t he will not object. I have already consulted him, and he expresses
himself as satisfied with the arrangement."

"Very well," said I; "then I will promise to consider the subject. I
can at any rate look over the manuscript and give you my opinion of its
condition."

"Oh, thank you," said she, with the prettiest gesture of satisfaction.
"How kind you are, and what can I ever do to repay you? But would you
like to see Mr. Harwell himself?" and she moved towards the door; but
suddenly paused, whispering, with a short shudder of remembrance: "He is
in the library; do you mind?"

Crushing down the sick qualm that arose at the mention of that spot, I
replied in the negative.

"The papers are all there, and he says he can work better in his old
place than anywhere else; but if you wish, I can call him down."

But I would not listen to this, and myself led the way to the foot of
the stairs.

"I have sometimes thought I would lock up that room," she hurriedly
observed; "but something restrains me. I can no more do so than I can
leave this house; a power beyond myself forces me to confront all its
horrors. And yet I suffer continually from terror. Sometimes, in the
darkness of the night--But I will not distress you. I have already said
too much; come," and with a sudden lift of the head she mounted the
stairs.

Mr. Harwell was seated, when we entered that fatal room, in the one
chair of all others I expected to see unoccupied; and as I beheld his
meagre figure bending where such a little while before his eyes had
encountered the outstretched form of his murdered employer, I could not
but marvel over the unimaginativeness of the man who, in the face of
such memories, could not only appropriate that very spot for his own
use, but pursue his avocations there with so much calmness and evident
precision. But in another moment I discovered that the disposition of
the light in the room made that one seat the only desirable one for his
purpose; and instantly my wonder changed to admiration at this quiet
surrender of personal feeling to the requirements of the occasion.

He looked up mechanically as we came in, but did not rise, his
countenance wearing the absorbed expression which bespeaks the
preoccupied mind.

"He is utterly oblivious," Mary whispered; "that is a way of his.
I doubt if he knows who or what it is that has disturbed him." And,
advancing into the room, she passed across his line of vision, as if
to call atten