before me till I
could see nothing else. Honora, Honora, Honora who trusted me! who had
suffered everything but the sight of blood! who was a bride, and whom it
would be base ingratitude for me to plunge into the depths of dishonor
and despair! And the struggle was so fierce, and the torture of it so
keen, that ere long my brain succumbed to the strain, and from the
height of anguished feeling I sank into apathy, and from apathy into
unconsciousness, till I no longer knew where I was or possessed power to
guide my horse. In this condition I was found wandering in a field and
thence carried to a farm house, where I remained a prey to fever. When I
returned to consciousness, three weeks had elapsed.

"As soon as I could be moved, I went back to Albany. I found the
community there settled in the belief that I had joined in death the
woman I so much loved, and was shown a letter which had been sent me,
and which had been opened by the authorities after all hope had been
given up of my return. It was from Mrs. Urquhart, and related how they
had changed their plans upon reaching New York. Having found a ship on
the point of sailing for France, they had determined to go there instead
of to the Bermudas, and, consequently, requested me to inform Mr. Hatton
of the fact, and also assure him that he would hear from them personally
as soon as a letter could reach him from the other side. As she was in
haste--in truth, was writing this in the post office on the way to the
ship--she would only add that her health had been improved by her long
journey down the river, and that when I heard from her again, she was
sure she would be able to write that all her fondest hopes had been
fully realized.

"And so Marah was in the river, and Urquhart on the seas. I had been
robbed of everything, even vengeance, and life had nothing for me, and I
was determined to leave it, not in the vulgar way of suicide, but by
cloistering myself in the great forests. As no one said me nay, I at
once carried out this scheme; and to show you how dead I had become to
the world, I will tell you that as I turned the lock of my door and took
my first step forward on the road which led to this spot, a great shout
broke out in the market place:

"'The farmers of Lexington have fired upon the king's troops!'

"And I did not even turn my head!"

CHAPTER XVI.

A DREAM ENDED.

There was silence in the cave. Mark Felt's story was at an end.

For a moment