ARIEL was downstairs in the shadowy hall, half asleep, halfawake, waiting to see the visitors clear of the house. Withoutspeaking to us, without looking at us, she led the way down thedark garden walk, and locked the gate behind us. "Good-night,Ariel," I called out to her over the paling. Nothing answered mebut the tramp of her heavy footsteps returning to the house, andthe dull thump, a moment afterward, of the closing door.

The footman had thoughtfully lighted the carriage lamps. Carryingone of them to serve as a lantern, he lighted us over the wildsof the brick desert, and landed us safely on the path by thehigh-road.

"Well!" said my mother-in-law, when we were comfortably seated inthe carriage again. "You have seen Miserrimus Dexter, and I hopeyou are satisfied. I will do him the justice to declare that Inever, in all my experience, saw him more completely crazy thanhe was to-night. What do _you_ say?"

"I don't presume to dispute your opinion," I answered. "But,speaking for myself, I'm not quite sure that he is mad."

"Not mad!" cried Mrs. Macallan, "after those frantic performancesin his chair? Not mad, after the exhibition he made of hisunfortunate cousin? Not mad, after the song that he sang in yourhonor, and the falling asleep by way of conclusion? Oh, Valeria!Valeria! Well said the wisdom of our ancestors--there are none soblind as those who won't see."

"Pardon me, dear Mrs. Macallan, I saw everything that youmention, and I never felt more surprised or more confounded in mylife. But now I have recovered from my amazement, and can thinkit over quietly, I must still venture to doubt whether thisstrange man is really mad in the true meaning of the word. Itseems to me that he only expresses--I admit in a very recklessand boisterous way--thoughts and feelings which most of us areashamed of as weaknesses, and which we keep to ourselvesaccordingly. I confess I have often fancied myself transformedinto some other person, and have felt a certain pleasure inseeing myself in my new character. One of our first amusements aschildren (if we have any imagination at all) is to get out of ourown characters, and to try the characters of other personages asa change--to fairies, to be queens, to be anything, in short, butwhat we really are. Mr. Dexter lets out the secret just as thechildren do, and if that is madness, he is certainly mad. But Inoticed that when his imagination cooled down he becameMiserrimus Dexter again--he no more believed himself than webelieved him to be Napoleon or Shakespeare. Besides, someallowance is surely to be made for the solitary, sedentary lifethat he leads. I am not learned enough to trace the influence ofthat life in making him what he is; but I think I can see theresult in an over-excited imagination, and I fancy I can tracehis exhibiting his power over the poor cousin and his singing ofthat wonderful song to no more formidable cause than inordinateself-conceit. I hope the confession will not lower me seriouslyin your good opinion; but I must say I have enjoyed my visit,and, worse still, Miserrimus Dexter really interests me."

"Does this learned discourse on Dexter mean that you are going tosee him again?" asked Mrs. Macallan.

"I don't know how I may feel about it tomorrow morning," I said;"but my impulse at this moment is decidedly to see him again. Ihad a little talk with him while you were away at the other endof the room, and I believe he really can be of use to me--"

"Of use to you in what?" interposed my mother-in-law.

"In the one object which I have in view--the object, dear Mrs.Macallan, which I regret to say you do not approve."

"And you are going to take him into your confidence? to open yourwhole mind to such a man as the man we have just left?"

"Yes, if I think of it to-morrow as I think of it to-night. Idare say it is a risk; but I must run risks. I know I am notprudent; but prudence won't help a woman in my position, with myend to gain."

Mrs. Macallan made no further remonstrance in words. She opened acapacious pocket in front of the carriage, and took from it a boxof matches and a railway reading-lamp.

"You provoke me," said the old lady, "into showing you what yourhusband thinks of this new whim of yours. I have got his letterwith me--his last letter from Spain. You shall judge foryourself, you poor deluded young creature, whether my son isworthy of the sacrifice--the useless and hopelesssacrifice--which you are bent on making of yourself for his sake.Strike a light!"

I willingly obeyed her. Ever since she had informed me ofEustace's departure to Spain I had been eager for more news ofhim, for something to sustain my spirits, after so much that haddisappointed and depressed me. Thus far I did not even knowwhether my husband thought of me sometimes in his self-imposedexile. As to this regretting already the rash act which hadseparated us, it was still too soon to begin hoping for that.

The lamp having been lighted, and fixed in its place between thetwo front windows of the carriage, Mrs. Macallan produced herson's letter. There is no folly like the folly of love. It costme a hard struggle to restrain myself from kissing the paper onwhich the dear hand had rested.

"There!" said my mother-in-law. "Begin on the second page, thepage devoted to you. Read straight down to the last line at thebottom, and, in God's name, come back to your senses, child,before it is too late!"

I followed my instructions, and read these words:

"Can I trust myself to write of Valeria? I _must_ write of her.Tell me how she is, how she looks, what she is doing. I am alwaysthinking of her. Not a day passes but I mourn the loss of her.Oh, if she had only been contented to let matters rest as theywere! Oh, if she had never discovered the miserable truth!

"She spoke of reading the Trial when I saw her last. Has shepersisted in doing so? I believe--I say this seriously, mother--Ibelieve the shame and the horror of it would have been the deathof me if I had met her face to face when she first knew of theignominy that I have suffered, of the infamous suspicion of whichI have been publicly made the subject. Think of those pure eyeslooking at a man who has been accus ed (and never whollyabsolved) of the foulest and the vilest of all murders, and thenthink of what that man must feel if he have any heart and anysense of shame left in him. I sicken as I write of it.

"Does she still meditate that hopeless project--the offspring,poor angel, of her artless, unthinking generosity? Does she stillfancy that it is in _her_ power to assert my innocence before theworld? Oh, mother (if she do), use your utmost influence to makeher give up the idea! Spare her the humiliation, thedisappointment, the insult, perhaps, to which she may innocentlyexpose herself. For her sake, for my sake, leave no means untriedto attain this righteous, this merciful end.

"I send her no message--I dare not do it. Say nothing, when yousee her, which can recall me to her memory. On the contrary, helpher to forget me as soon as possible. The kindest thing I cando--the one atonement I can make to her--is to drop out of herlife."

With those wretched words it ended. I handed his letter back tohis mother in silence. She said but little on her side.

"If _this_ doesn't discourage you," she remarked, slowly foldingup the letter, "nothing will. Let us leave it there, and say nomore."

I made no answer--I was crying behind my veil. My domesticprospect looked so dreary! my unfortunate husband was sohopelessly misguided, so pitiably wrong! The one chance for bothof us, and the one consolation for poor Me, was to hold to mydesperate resolution more firmly than ever. If I had wantedanything to confirm me in this view, and to arm me against theremonstrances of every one of my friends, Eustace's letter wouldhave proved more than sufficient to answer the purpose. At leasthe had not forgotten me; he thought of me, and he mourned theloss of me every day of his life. That was encouragementenough--for the present. "If Ariel calls for me in thepony-chaise to-morrow," I thought to myself, "with Ariel I go."

Mrs. Macallan set me down at Benjamin's door.

I mentioned to her at parting--I stood sufficiently in awe of herto put it off till the last moment--that Miserrimus Dexter hadarranged to send his cousin and his pony-chaise to her residenceon the next day; and I inquired thereupon whether mymother-in-law would permit me to call at her house to wait forthe appearance of the cousin, or whether she would prefer sendingthe chaise on to Benjamin's cottage. I fully expected anexplosion of anger to follow this bold avowal of my plans for thenext day. The old lady agreeably surprised me. She proved thatshe had really taken a liking to me: she kept her temper.

"If you persist in going back to Dexter, you certainly shall notgo to him from my door," she said. "But I hope you will _not_persist. I hope you will awake a wiser woman to-morrow morning."

The morning came. A little before noon the arrival of thepony-chaise was announced at the door, and a letter was broughtin to me from Mrs. Macallan.

"I have no right to control your movements," my mother-in-lawwrote. "I send the chaise to Mr. Benjamin's house; and Isincerely trust that you will not take your place in it. I wish Icould persuade you, Valeria, how truly I am your friend. I havebeen thinking about you anxiously in the wakeful hours of thenight. _How_ anxiously, you will understand when I tell you thatI now reproach myself for not having done more than I did toprevent your unhappy marriage. And yet, what more I could havedone I don't really know. My son admitted to me that he wascourting you under an assumed name, but he never told me what thename was. Or who you were, or where your friends lived. Perhaps Iought to have taken measures to find this out. Perhaps, if I hadsucceeded, I ought to have interfered and enlightened you, evenat the sad sacrifice of making an enemy of my own son. I honestlythought I did my duty in expressing my disapproval, and inrefusing to be present at the marriage. Was I too easilysatisfied? It is too late to ask. Why do I trouble you with anold woman's vain misgivings and regrets? My child, if you come toany harm, I shall feel (indirectly) responsible for it. It isthis uneasy state of mind which sets me writing, with nothing tosay that can interest you. Don't go to Dexter! The fear has beenpursuing me all night that your going to Dexter will end badly.Write him an excuse. Valeria! I firmly believe you will repent itif you return to that house."

Was ever a woman more plainly warned, more carefully advised,than I? And yet warning and advice were both thrown away on me.

Let me say for myself that I was really touched by the kindnessof my mother-in-law's letter, though I was not shaken by it inthe smallest degree. As long as I lived, moved, and thought, myone purpose now was to make Miserrimus Dexter confide to me hisideas on the subject of Mrs. Eustace Macallan's death. To thoseideas I looked as my guiding stars along the dark way on which Iwas going. I wrote back to Mrs. Macallan, as I really feltgratefully and penitently. And then I went out to the chaise.