ll neither assert nor deny any thing. If you have not sufficient
confidence in my honor, and reliance on my truth to trust and believe
me, my only answer to your reproaches shall be silence. Light indeed
must be my hold on your heart, if a breath has power to shake it. The
time has been--but, alas!--how sadly are you changed!"

"I changed!" repeated she. "Would to Heaven I could change!"

"Yes, changed. Be not angry, but hear me. Where is the softness, the
womanly tenderness and grace that first enchanted me, forming as it did
so bewitching a contrast with the dazzling splendor of your beauty? I
did not know then that daggers were sheathed in your brilliant eyes, or
that scorn lurked in those beautiful lips. Nay, interrupt me not. Where,
I say, is the loving, trusting being I loved and adored? You watch me
with the vigilance of hatred, the intensity of revenge. Every word and
look have been misconstrued, every action warped and perverted by
prejudice and passion. You are jealous, frantically jealous of a mere
child, with whom I idly amused myself one passing moment. You have made
your parents look coldly and suspiciously upon me. You have taught me a
bitter lesson."

Every drop of blood forsook the cheeks of Mittie. She felt as if she
were congealing--so cold fell the words of Clinton on her burning heart.

"Then I have forever estranged you. You love me no longer!" said she, in
a faint, husky voice.

"No, Mittie, I love you still. Constancy is one of the elements of my
nature. But love no longer imparts happiness. The chain of gold is
transformed to iron, and the links corrode and lacerate the heart. I
feel that I have cast a cloud over the household, and it is necessary to
depart. I go to-morrow, and may you recover that peace of which I have
momentarily deprived you. I shall pass away from your memory like the
pebble that ruffles a moment the face of the water then sinks, and is
remembered no more."

"What, going--going to-morrow?" she exclaimed, catching hold of his arm
for support, for she felt sick and dizzy at the sudden annunciation.

"Yes!" he replied, drawing her arm through his, and retaining her hand,
which was as cold as ice. "Your brother Louis will accompany me. It is
meet that he should visit my Virginian home, since I have so long
trespassed on the hospitality of his. Whether I ever return depends upon
yourself. If my presence bring only discord and sorrow, it is better,
far better, that I never