aid you not
something of--did you not tell me of a person who could say for you that
which would have done much towards your escape? A woman, was it
not--speak, who is she--let me go to her--she will not refuse to tell me
all, and do all, if she be a woman."

Ralph assured her in the gentlest manner of the hopelessness of any such
application; and the momentary dream which her own desires had conjured
into a promise, as suddenly subsided, leaving her to a full
consciousness of her desolation. Her father at length found it necessary
to abridge the interview. Every moment of its protraction seemed still
more to unsettle the understanding of his daughter. She spoke wildly and
confusedly, and in that thought of separation which the doom of her
lover perpetually forced upon her, she contemplated, in all its fearful
extremities, her own. She was borne away half delirious--the feeling of
wo something blunted, however, by the mental unconsciousness following
its realization.

Private apartments were readily found them in the village, and having
provided good attendance for his daughter, Colonel Colleton set out,
though almost entirely hopeless, to ascertain still farther the
particulars of the case, and to see what might be done in behalf of one
of whose innocence he felt perfectly assured. He knew Ralph too well to
suspect him of falsehood; and the clear narrative which he had given,
and the manly and unhesitating account of all particulars having any
bearing on the case which had fallen from his lips, he knew, from all
his previous high-mindedness of character, might safely be relied on.
Assured of this himself, he deemed it not improbable that something
might undergo development, in a course of active inquiry, which might
tend to the creation of a like conviction in the minds of those in whom
rested the control of life and judgment.

His first visit was to the lawyer, from whom, however, he could procure
nothing, besides being compelled, without possibility of escape, to
listen to a long string of reproaches against his nephew.

"I could, and would have saved him, Colonel Colleton, if the power were
in mortal," was the self-sufficient speech of the little man; "but he
would not--he broke in upon me when the very threshold was to be passed,
and just as I was upon it. Things were in a fair train, and all might
have gone well but for his boyish interruption. I would have come over
the jury with a settler. I would have made