tiny was in his hands. When he had done the
deed, and retired to his solitary abode at Bridman, he felt
frightened at what he had hazarded, and trembled like a child
at the idea of Mrs. Tracy's anger. It was, therefore, a relief
to him when Henry sought him out, and humbled himself before
him. He was released from an awful responsibility, and
returned to his post, supported by his aunt's bounty, obedient
to her orders, and with a dog-like, self-denying fidelity,
ready to die at Alice's feet, to kill her husband, or to save
his life at the expense of his own, according as he was told
that _she_ willed it--that _she_ required it. During the time
he was in Mr. Escourt's service he might have been betrayed
into more active steps, had he not detected, with a keen and
instinctive jealousy, the motive which dictated his patron's
sharp investigations, and the object he had in view; which,
with a singular mixture of cunning and honesty, he contrived
to defeat.

Mrs. Tracy described to Alice, in tones and with looks that
made her shudder, how her spirit was moved, even at the altar
where Ellen's ill-omened marriage was solemnised, to denounce
that pale, stern bride as a homicide, and to proclaim aloud
that the trembling hand which one man bestowed, and another
received, with such loving trust, was stained with blood. She
had risen to speak; the words were upon her lips:

"Phrenzy to her heart was given,
To speak the malison of Heaven,"

when she met the full and glaring force of Henry's flashing
eyes. She could not withstand their dark and dreadful power;
Alice, her helpless child, was by his side, and she sunk back
in her seat, overcome and subdued. On the day of Alice's
confinement her hopes had been raised, and her heart softened,
by some indications of sensibility on Henry's part. The
reaction was violent when he returned after an absence of
several hours, which she knew had been devoted to Ellen. She
reproached and upbraided him, and he answered her by a
careless and brutal avowal of the nature of his feelings, and
he left the house again at dinner-time without even visiting
his wife. Then in her fury she resolved at all risks to
separate him from Ellen; she broke open his desk, where she
found notes which excited her hatred and anger to such a
degree that she determined to send them at once to Edward
Middleton, and thus place an eternal barrier between the
guilty pair. The result of that fatal act she now depl