the point of making, and then hurriedly said--"He is dead, sir; he
was found dead in his room, this morning, at eight o'clock. I assure you
I have not been myself ever since."

Charles Marston was so stunned by this sudden blow, that he was upon the
point of fainting. Rallying, however, with a strong effort, he demanded
to be conducted to the chamber where the body lay. The man assented, but
hesitated on reaching the door, and whispered something in the ear of
Doctor Danvers, who, as he heard it, raised his hands and eyes with a
mute expression of horror, and turning to Charles, said--

"My dear young friend, remain where you are for a few moments. I will
return to you immediately, and tell you whatever I have ascertained. You
are in no condition for such a scene at present."

Charles, indeed, felt that the fact was so, and, sick and giddy, suffered
Doctor Danvers, with gentle compulsion, to force him into a seat.

In silence the venerable clergyman followed his conductor. With a
palpitating heart he advanced to the bedside, and twice essayed to draw
the curtain, and twice lost courage; but gathering resolution at last,
he pulled the drapery aside, and beheld all he was to see again of
Richard Marston.

The bedclothes were drawn so as nearly to cover the mouth.

"There is the wound, sir," whispered the man, as with coarse
officiousness he drew back the bedclothes from the throat of the corpse,
and exhibited a gash, as it seemed, nearly severing the head from the
body. With sickening horror Doctor Danvers turned away from the awful
spectacle. He covered his face in his hands, and it seemed to him as if a
soft, solemn voice whispered in his ear the mystic words, "Whoso
sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed."

The hand which, but a few years before, had, unsuspected, consigned a
fellow-mortal to the grave, had itself avenged the murder--Marston had
perished by his own hand.

Naturally ambitious and intriguing, the perilous tendencies of such a
spirit in Mademoiselle de Barras had never been schooled by the mighty
and benignant principles of religion; of her accidental acquaintance at
Rouen with Sir Wynston Berkley, and her subsequent introduction, in an
evil hour, into the family at Gray Forest, it is unnecessary to speak.
The unhappy terms on which she found Marston living with his wife,
suggested, in their mutual alienation, the idea of founding a double
influence in the household; and to conceive