ontaining Urquhart and
his bride.

"'She has not been here,' thought I, 'or I should have met her,
unless--' and my eye stole with a certain shrinking terror toward the
river which skirted along the garden at the back--'unless'-- But even my
thoughts stopped here. I would not, could not, think of what, if it were
true, would end all things for me.

"Leaving this place, I wandered aimlessly through the streets, studying
each face that I met for intimations which should guide me in my search.
If not a madman, I was near enough to one to make the memory of that
hour hideous to me; and when at last, worn out as much by my emotions as
by the countless steps I had taken, I returned to my house for a bite
and sup, something in the sight of its desolation overpowered me, and
yielding to a despair which assured me that I should never again see her
in this world, I sank on the floor inert and powerless, and continued
thus till morning, without movement and almost without consciousness.

"Fatal repose! And yet I do not know if I should call it so. It only
robbed me of a few hours less of conscious misery. For when I roused,
when I became again myself, and looked about my house, there on the
floor, underneath a curtain window which had been left unlatched, I saw
a letter containing these words:

'HONORED AND MUCH ABUSED FRIEND:--When you read
this, Marah will be no more. After all that has
passed--after our broken marriage and the
departure of my cousin--life has become
insupportable; and, believing that you would
rather know me dead than miserable, I ventured
to write you these words, and ask you to
forgive me, now that I am gone.

'I loved him: let that explain everything.

'Despairingly yours,
'MARAH LEIGHTON.'

"With shrieks I tore from the house. Marah dying! Marah dead! I would
see about that. Racing down to the gate, I paused. Some one was leaning
on it. It was Caesar, and at the first glimpse I had of his face I knew I
was too late--that all was over, and that the whole town knew it.

"'Oh, massa, I wanted to go in, but I was frightened. I's been waiting
here an hour, sah; when dey told me dat dey had found her bonnet
floating on de ribber, I know'd how you'd feel, sah, and so I come here
and--'

"I found words to ask him a question. 'When was this found, and where?'

"'This morning, sah, at daybreak. It was caught