o remote, that the
pseudo-banns of Owen Charteris Sandbrook and Edna Murrell had attracted
no attention.

'It was very wrong,' feebly said Edna; 'I drew him into it! I loved him
so much; and they all talked so after I went in the boat with him, that I
thought my character was gone, and I begged him to save me from them. It
was my fault, sir; and I've the punishment. You'll not betray him, sir;
only don't let that young lady, your sister, trust to him. Not yet. My
baby and I shall soon be out of her way.'

The calm languor of her tone was almost fearful, and even as she spoke a
shuddering seized her, making her tremble convulsively, her teeth
knocking together, and the couch shaking under her.

'You must have instant advice,' cried Robert. 'I will fetch some one.'

'You won't betray him,' almost shrieked Edna. 'A little while--stay a
little while--he will be free of me.'

There was delirium in look and voice, and he was compelled to pause and
assure her that he was only going for the doctor, and would come again
before taking any other step.

It was not till the medical man had been summoned that his mind recurred
to the words about his sister. He might have dismissed them as merely
the jealous suspicion of the deserted wife, but that he remembered
Lucilla's hint as to an attachment between Owen and Phoebe, and he knew
that such would have been most welcome to Miss Charlecote.

'My Phoebe, my one bright spot!' was his inward cry, 'must your guileless
happiness be quenched! O, I would rather have it all over again myself
than that one pang should come near you, in your sweetness and innocence,
the blessing of us all! And I not near to guard nor warn! What may not
be passing even now? Unprincipled, hard-hearted deceiver, walking at
large among those gentle, unsuspicious women--trading on their innocent
trust! Would that I had disclosed the villainy I knew of!'

His hand clenched, his brow lowered, and his mouth was set so savagely,
that the passing policeman looked in wonder from the dangerous face to
the clerical dress.

Early next morning he was at No. 8, and learnt that Mrs. Brook, as the
maid called her, had been very ill all night, and that the doctor was
still with her. Begging to see the doctor, Robert found that high fever
had set in, an aggravation of the low nervous fever that had been
consuming her strength all the spring, and her condition was already such
that there was little hope of h