their proximity to
such dangers as both had incurred, and, by a circuitous way, reached the
river, where, taking a boat, they rowed under the banks down stream.

Hatchie was disappointed, on his return, to find his prisoner had
escaped. A diligent search, by the precaution of the confederates, was
rendered fruitless.

CHAPTER XVIII.

"Why should my curiosity excite me
To search and pry into the affairs of others,
Who have to employ my thoughts so many cares
And sorrows of my own?" LILLO.

Jaspar Dumont sat in the library at Bellevue. It was the evening after
his return from Vicksburg. Near him, engaged in examining a heap of
papers, was his new overseer, Dalhousie.

Jaspar was musing over the late turn his affairs had taken; and, while
he congratulated himself on his present triumphant position, he could
but regard with apprehension the future, which seemed to smile only to
lure him on to certain destruction. The trite saying, "There is no peace
for the wicked," is literally and universally true. The lowering brow,
the threatening scowl, the suspicious glance, of the wicked uncle, were
as reliable evidences of his misery as his naked soul, torn with doubt
and anguish, could have been. Every new paper the overseer turned over
produced a start of apprehension, lest it might contain evidence of his
villany. His nerves had suffered terribly beneath the vision of guilt
and punishment that constantly haunted him. His new overseer, whom he
had partially admitted to his bosom as a confidant, had secured a strong
hold upon his fears. His presence seemed necessary to cheer him in his
lonely hours, to chase away the phantoms of vengeance that pursued him.
Harassed by doubts and fears, his constitution was, in some degree,
impaired, and his mind, losing the pillar upon which it rested, was
prone to yield also.

Dalhousie examined with minuteness the papers to which his attention had
been directed. Before him was a heap of documents of various kinds, all
in confusion,--bills and bonds, letters and deeds, were thrown
promiscuously together. His purpose was to sort and file them away for
future reference. This confusion among the papers was not the work of
Colonel Dumont; he had been strictly methodical and accurate in all his
business affairs. This fact was attested by the occasional strips of
pasteboard, on which were marked various descriptions of papers, as well
as by bits of red