ary steps to
regain your fortune, and remove the stigma which rests on your name."

"Never, sir, never! I will die a beggar before I will owe my prosperity
to such a contract!" exclaimed Emily, whose indignation now found
utterance.

"I beg madam will reflect before she decides," said Maxwell, in a
satirical tone.

"Sir, I will die upon the rack, before the hand of a villain shall lead
me to the altar!" answered Emily, unable to control her feelings.

"Softly, lady, softly!"

"Leave me, sir! leave me, or I will call upon my uncle to protect me
from further insult!"

"Your _uncle_, I fear, was left at the last wood-yard; so I heard my
friend De Guy say."

Emily felt herself the victim of a plot, and, rousing all her energies,
she said,

"I see it all. The machinations of a villain--for such you are--shall be
foiled."

"Miss Dumont," said Maxwell, his passions roused by the severity of her
epithet, "do you forget your condition? You are a _slave_! Your supposed
uncle is not here. You have no free papers, and are liable to be
committed to the next jail."

"But I am not without a friend who is able to protect me," said Emily,
with spirit, as she saw Henry Carroll ascend to the deck upon which they
stood.

"Your friend is helpless. Another word, and I will proclaim your
condition," and he rudely seized her by the arm. "Your friend cannot
help you. He has not your free papers."

"But he has a strong arm!" shouted Henry Carroll, as with a single blow
he struck the attorney to the deck.

"This way, Emily," said he to the weeping girl, who clung tremblingly to
him; "you are safe now."

Emily was conducted by the gallant arm which had protected her from we
know not what indignity. She felt secure in his presence from further
molestation, and his soothing words and hopeful promises did much to
restore her.

Maxwell soon recovered from the effects of the blow he had received,
and, boiling with passion, swore vengeance upon the man who had
interrupted him. But his passion was of short duration, and was
succeeded by sober reflections upon the "position of his case." Emily
Dumont was not of that class of women with whom he was accustomed to
deal. He had found in her an element with which he had not before been
conversant,--of which, indeed, he had read in books of poetry, but did
not believe it existed in the material world.

CHAPTER XI.

"Caught, caught
In thine own tra