ntrition
and remorse, had neither the wish nor the strength to resist.

"Oh! the terrible night and day that succeeded! I wandered out into the
country, spent the whole night walking beneath the open sky,
endeavouring to collect my thoughts and compose my mind, and still
morning found me with a fevered pulse and excited brain. With the
returning light, however, I began to realise the necessity of forming
some future plan of action.

"Emily's sad situation, and my intense anxiety to learn the worst
effects of the fatal accident, urged me to hasten with the earliest
morning, either openly or by stealth, to Mr. Graham's house. Everything
also which I possessed--all my money, the residue of my last quarter's
allowance, my clothing, and a few valuable gifts from my mother--were in
the chamber which I had occupied. There seemed to be no other course
left for me than to return thither, and I retracted my steps to the
city, determined, if it were necessary in order to gain the desired
particulars concerning Emily, to meet her father face to face. But as I
drew near the house I hesitated and dared not proceed. Mr. Graham had
exhausted upon me every angry word, had threatened even deeds of
violence should I again cross his threshold; and I feared to trust my
own fiery spirit to a collision in which I might be led on to an open
resistance of the man whom I had already sufficiently injured. In the
terrible work I had but yesterday done--a work of whose fatal effect I
had even then a gloomy foreshadowing--I had blighted the existence of
his worshipped child, and drawn a dark pall over his dearest hopes. It
was enough. I would not for worlds be guilty of the sin of lifting my
hand against the man who, unjust as he had been towards an innocent
youth, had met a retaliation far too severe.

"Still, I knew his wrath to be unmitigated, was well aware of his power
to excite my hot nature to frenzy, and resolved to beware how I crossed
his path. Meet him I must, to refute the false charges he had brought
against me; but not within the walls of his dwelling, the home of his
suffering daughter. In the counting-house, where the crime of forgery
was said to have been committed, and in the presence of my
fellow-clerks, I would publicly deny the deed, and dare him to its
proof. But first I must either see or hear from Emily before I met the
father at all. I must learn the exact nature and extent of the wrong I
had done him in the person of his