finished, the two remain for some time
silent,--pondering upon the strange circumstances thus revealed to them.

Blue Bill is the first to resume speech. He says:--

"Dar's a good deal in dat letter I know'd afore, and dar's odder points
as 'pear new to me; but whether de old or de new, 'twon't do for us folk
declar a single word o' what de young lady hab wrote in dat ere 'pistle.
No, Phoebe, neery word must 'scape de lips ob eider o' us. We muss
hide de letter, an' nebba let nob'dy know dar's sich a dockyment in our
posseshun. And dar must be nuffin' know'd 'bout dis nigga findin' it.
Ef dat sakumstance war to leak out, I needn't warn you what 'ud happen
to me. Blue Bill 'ud catch de cowhide,--maybe de punishment ob de pump.
So, Phoebe, gal, gi'e me yar word to keep dark, for de case am a
dangersome, an a desprit one."

The wife can well comprehend the husband's caution, with the necessity
of compliance; and the two retire to rest, in the midst of their black
olive branches, with a mutual promise to be "mum."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

WHY COMES HE NOT?

Helen Armstrong goes to bed, with spiteful thoughts about Charles
Clancy. So rancorous she cannot sleep, but turns distractedly on her
couch, from time to time changing cheek upon the pillow.

At little more than a mile's distance from this chamber of unrest,
another woman is also awake, thinking of the same man--not spitefully,
but anxiously. It is his mother.

As already said, the road running north from Natchez leads past Colonel
Armstrong's gate. A traveller, going in the opposite direction--that is
towards the city--on clearing the skirts of the plantation, would see,
near the road side, a dwelling of very different kind; of humble
unpretentious aspect, compared with the grand mansion of the planter.
It would be called a cottage, were this name known in the State of
Mississippi--which it is not. Still it is not a log-cabin; but a
"frame-house," its walls of "weather-boarding," planed and painted, its
roof cedar-shingled; a style of architecture occasionally seen in the
Southern States, though not so frequently as in the Northern--inhabited
by men in moderate circumstances, poorer than planters, but richer, or
more gentle, than the "white trash," who live in log-cabins.

Planters they are in social rank, though poor; perhaps owning a
half-dozen slaves, and cultivating a small tract of cleared ground, from
twenty to fifty acres. The frame-house vouch