rself. She scattered smiles and favours on scores. He
knew at last what she took, and what she gave, if he did not guess it
always."

"Why did he not save her, Bridget? die with her!"

"Madam," bitterly, "he did what man could do. They say he was more like
a spirit than a mortal; but if he was to lose his love, how could even
Master Hector fight against his Maker? He was fain to follow her; he
dallied with death for weeks and months. Those were fell days at Otter,
but the Lord restored him, and now he is himself again, and no woman
will ever move Master Hector more."

There was silence in the room for a space. At last Bridget broke it: "Do
you want anything more with me, madam, or shall I go?"

Haughty as Bridget Kennedy was, she spoke hesitatingly, almost
pitifully. She had stabbed that young thing, sitting pale and cold
before her; and no sooner was the deed done than her strong, deep nature
yearned over her victim as it had never done to Hector Garret's girl
wife, in the first rosy flush of her thoughtless gladness.

"Nothing more." The words were low and heavy, and when Bridget left her,
Leslie raised her hands and linked them together, and stretched them out
in impotence of relief.

What was this news that had come to her as from a far country?--this
blinding light, this burst of knowledge that had to do with the very
springs of a man's nature, this fountain so full to some, so empty to
others? She had been deceived, robbed. Hector Garret was Alice
Boswell's--in life and death, Alice Boswell's.

This love, which she had known so slightly, measured so carelessly--oh,
light, shallow heart!--had been rooted in his very vitals, had
constrained him as a conqueror his captive, had been the very essence of
the man until it spent itself on Alice Boswell's wild grave. He had come
to her with a lie in his right hand, for he was bound and fettered in
heart, or else but the blue, stiff corpse of a man dead within; he had
betrayed her woman's right, her best, dearest, truest right, her call
to love and be loved. Another might have wooed her as he had wooed Alice
Boswell; to another she might have been the first, the only one! she
knew now why she was no helpmeet, no friend for him; why his hand did
not raise her to his eminence, his soul's breath did not blow upon hers,
and create vigour, goodness, and grace to match his own. Deep had not
cried unto deep: heart had not spoken to heart: the dry bones, the
vacant form, th