those little services which are so sweet
when love prompts them, yet which fall upon us like insults when
rendered by those against whom our natures are in repulsion. To save
herself from this officious tending, Mabel inquired for the mulatto
woman, preferring her presence to the endurance of attentions so
oppressive.

Agnes smiled sweetly at the inquiry: "but the chambermaid had gone out,"
she said, "and might not be back till late; meantime, it was a happiness
to attend madam--was the cushion comfortably arranged? should she move
the footstool?"

The girl sank upon her knees, and, in moving the ottoman, touched
Mabel's foot with her hand. The excited woman sprang up with a shudder,
as if a rattlesnake had crept across her ankles, and, unable to endure
the presence of her tormentor a moment more, hurried out of the room.

"Is there no place," she said, moving wildly forward, "no place in which
I can hide myself, and snatch a moment's rest? Will these creatures
trail themselves in my path forever and ever!"

The unhappy woman did not even think that she possessed the right to
send the offensive persons at any moment from her presence; for, since
the discovery of her secret, Mabel no longer felt that she was the
mistress of these people, or that she held a power of command anywhere.
All that she wished was to hide herself from every one. Influenced only
by this unconquerable desire, she hurried up the stairs, and taking a
bronze lamp from a statue that occupied a niche in the first landing,
went forward till she came to the door of a chamber that had been
occupied by James Harrington. Here a gleam of intelligence shot over her
pale face, and she eagerly tried the lock. It yielded, and, drawing a
quick breath, she crossed the threshold, turning the key which had been
left inside with an impatient violence, and looked round exultingly at
the solitude which she had thus insured.

"It was here," she said, looking around on the grate and on the table,
while her pale brow darkened and her lips began to tremble; "it was here
that he burned my poor journal--here that he tore the secret from my
soul, while I lay sleeping below. After this cruel pillage of my life,
he fled to hide the----No, no! Scorn he could _not_ feel--hate, pity,
anything but scorn! Let me search if any vestige remains."

She bent over the empty grate, peering through the polished bars with
keen glances, but it was bare and cold; not an ember remained, n