of music--so much so that he often took his instrument out with him when
he went for a walk. This taste of his was his great recommendation to
my mistress, who was a wonderfully fine player on the piano, and who was
delighted to get such a performer as Mr. Meeke to play duets with her.
Besides liking his society for this reason, she felt for him in his
lonely position; naturally enough, I think, considering how often she
was left in solitude herself. Mr. Meeke, on his side, when he got
over his first shyness, was only too glad to leave his lonesome little
parsonage for the fine music-room at the Hall, and for the company of
a handsome, kind-hearted lady, who made much of him, and admired his
fiddle-playing with all her heart. Thus it happened that, whenever my
master was away at sea, my mistress and Mr. Meeke were always together,
playing duets as if they had their living to get by it. A more harmless
connection than the connection between those two never existed in this
world; and yet, innocent as it was, it turned out to be the first cause
of all the misfortunes that afterward happened.

My master's treatment of Mr. Meeke was, from the first, the very
opposite of my mistress's. The restless, rackety, bounceable Mr. James
Smith felt a contempt for the weak, womanish, fiddling little parson,
and, what was more, did not care to conceal it. For this reason, Mr.
Meeke (who was dreadfully frightened by my master's violent language and
rough ways) very seldom visited at the Hall except when my mistress was
alone there. Meaning no wrong, and therefore stooping to no concealment,
she never thought of taking any measures to keep Mr. Meeke out of the
way when he happened to be with her at the time of her husband's coming
home, whether it was only from a riding excursion in the neighborhood
or from a cruise in the schooner. In this way it so turned out that
whenever my master came home, after a long or short absence, in nine
cases out of ten he found the parson at the Hall.

At first he used to laugh at this circumstance, and to amuse himself
with some coarse jokes at the expense of his wife and her companion.
But, after a while, his variable temper changed, as usual. He grew
sulky, rude, angry, and, at last, downright jealous of Mr. Meeke. Though
too proud to confess it in so many words, he still showed the state of
his mind clearly enough to my mistress to excite her indignation. She
was a woman who could be led anywhere by an