t you sit
down?"

She handed me a letter--without answering and without taking a chair. I
opened the envelope. The letter inside was written by Miserrimus Dexter.
It contained these lines:

"Try to pity me, if you have any pity left for a miserable man; I have
bitterly expiated the madness of a moment. If you could see me--even
you would own that my punishment has been heavy enough. For God's sake,
don't abandon me! I was beside myself when I let the feeling that you
have awakened in me get the better of my control. It shall never show
itself again; it shall be a secret that dies with me. Can I expect you
to believe this? No. I won't ask you to believe me; I won't ask you to
trust me in the future. If you ever consent to see me again, let it be
in the presence of any third person whom you may appoint to protect you.
I deserve that--I will submit to it; I will wait till time has composed
your angry feeling against me. All I ask now is leave to hope. Say to
Ariel, 'I forgive him; and one day I will let him see me again.'
She will remember it, for love of me. If you send her back without a
message, you send me to the mad-house. Ask her, if you don't believe me.

"MISERRIMUS DEXTER."

I finished the strange letter, and looked at Ariel.

She stood with her eyes on the floor, and held out to me the thick
walking-stick which she carried in her hand.

"Take the stick" were the first words she said to me.

"Why am I to take it?" I asked.

She struggled a little with her sluggishly working mind, and slowly put
her thoughts into words.

"You're angry with the Master," she said. "Take it out on Me. Here's the
stick. Beat me."

"Beat you!" I exclaimed.

"My back's broad," said the poor creature. "I won't make a row. I'll
bear it. Drat you, take the stick! Don't vex _him._ Whack it out on my
back. Beat _me._"

She roughly forced the stick into my hand; she turned her poor shapeless
shoulders to me; waiting for the blow. It was at once dreadful and
touching to see her. The tears rose in my eyes. I tried, gently and
patiently, to reason with her. Quite useless! The idea of taking the
Master's punishment on herself was the one idea in her mind. "Don't vex
_him,_" she repeated. "Beat _me._"

"What do you mean by 'vexing him'?" I asked.

She tried to explain, and failed to find the words. She showed me by
imitation, as a savage might have shown me, what she meant. Striding to
the fire-pla