CHAPTER XX.

What an earthquake I feel in me! And on the sudden my whole fabric totters. My blood within me turns, and through my veins, Parting with natural redness, I descern it Changed to a fatal yellow.'

MASSINGER.

BUT Edith had not rightly heard one sentence. that her companion uttered; if she answered her, it must have been at random, for all she was conscious of, was a feverish impatience to be alone to be alone!-and then-oh! it was dreadful!-oh! it was pitiable!

Her mother's assertion, was, then, all true! -her own combated, but oft-recurring sus

picion, was, then, true!-and a feeling of fierce hatred filled her heart-a vindictive

desire for revenge, a fiery impatience to take signal vengeance, possessed her; and, for a time, she felt as if to remain passive, would drive her mad. But the very intensity of passion wore itself out; and then came other thoughts and emotions not less painful, but, happily, less violent; and, after an hour spent in the solitude of her own room, she was able to feel a satisfaction in the remembrance, that her husband had not met her while in that fierce mood, and under the excitement which that recent event had called forth-a mood which not even he would then have had the power to charm away.

One reflection alone had had the effect of somewhat calming her: it was evident that the ties which, too surely, once bound him to Minnie, existed no longer. The very employment in which she beheld his luckless victim engaged, proved that-for she knew too well his generosity and care for anything that he

loved, not to be certain that, in this case especially, all that the most thoughtful solicitude could imagine, would be freely lavished on his idol, and that the very winds of heaven would not be suffered to visit her face too roughly.

Still this discovery rankled deeply in her mind-and, had Gerald given himself much trouble to note the change in Edith's behaviour, he must have been sensible that there was less devotion to his wishes-less gentleness to himself

For to be wroth with one we love,

Doth work like madness in the brain.'

Sometimes, it is true, an asperity of manner, or an ill-humour, unusually demonstrative, would remind him of the days, when he had thought her less amiable than he had hitherto found her; while a curiosity about his movements and pursuits would occasionally annoy him-but, in general, he paid no attention to these changes.

Rather less than a month after this event,

which had been as an earthquake shock to the whole of Edith's happiness, one morning, during breakfast, a thick letter was given to her. Opening the envelope, a second, but undirected, packet was within, and on the envelope were the words "Lady Blaymore is earnestly entreated to forward the enclosed to Miss Durnsford, whose address the writer does not know."

Edith's first impulse made her cast the letter from her her next was to seize and destroy it; but her husband was present, and she felt that she must endeavour to control her passion. So, there lay letter and envelope, she starting from again touching them, as if they had been scorpions-and yet scarcely removing her eyes from them, as though they possessed the power of fascination ascribed to the basilisk.

Very short and sharp were her replies to all Gerald's remarks during that meal-not one did she volunteer in return; and, when he at length left the room, she still remained,

apparently lost in thought-recollection after recollection carrying her back to the buried past-back to her marriage-back to her father's death-back to Minnie's strange disappearance-back to the days of their girlish friendship and all these memories were fraught with bitterness. Yes-all; and, instead of her feelings having been softened by the last remembrance of their loving and innocent associations, she rose with hatred in her heart, and rage in her looks, and seizing the packet, would undoubtedly have burned it, but that the urn lamp had exhausted the spirit.

'All other woes our pity claim,
Except an erring sister's shame.'

And then the thought flashed across her-she had no right to destroy it-it was not hers.

The open drawer of a Davenport stood near; and, with a look and gesture of the strongest abhorrence, she contemptuously cast it among several loose papers.

Whether it really was her intention to de