y in
various ridges along the street. But the wind was not still in the keen
but quiet sharpness of frost; on the contrary, it howled almost like a
hurricane through the desolate thoroughfares, and the lamps flickered
unsteadily in the turbulent gusts. Perhaps it was the blasts which
increased the haggardness of aspect in the young man I have mentioned.
His hair, which was much longer than is commonly worn, was tossed wildly
from cheeks preternaturally shrunken, hollow, and livid: and the frail,
thin form seemed scarcely able to support itself against the rush of the
winds.

As the tall figure, which, in its masculine stature and proportions, and
a peculiar and nameless grandeur of bearing, strongly contrasted that of
the younger man, now came to the spot where the streets met, it paused
abruptly.

"You are here once more, Castruccio Cesarini; it is well!" said the low
but ringing voice of Ernest Maltravers. "This, I believe, will not be
our last interview to-night."

"I ask you, sir," said Cesarini, in a tone in which pride struggled with
emotion--"I ask you to tell me how she is; whether you know--I cannot
speak--"

"Your work is nearly done," answered Maltravers. "A few hours more, and
your victim, for she is yours, will bear her tale to the Great Judgment
Seat. Murderer as you are, tremble, for your own hour approaches!"

"She dies and I cannot see her! and you are permitted that last glimpse
of human perfectness; you who never loved her as I did; you--hated and
detested! you--"

Cesarini paused, and his voice died away, choked in his own convulsive
gaspings for breath.

Maltravers looked at him from the height of his erect and lofty form,
with a merciless eye; for in this one quarter, Maltravers had shut out
pity from his soul.

"Weak criminal!" said he, "hear me. You received at my hands
forbearance, friendship, fostering and anxious care. When your own
follies plunged you into penury, mine was the unseen hand that plucked
you from famine, or the prison. I strove to redeem, and save, and raise
you, and endow your miserable spirit with the thirst and the power of
honour and independence. The agent of that wish was Florence Lascelles;
you repaid us well! a base and fraudulent forgery, attaching meanness to
me, fraught with agony and death to her. Your conscience at last smote
you; you revealed to her your crime--one spark of manhood made you
reveal it also to myself. Fresh as I was in that moment from the