Unable to conceal the emotion he was unwilling she should witness, Dr. Grey disengaged his arm and walked away, striving to regain his usual composure.

Did the governess suspect the proximity of her long-lost friend? If she claimed his assistance in prosecuting her search, what course would duty dictate?

Retracing his steps, he found that she had seated herself on a bench near one of the tallest lilacs, and having thrown aside her quilted hood of scarlet silk, her care-worn countenance was fully exposed.

She was gazing very intently at some object in her hand, which she bent over and kissed several times, and did not perceive his approach until he stood beside her.

"Dr. Grey, I believe my prayer has been heard, and that at last I have discovered a clew to the retreat of my lost Evelyn. Last week I went to a jewelry store in town, to buy a locket which I intended as a birthday gift for Muriel. Several customers had preceded me, and while waiting, my attention was attracted towards one of the workmen who uttered an impatient ejaculation and dashed down some article upon which he was at work. As it fell, I saw that it was an oval ivory miniature, orginally surrounded with very large handsome pearls, the greater portion of which the jeweller had removed and placed in a small glass bowl that stood near him. I leaned down to examine the miniature, and though the paint was blurred and faded, it was impossible to mistake the likeness, and you cannot realize the thrill that ran along my nerves as I recognized the portrait of Evelyn. So great was my astonishment and delight that I must have cried out, for the people in the store all turned and stared at me, and when I snatched the piece of ivory from the work-table, the man looked at me in amazement. Very incoherently I demanded where and how he obtained it, and, beckoning to the proprietor, he said, 'Just as I told you; this has turned out stolen property.' Then he opened a drawer and took from it a similar oval slab of ivory, and when I looked at it and saw Maurice's handsome face, my brain reeled, and I grew so dizzy I almost fell. 'Madam, do you know these portraits?' asked the proprietor.

"I told him that I did,-that I had seen these jewelled miniatures eight years before on the dressing-table of a bride, and I implored him to tell me how they came into his possession. He fitted them into a dingy, worn case, which seemed to have been composed of purple velvet, and informed me that he purchased the whole from an Irish lad, who asserted that he picked it up on the beach, where it had evidently drifted in a high tide. On examination, he found that the case had indeed been saturated with sea-water, but the pearls were in such a remarkable state of preservation that he doubted the lad's statement. He had bought

the miniatures in order to secure the pearls, which he assured me were unusually fine, and to satisfy himself concerning the affair had advertised two ivory miniatures, and invited the owners to come forward and prove property. After the expiration of a week, he discontinued the notice, and finally ordered the pearls removed from their gold frames. When I had given him the names of the originals, he consented that I should take the portraits which were now worthless to him, and gave me also the name of the boy. It was not until two days afterward that I succeeded in finding Thomas Donovan, a lad about fourteen years old, whose mother Phoebe is a laundress, and does up laces and fine muslins. When I called and stated the object of my visit he seemed much confused, but sullenly repeated the assertion made to the jeweller. Yesterday I went again and had a long conversation with his mother, who must be an honest soul, for she assured me she knew nothing of the matter, and would investigate it immediately. The boy was absent, but she promised either to send him here this morning or come in person, to acquaint me with the result. I offered a reward if he would confess where he obtained them; and if he proved obstinate, threatened to have him arrested. Now, Dr. Grey, you can understand why I have so tediously made a full revelation of my past, for I wish to enlist your sympathy and claim your aid in my search for my long-lost friend. These portraits inadequately represent the fascinating beauty of one of the originals, and the sweetness and almost angelic purity of the other."

She held up the somewhat defaced and faded miniatures for the inspection of her companion, but scarcely glancing at them, he said, abstractedly,—

"You are sure they belong to Mrs. Carlyle ?"

"Yes. As she put on her diamonds just before going down stairs she showed me the portraits in her jewelry casket, where she had also placed a similar one of myself. Ah! at this instant I seem to see her beaming face, as she bent down, and sweeping her veil aside, kissed my picture and Maurice's."

"Do you imagine that she is in America ?"

66 No; I fear she is dead, and that these were stolen from the old nurse. Who is that yonder? Ah, yes,-Phoebe Donovan. Now I shall hear the truth."

Forgetting her shawl, and unmindful of the fact that the sun was streaming full on her head and face, she hurried to meet the woman who was ascending the avenue, and very soon they entered

the house.

A quarter of an hour elapsed ere Phoebe came out, and walked rapidly away; and, unwilling to prolong his suspense, Dr. Grey went in search of the governess.

He met her in the hall, and saw that she was equipped for a

walk. Her cheeks were scarlet, her brown eyes all aglow with eager expectation, and her lips twitched, as she exclaimed,—

"Oh, doctor, I hope everything; for I learn that the pictures were found on the lawn at 'Solitude,' where Phoebe was once hired as cook; and she recognized the case as the same she had one day seen on a writing-desk in the parlour. The boy confessed that he picked it up from the grass, and, after taking out the contents, soaked the case in a bucket of salt-water. Phoebe says the pictures belong to Mrs. Gerome, the gray-headed woman who owns that place on the beach, and I am almost tempted to believe she is Elsie, who may have married again. At all events, I shall soon know where she obtained the portraits."

"You are not going to 'Solitude ?'"

"Yes, immediately. I can not rest till I have learned all. God grant may not be mocked in my hopes."

The unwonted excitement had kindled a strange beauty in the whilom passive face, and Dr. Grey could for the first time realize how lovely she must have been in the happy days of eld.

"Miss Dexter, Mrs. Gerome will not receive you. She sees no visitors, not even ministers of the gospel."

"She must-she shall-admit me; for I will assure her that life and death hang upon it."

66 How so?"

"If Evelyn is alive, and I can discover her retreat, I will urge her to go to her husband, who needs her care. You know Mrs. Gerome, she is one of your patients. Come with me, and prevail upon her to receive me."

In her eagerness she laid her hand on his arm, and even then noticed and wondered at the crimson that suddenly leaped into his olive face.

"Some day I will give you good reasons for refusing your request, which it is impossible for me to grant. If you are resolved to hazard the visit, I will take you in my buggy as far as the gate at 'Solitude,' and when you return will confer with you concerning the result. Just now, I can promise no more."

An expression of disappointment clouded her brow.

"I had hoped that you would sympathize with and be more interested in my great sorrow."

"Miss Dexter, my interest is more profound, more intense, than you can imagine, but at this juncture circumstances forbid its expression. My buggy is at the door."

CHAPTER XXX.

MISS DEXTER VISITS EVELYN CARLYLE AT SOLITUDE.'

E

VEN at mid-day the grounds around "Solitude were sombre and chill, for across the sky the winds had woven a thin, vapory veil, whose cloud-meshes seemed fine as lacework; and through this gilded netting the sun looked hazy, the light wan and yellow, and rifled of its customary noon glitter.

Following one of the serpentine walks, the governess was approaching the house, when her attention was attracted by the gleaming surface of a tomb, and she turned towards the pyramidal deodars that were swaying slowly in the breeze,—

and photographing fringy images on the shining marble.

A broad circle of violets, blue with bloom, surrounded a sexangular temple, whose dome was terminated by a mural crown and surmounted by a cross. The beautifully polished pillars were fluted, and wreathed with carved ivy that wound up to the richlysculptured cornices, where poppies clustered and tossed their leaves along the architrave; and, in the centre, visible through all the arches, rose an altar, bearing two angels with fingers on their lips, who guarded an exquisite urn that was inscribed "cor cordium.”

Beneath the eastern arch, that directly fronted the sea, were two steps leading into the mausoleum, and, as Miss Dexter stood within, she saw that the floor was arranged with slabs for only two tombs close to the altar, one side of which bore in golden tracery,

"Elsie Maclean, 68. Amicus Amicorum."

Around the base of the urn were scattered some fresh geraniumleaves, and very near it stood a tall, slender, Venetian glass vase filled with odorous flowers, which had evidently been gathered and arranged that day.

For whom had the remaining slab and opposite side of the altar been reserved?

The heart of the governess seemed for a moment to forget its functions, then a vague hope made it throb fiercely; and rapidly

the anxious woman directed her steps towards the house, that seemed as silent as the grave behind her.

The hall door had swung partially open, and, dreading that she might be refused admittance if she rang the bell, she availed herself of the lucky accident (which in Elsie's lifetime never happened), and entered unchallenged and unobserved.

From the parlor issued a rather monotonous and suppressed sound, as of some one reading aloud, and, advancing a few steps, the governess stood inside the threshold.

The curtains of the south window were looped back, the blinds thrown open, and the sickly sunshine poured in, lighting the easel, before which the mistress of the house had drawn an ottoman and seated herself.

To-day, an air of unwonted negligence marked her appearance, usually distinguished by extraordinary care and taste.

Her white merino robe de chambre was partially ungirded, and the blue tassels trailed on the carpet; her luxuriant hair instead of being braided and classically coiled, was gathered in three or four large heavy loops, and fastened rather loosely by the massive silver comb that allowed one long tress to straggle across her shoulder, while the folds in front slipped low on her temples and forehead.

Intently contemplating her work, she leaned her cheek on her hand, and only the profile was visible from the door, as she repeated, in a subdued tone,

"I stanch with ice my burning breast,

With silence balm my whirling brain,
O Brandan! to this hour of rest,

That Joppan leper's ease was pain."

The easel held the largest of many pictures, upon which she had lavished time and study, and her present work was a wide stretch of mid-ocean, lighted by innumerable stars, and a round glittering polar moon that swung mid-heaven like a globe of silver, and shed a ghostly lustre on the raging, ragged waves, above which an Aurora Borealis, lifted its gleaming arch of mysterious white fires.

On the flowery shore of a tropic isle, under clustering boughs of lime and citron, knelt the venerable figure of Saint Brandan,—and upon a towering, jagged iceberg, whose crystal cliffs and diamond peaks glittered with the ghastly radiance reflected from arctic moon and boreal flames, lay Judas, pressing his hot palms and burning breast to the frigid bosom of his sailing sapphire berg.

No hideous, scowling, red-haired arch-apostate was this painted Iscariot, but a handsome man, whose features were startlingly like those in the ivory miniature.