d, agonizing prayer? The hands were thrown up: he had come gradually
nearer, and could see them, ghostly white in the long feeble ray of the
distant lamp. What was she deciding or asking? A shiver ran over him as
the thought of suicide entered his brain. At all events, he must not let
her go to destruction.

Her hands dropped. She took a few slow, irresolute steps, then turned
and came so quickly, that before he could stir or think, she confronted
him. A wild face with staring eyes, a wilder shriek ringing out on the
night air, making muffled echoes around, a desperate plunge, and a fall.
He sprang and essayed to raise her from the half-frozen hail-bed of the
sidewalk; the hood fell back, and he was more than astonished at
beholding the face of Irene Lawrence.

He appeared suddenly to comprehend the whole fact, though he came to
know afterward that he misjudged her. Only a desire to put an end to
life and suffering, real or fancied, could have brought her out this
night, in the lonely neighborhood, still, not so far from her own home.
He must take her back, and then go for Maverick, who had become quite a
favorite with Mrs. Lawrence, and prescribed harmless remedies for her,
since she insisted she must have them.

Jack Darcy never experienced a more exultant pride in his strength than
now. He lifted the helpless form, settled the swaying head on his broad
shoulder, and, clasping the body tightly, picked his way through the
slippery streets, in a manner that would have done credit to an Alp
climber. Round this corner and that, to the quiet, deserted street,
where every window was closed, and perhaps half the inmates in bed. Only
in one house was there a sound of life. Some one was playing an
accompaniment for an evening hymn, and youthful voices were singing.
Two lines floated out as he passed, making a kind of glow on the sullen
night:--

"Though long a wanderer,
The sun gone down"--

Unconsciously he tightened his arms around this wanderer. Of course all
their brief acquaintance had gone through his mind, especially the day
when in her haughty pride and beauty she had given him that cold,
insolent stare; but he forgave her freely, just as he had forgiven
Fred's sin, unasked. How strangely he was destined to be mixed up with
these Lawrences!

He paused on the low porch, where a honeysuckle rioted in summer, and
was still full of withered leaves. His burthen had not stirred, and was
a dead