crisis."

"Crisis! what crisis!" interrupted the youth vehemently. "Obdurate
man, has the past not cured him of his martinetism? By heaven, let
him refuse me, and I, alone and without permission, will go in
search of my wife. Fool, fool that I was to return now without
her; but I had hoped she was here;" and again he burst into another
wild agony of grief.

Corporal Collins touched his cap and advanced a pace forward.

"The Captain said this afternoon that the next time your honor left
the fort you should never return to it. I thought it was my duty,
your honor, to tell you, for I couldn't make out what he meant."

"Oh! he did, did he?" muttered Ronayne, with sudden calm. "Well,
be it so!"

"Corporal Collins," said Mrs. Headley sternly to him, as she arose
from her kneeling posture, "you would have done better to have held
your peace on a matter which you say you do not comprehend. Mr.
Ronayne has annoyance sufficient without your misinterpreting to
him an observation of his commanding officer, which, in all
probability, was made in any other spirit than that which your
words would convey."

The corporal made a respectful obeisance and withdrew into the
corridor, rebuked.

"Ronayne," pursued Mrs. Headley, "I can make all allowance for your
excited feelings. I will speak to Headley on the matter; and,
although I cannot hold out to you any hope that he either will even
acknowledge the necessity, much less take the action you desire,
I feel perfectly assured that, when you have heard his reasons,
you will agree with us both that it would neither be of avail nor
politic to take a step of this kind for the recovery of her whom
we all deplore--God knows, no one more bitterly than myself."

"Mrs. Headley, you surprise me; I can scarcely believe that I
understand you rightly. I had always thought your feelings towards
Maria were those of a mother for her child?"

"Even so, Ronayne. You judged them rightly. As a mother I have
loved, and love her still; but we will talk of all this to-morrow
morning, and I leave you now to the quiet, if rest is not to be
hoped for, that you so much require; for Headley needs all his
officers in important council to-morrow, prior to holding a second
immediately after with our Indian allies. Nay," seeing that all
present looked surprised, and a desire to know wherefore, "it were
idle to enter upon the subject now; sufficient be it to know that
it is one of the deepest importance, and