der," he thought;
"and if the old woman's up, perhaps I'll get a sight of her. I'd like to
see what sort of a face answers to that outlandish name."

As the doctor leaned over the paling, and looked again at Hetty's
garden, he saw something which had escaped his notice before, and at
which he started again, and muttered--this time aloud, and with
an expression almost of terror,--"Good Heavens, if there isn't a
chrysanthemum bed too, exactly like ours! what does this mean?" Hetty
had little thought when she was laying out her garden, as nearly as
possible like the garden she had left behind her, that she was writing a
record which any eye but her own would note.

"I believe I'll go in and see this old French woman," he thought: "it
is such a strange thing that she should have just the same flowers Hetty
had. I don't believe she's an adventuress, after all."

Dr. Eben had his hand on the latch of the gate. At that instant, the
cottage door opened, and "Tantibba," in her white cap and gray gown, and
with her scarlet basket on her arm, appeared on the threshold. Dr. Eben
lifted his hat courteously, and advanced.

"I was just about to take the liberty of knocking at your door, madame,"
he said, "to ask if you would give me a few of your lavender blossoms."

As he began to speak, "Tantibba's" basket fell from her hand. As he
advanced towards her, her eyes grew large with terror, and all color
left her cheeks.

"Why do I terrify her so?" thought Dr. Eben, quickening his steps, and
hastening to reassure her, by saying still more gently:

"Pray forgive me for intruding. I"--the words died on his lips: he stood
like one stricken by paralysis; his hands falling helplessly by his
side, and his eyes fixed in almost ghastly dread on this gray-haired
woman, from whose white lips came, in Hetty's voice, the cry:

"Eben! oh! Eben!"

Hetty was the first to recover herself. Seeing with terror how rigid and
pale her husband's face had become; how motionless, like one turned to
stone, he stood--she hastened down the steps, and, taking him by the
hand, said, in a trembling whisper:

"Oh, come into the house, Eben."

Mechanically he followed her; she still leading him by the hand, like
a child. Like a child, or rather like a blind man, he sat down in the
chair which she placed for him. His eyes did not move from her face; but
they looked almost like sightless eyes. Hetty stood before him, with her
hands clasped tight. Neither spo