time, the veil had still
partly covered the face of the fair one, so that Jerome had scarcely
seen it. When she had so far recovered as to be able to look around her,
she raised herself slightly, and again screamed and swooned. The old man
now feeling satisfied that Jerome's dark complexion was the immediate
cause of the catastrophe, said in a somewhat petulant tone,--

"I will be glad, sir, if you will leave us alone."

The little boy at this juncture set up a loud cry, and amid the general
confusion, Jerome left the ground and returned to his hotel.

While seated at the window of his room looking out upon the crowded
street, with every now and then the strange scene in the graveyard
vividly before him, Jerome suddenly thought of the book he had been
reading, and, remembering that he had left it on the tombstone, where he
dropped it when called to the lady's assistance, he determined to return
for it at once.

After a walk of some twenty minutes, he found himself again in the
burial-ground and on the spot where he had been an hour before. The
pensive moon was already up, and its soft light was sleeping on the
little pond at the back of the grounds, while the stars seemed smiling
at their own sparkling rays gleaming up from the beautiful sheet of
water.

Jerome searched in vain for his book; it was nowhere to be found.
Nothing, save the bouquet that the lady had dropped, and which lay
half-buried in the grass, from having been trodden upon, indicated that
any one had been there that evening. The stillness of death reigned over
the place; even the little birds, that had before been twittering and
flying about, had retired for the night.

Taking up the bunch of flowers, Jerome returned to his hotel. "What can
this mean?" he would ask himself; "and why should they take my book?"
These questions he put to himself again and again during his walk. His
sleep was broken more than once that night, and he welcomed the early
dawn as it made its appearance.

CHAPTER XXXII. THE HAPPY MEETING

AFTER passing a sleepless night, and hearing the clock strike six,
Jerome took from his table a book, and thus endeavored to pass away the
hours before breakfast-time. While thus engaged, a servant entered and
handed him a note. Hastily tearing it open, Jerome read as follows:--

"SIR,--I owe you an apology for the abrupt manner in which I addressed
you last evening, and the inconvenience to which you were subjected
b