ening suspicion made his brain whirl and his heart
stand still. He followed her, and said, pleadingly,--

"Do not keep me in painful suspense. Why is my declaration of devoted
affection so revolting to you? Why can you not at least permit me to
express the love--"

"Because that love dishonors me! Dr. Grey, I--am--a--wife!"

The words fell slowly from her white lips, as if her heart's blood
were dripping with them, and a deep, purplish spot burned on each
cheek, to attest her utter humiliation.

Dr. Grey gazed at her, with a bewildered, incredulous expression.

"You mean that your heart is buried in your husband's grave?"

"Oh, if that were true, you and I might be spared this shame and
agony."

A low wail escaped her, and she hid her face in her arms.

"Mrs. Gerome, is not your husband dead?"

"Dead to me,--but not yet in his grave. The man I married is still
alive."

She heard a half-stifled groan, and buried her face deeper in her arms
to avoid the sight of the suffering she had caused.

For some time the stillness of death reigned around them, and when at
last the wretched woman raised her eyes, she saw Dr. Grey standing
beside her, with one hand on the back of her chair, the other clasped
over his eyes. Reverently she turned and pressed her lips to his cold
fingers, and he felt her hot tears falling upon them, as she said,
falteringly,--

"Forgive me the pain that I have innocently inflicted on you. God is
my witness, I did not imagine you cared for me. I supposed you pitied
me, and were only interested in saving my miserable soul. The servants
told me you were very soon to be married to a young girl who lived
with your sister; and I never dreamed that your noble, generous heart
felt any interest in me, save that of genuine Christian compassion for
my loneliness and desolation. If I had suspected your feelings, I
would have gone away immediately, or told you all. Oh, that I had
never come here!--that I had never left my safe retreat, near Funchal!
Then I would not have stabbed the heart of the only man whom I
respect, revere, and trust."

Some moments elapsed ere he could fully command himself, and when he
spoke he had entirely regained composure.

"Do not reproach yourself. The fault has been mine, rather than
yours. Knowing that some mystery enveloped your early life, I should
not have allowed my affections to centre so completely in one
concerning whose antecedents I knew absolutely nothing. I