his angel to save me, and to prove
that there was hope, and rest, and happiness for me yet in this world."

Ere he had finished speaking Ada had thrown herself into his arms, and
was looking proudly in his scarred face.

"Sir Murray Gernon," he continued, after an instant's pause, "I refused
to meet you, and I have now told you the true reason for my having done
so. In this world we shall probably never meet again. Our paths lie,
as they ought, in different directions. It is fit they should. But
once more, I swear before Heaven that your base charges are false. Go,
and by honest, manly confession, try and win her back to life, and
obtain her forgiveness. Tell her that I kept my word, even to making
myself for her sake a coward in the eyes of the world."

As he ceased speaking, he turned from Sir Murray to gaze down in his
wife's face. There was a sad, despairing look in his countenance,
though, that troubled her; it was the same drawn, haggard aspect that
she had looked on years before; but as she clung to him closer and
closer, twining her arms more tightly round him, and trying to draw that
pale, scarred face to hers, the wild, scared aspect slowly faded away,
for from her eyes he seemed to draw life and hope, and at last, with a
sigh that seemed torn from his breast's utmost depths, he pressed his
lips upon her forehead, and then turned once more to confront his
accuser.

But they were alone; for, after listening with conflicting thoughts to
Norton's words, Sir Murray Gernon had slowly turned upon his heel,
leaving the room, unnoticed.

Book 1, Chapter XVII.

JANE'S HEART.

"Oh, dear!--oh, dear! what shall I do?--what shall I do?" sobbed Jane
Barker. "What a wicked set we must all be for the troubles to come
bubbling and rolling over us like this in a great water-flood. There's
poor Sir Murray half-mad with grief, shutting himself up in his library,
and never hardly so much as eating or drinking a bit. There's my own
dear, sweet lady lying there day after day, with the lids shut down over
those poor soft eyes of hers, never moving, and nobody knowing whether
she's living or dead, only when she gives one of those little sobbing
sighs. And then there's the poor old Rector, coming every day over and
over again to see how she is, and looking as if his heart would break;
and poor Mrs Elstree wandering up and down the passages like a ghost.
Oh, dear!--oh, dear!--oh, dear! the place isn't like the same,