th
riches. However he chanced to come to the obscure settlement was not
stated. He did come, saw Desire Michell, and fell as abjectly prostrate
before her as any youth who never had left the village.

He pressed his courtship hard and eagerly. At first he was welcome at
the minister's house. But a day came when Master Michell forbade him to
cross that door and rumor whispered, scandalized, that Sir Austin's suit
had not been honorable to the maid.

Sir Austin sulked a week at the village inn. Then he broke under the
torment of not seeing Desire Michell. Their betrothal was made public,
and he rode away to prepare his home for their marriage in the spring.

Travel was slow in the winter, news trickled slowly across snowbound
distances. With spring came no bridegroom; instead word arrived of his
affair with an heiress recently come to New York from England. She was
rich in gold and grants of land from the Crown. Her husband would be a
man of weight and influence, it seemed.

Sir Austin had married her.

Desire Michell shut herself in her father's house. The clergyman did not
live many months after the humiliation. Alone, the girl lived.
"Student," wrote Abimelech Fetherstone, "of black and bitter arts. Or as
some say, having, like Bombastus de Hohenheim, a devil's bird enchained
to do her will."

In his distant home, Sir Austin sickened. He burned with fever, anguish
consumed him. Physicians were called to the bedside of the rich man.
They could not diagnose his ailment or help him. He screamed for water.
When it was brought, his throat locked and he could not swallow. He
raved of Desire Michell, beseeching her mercy. In his times of sanity,
he begged and commanded his wife and servants to send for the girl. In
her pardon he saw his sole hope of life.

Finally, he was obeyed. Messengers were sent to the village. They were
not even admitted to the house they sought, or to sight of Mistress
Michell.

"Your master came himself to woo; let him come himself to plead."

That was the answer they received to carry back to the sick man.

Sir Austin heard, and submitted with trembling hope. Writhing in the
anguish wasting him by day and night, he made the journey by coach and
litter to Desire Michell's house. At her door-sill he implored entrance
and pity. The door did not open.

It never opened for him. For three days in succession he was borne to
her threshold, calling on her in his pain and fear. His servants and
p