lifted those white feeble

She who had

mind than was the sentiment of safety, of love, and watchfulness which somehow abode in this strange, dim room, in the little andecipherable circle of faces which surrounded her bed. "Hush!" said Susan again, holding the stranger close. "Here are women -women! nobody will harm us;" then, with a sudden flush over all her face, and cry of joy as the doctor suddenly threw the light full upon Mrs. Vincent, who was bending over her, her mind struggled into possession of itself, "Here is my mother! she has come to take us home!"

Mrs. Vincent remembered nothing more; she did not faint, for her child wanted her she sat all the night through on the bed, with Susan leaning against her shoulder, clinging to her, holding her fast-starting again and again to make sure that all was safe, and that it was indeed her mother's arms that held her. Her soul was recalled out of that trance of death. They laid the beautiful child upon the sofa in her young guardian's sight, to keep up that happy influence; and when the night was about half spent, the widow, throbbing all over her wearied frame with exhaustion, pain, and joy, perceived that her Susan had fallen deep and sweet asleep, clasping close, as if never again to lose hold of them, her mother's tender hands.

arms to put them round the appealing child. | her. But the recollection of deadly peril Then Susan struggled up, faint, yet inspired, was not more distinct upon her confused unconscious of her mother's help that enabled her to do so, and confronted the strange people in her room, whom she had seen for weeks past, but did not know with living eyes. "Nobody shall touch her-we will protect each other," said the voice that had grown strange even to her mother's ears. Mrs. Vincent could hardly be restrained from breaking in with a thousand caresses and outcries of joy and thankfulness. But Dr. Rider quieted the poor mother with a touch of his hand. "Let them alone," he said, with that authority which no one in a sick-room can resist. Mrs. Vincent kept back with unspeakable pangs in her heart, and watched the waking up of that paralyzed life which, alike in its loss and its recovery, had been swept apart from her into another world. Without any help from her mother, without even recognizing her mother or distinguishing her from the strangers round, Susan's soul awoke. She raised herself more and more among those pillows where a little while ago she lay so passively --she opened her eyes fully and looked round upon the man by her bedside, and the other indistinct figures in the room, with a look of resistance and conscious strength. "We will protect each other," said Susan, slowly: "nobody shall harm her-we will keep each other safe." Then, after another interval, other instincts awoke in the reviving soul. She cast a wistful look from one to another, always drawing her faint white arm round the girl who clung to her, and found security in her clasp. "Hush, hush! there are women here," she said in a whisper, and with a tone of strange confusion, light breaking through the darkness. Then there followed a long pause. Dr. Rider stood by the bedside holding up his candle, attracting the wandering, wistful glances of his patient, who ceased to look at him with defiance as her eyes again and again returned to the face, of which, often as it had bent over her, she had no knowledge. All over the unknown room wandered those strange looks, interrogating everything with a wistfulness beyond words. What was this strange, unfamiliar world into which, after her trance of suffering, Susan had awakened? She did not know where she was, nor who the people were who surrounded not realized his sister's extreme peril, and

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE after-events of the evening naturally lessened, in the minister's family at least, the all-absorbing interest of the meeting at Salem. Even Mr. Vincent's landlady, in her wondering narrative of the scene in the sickroom-which, all Mrs. Vincent's usual decorums being thrust aside by that unexpected occurrence, she had witnessed-forgot the other public event which was of equally great importance. The house was in a state of agitation as great as on Susan's return; and when the exulting doctor, whose experiment had been so rarely successful, turned all supernumerary persons out of the sick-room, it fell to Vincent's part to take charge of the perplexed governess, Miss Smith, who stood outside, anxious to offer explanations, a fatigued and harassed, but perfectly virtuous and exemplary woman. Vincent, who had

who was rather disconcerted by this fresh I wrote to say so, but I think Mrs. Mildmay

could not have got my letter. The child would have run away by herself if I had not brought her. Besides," said Miss Smith, apologetically, "the doctors have assured me that, if she ever became much interested in any one, or attached to anybody in particular, she was not to be crossed. It was the best chance for her mind, the doctors said. What could I do? What do you think I could do, Mr. Vincent? I brought her home, for I could not help myself-otherwise she would have run away. She has a very strong will, though she looks so gentle. I hope you will help me to explain the circumstances to Mrs. Mildmay, and how it was I came back without her authority. Don't you think they ought to call in the friends on both sides and come to some arrangement, Mr. Vincent ?" said the excellent woman, anxiously. "I know she trusts you very much, and it was she herself who gave me your address."

invasion of his house, opened the door of his sitting-room for her with more annoyance than hospitality. His own affairs were urgest in his mind. He could not keep his thoughts from dwelling upon Salem and what had occurred there, though no one else thought of it. Had he known the danger in which his sister lay, his heart might have rejected every secondary matter. But the minister did not know that Susan had been sinking into the last apathy when this sudden arrival saved her. He gave Miss Smith the easy-chair by the fire, and listened with an appearance of attention, but with little real understanding, to her lengthy and perplexed story. She was all in a flutter, the good governess said: everything was so mysterious and out of the way, she did not know what to think. Little Alice's mamma, Miss Russell that was, Mrs. Mildmay she meant, had brought the child back to her after that dreadful business at Dover. What was the rights of that business, could Mr. To this speech Vincent listened with an Vincent tell her? Colonel Mildmay was impatience and restlessness which he found getting better, she knew, and it was not a it impossible to conceal. He paced about murder; and she was heart-broken when she the darker end of his room, on the other heard the trouble poor dear Miss Vincent side of that table, where the lamp shone had got into about it. Well, Alice's mamma vacantly upon his open desk and scattered brought back the child, and they started with papers, answering now and then with a monher at once to France. They went up be- osyllable of reluctant courtesy, irritated and yond Lyons to the hills, an out-of-the-way disturbed beyond expression by the perfectly little place, but Mrs. Mildmay was always serious and proper figure seated by the fire. so nervous. "And then she left us, Mr. Somebody might come from that assembly Vincent," said the afflicted governess, as the which had met to discuss him, and he could minister, in grievous impatience, kept pacing not be alone to receive them. In the annoyup and down the room thus occupied and ance of the moment the minister almost taken possession of "left us without a soul chafed at his sister and her concerns. His to speak to or a church within reach; and life was invaded by these women, with their if there is one thing I have more horror of mysteries and agonies. He listened to the than another for its effect upon the youthful steps outside, thinking every moment to hear mind, it is Popery, which is so seductive to the steady tramp of the deputation from Sathe imagination. Alice did not take to lem, or at least Tozer, whom it would have her mamma, Mr. Vincent. It was natural been balm to his mind, in the height of the enough, but it was hard upon Mrs. Mild- good man's triumph, to cut short and annimay: she never had a good way with chil- hilate. But how do that, or anything else, dren; and from the moment we started till with this woman seated by his fire explainnow, it has been impossible to get your sis-ing her unintelligible affairs? Such was ter out of the child's mind. She took a Vincent's state of mind while his mother, in fancy to her the moment she saw her. Girls an agony of joy, was hearing from Susan's of that age, if you will not think it strange of me to say so, very often fall in love with a girl older than themselves-quite fall in love, though it is a strange thing to say. Alice would not rest-she gave me no peace.

lips, for the first time, broken explanations of those few days of her life which qutbalanced in terrible importance all its preceding years. The minister did not know that his sister's very existence, as well as her reason,