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Title: The Lady of the Ice
       A Novel

Author: James De Mille

Release Date: July 7, 2007 [EBook #22013]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LADY OF THE ICE ***




Produced by Marlo Dianne




The LADY OF THE ICE

A NOVEL.

by JAMES DE MILLE,
AUTHOR OF
"THE DODGE CLUB ABROAD," "CORD AND CREESE," ETC


NEW YORK:
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
90, 92, & 94 GRAND STREET
1870




CONTENTS.


CHAPTER


I. Consisting merely of Introductory Matter.

II. My Quarters, where you will become acquainted with Old Jack Randolph,
my most Intimate Friend, and one who divides with me the Honor of being
the Hero of my Story.

III. "Macrorie--old Chap--I'm--going--to--be--married!!!"

IV. "It's--the--the Widow! It's Mrs.--Finnimore!!!"

V. "Fact, my Boy--it is as I say.--There's another Lady in the Case, and
this last is the Worst Scrape of all!"

VI. "I implored her to run away with me, and have a Private Marriage,
leaving the rest to Fate. And I Solemnly assured her that, if she
refused, I would blow my Brains out on her Door-steps.--There, now!
what do you think of that?"

VII. Crossing the St. Lawrence.--The Storm and the Break-up.--A Wonderful
Adventure.--A Struggle for Life.--Who is she?--The Ice-ridge.--Fly for
your Life!

VIII. I fly back, and send the Doctor to the Rescue.--Return to the Spot.
--Flight of the Bird.--Perplexity, Astonishment, Wonder, and Despair.
--"Pas un Mot, Monsieur!"

IX. By one's own Fireside.--The Comforts of a Bachelor.--Chewing the Cud
of Sweet and Bitter Fancy.--A Discovery full of Mortification and
Embarrassment.--Jack Randolph again.--News from the Seat of War.

X. "Berton's?--Best Place in the Town.--Girls always glad to see a
Fellow.--Plenty of Chat, and Lots of Fun.--No End of Larks, you know,
and all that Sort of Thing."

XI. "Macrorie, my Boy, have you been to Anderson's yet?"--"No."--"Well,
then, I want you to attend to that Business of the Stone to-morrow. Don't
forget the Size--Four Feet by Eighteen Inches; and nothing but the Name
and Date. The Time's come at last. There's no Place for me but the Cold
Grave, where the Pensive Passer-by may drop a Tear over the Mournful
Fate of Jack Randolph. Amen. R. I. P."

XII. My Adventures Rehearsed to Jack Randolph.--"My dear Fellow, you don't
say so!"--"'Pon my Life, yes."--"By Jove! Old Chap, how close you've
been! You just have no End of Secrets. And what's become of the Lady?
Who is She?"

XIII. "Advertising!!!"

XIV. A Concert.--A Singular Character.--"God Save the Queen."--A Fenian.--A
General Row.--Macrorie to the Rescue!--Macrorie's Maiden Speech, and
its effectiveness.--O'Halloran.--A Strange Companion.--Invited to
partake of Hospitality.

XV. The O'Halloran Ladies.--Their Appearance.--Their Ages.--Their Dress.--
Their Demeanor.--Their Culture, Polish, Education, Rank, Style,
Attainments, and all about them.

XVI. The Daily Paper.

XVII. "Somethin' Warrum."

XVIII. The Following Morning.--Appearance of Jack Randolph.--A New
Complication.--The Three Oranges.--Desperate Efforts of the Juggler.
--How to make full, ample, complete, and most satisfactory
Explanations.--Miss Phillips!--The Widow!!--Number Three!!!--Louie
rapidly rising into greater prominence on the Mental and Sentimental
horizon of Jack Randolph.

XIX. O'Halloran's again.--A Startling Revelation.--The Lady of the Ice.
--Found at Last.--Confusion, Embarrassment, Reticence, and Shyness,
succeeded by Wit, Fascination, Laughter, and Witching Smiles.

XX. "Our Symposium," as O'Halloran called it.--High and mighty Discourse.
--General inspection of Antiquity by a Learned Eye.--A Discourse upon
the "Oioneesoizin" of the English language.--Homeric Translations.
--O'Halloran And Burns.--A new Epoch for the Brogue.--The Dinner of
Achilles and the Palace of Antinous.

XXI. Jack once more.--The Woes of a Lover.--Not Wisely but too Many.--While
Jack is telling his Little Story, the ones whom he thus entertains have
a Separate Meeting.--The Bursting of the Storm.--The Letter of "Number
Three."--The Widow and Miss Phillips.--Jack has to avail himself of the
aid of a Chaplain of Her Majesty's Forces.--Jack an Injured Man.

XXII. I Reveal my Secret.--Tremendous effects of the Revelation.--Mutual
Explanations, which are by no means Satisfactory. Jack Stands Up for
what he calls His Rights.--Remonstrances and Reasonings, ending in a
General Row.--Jack makes a Declaration of War, and takes his Departure
in a state of Unparalleled Huffiness.

XXIII. A Friend becomes an Enemy.--Meditations on the Ancient and Venerable
Fable of the Dog in the Manger.--The Corruption of the Human Heart.
--Consideration of the Whole Situation.--Attempts to Countermine Jack,
and Final Resolve.

XXIV. Tremendous Excitement.--The Hour Approaches, and with it the Man.
--The Lady of the Ice.--A Tumultuous Meeting.--Outpouring of Tender
Emotions.--Agitation of the Lady.--A Sudden Interruption.--An Injured
Man, an Awful, Fearful, Direful, and Utterly-crushing Revelation.--Who
is the Lady of the Ice?

XXV. Recovery from the last Great Shock.--Geniality of mine Host.--Off
again among Antiquities.--The Fenians.--A Startling Revelation by one of
the Inner Circle.--Politics, Poetry, and Pathos.--Far-reaching Plans and
Deep-seated Purposes.

XXVI. A few Parting Words with O'Halloran.--His touching Parental
Tenderness, High Chivalric Sentiment, and lofty sense of Honor.--Pistols
for Two.--Pleasant and Harmonious Arrangement.--"Me Boy, Ye're and Honor
to Yer Sex!"

XXVII. Sensational!--Terrific!--Tremendous!--I leave the house in Strange
Whirl.--A Storm.--The Driving Sleet.--I Wander About.--The voices of
the Storm, and of the River.--The clangor of the Bells.--The Shadow in
the Doorway.--The Mysterious Companion.--A Terrible Walk.--Familiar
Voices.--Sinking into Senselessness.--The Lady of the Ice is Revealed
At Last amid the Storm!

XXVIII. My Lady of the Ice.--Snow and Sleet.--Reawakening.--A Desperate
Situation.--Saved a Second Time.--Snatched from a Worse Fate.--Borne in
My Arms Once More.--The Open Door.

XXIX. Puzzling Questions which cannot be Answered as yet.--A Step toward
Reconcilation.--Reunion of a Broken Friendship.--Pieces all Collected
and Joined.--Joy of Jack.--Solemn Debates over the Great Puzzle of the
period.--Friendly Conferences and Confidences.--An Important
Communication.

XXX. A Letter!--Strange Hesitation.--Gloomy Forebodings.--Jack down deep in
the Dumps.--Fresh Confessions.--Why he Missed the Tryst.--Remorse and
Revenge.--Jack's Vows of Vengeance.--A very Singular and Unaccountable
Character.--Jack's Gloomy Menaces.

XXXI. A Friendly Call.--Preliminaries of the Duel Neatly Arranged.--A Damp
Journey, and Depressed Spirits.--A Secluded Spot.--Difficulties
which attend a Duel in a Canadian Spring.--A Masterly Decision.
--Debates about the niceties of the Code of Honor.--Who shall have the
First Shot, Struggle for Precedence.--A very Singular and Obstinate
Dispute.--I save O'Halloran from Death by Rheumatism.

XXXII. Home again.--The Growls of a Confirmed Growler.--Hospitality.--The
well-known Room.--Vision of a Lady.--Alone with Marion.--Interchange of
Thought and Sentiment.--Two Beautiful Women.--An Evening to be
Remembered.--The Conviviality of O'Halloran.--The Humors of
O'Halloran, and his Bacchic Joy.

XXXIII. From April to June.--Tempora Mutantur, et nos Mutamur in Illis.
--Startling Change in Marion!--And Why?--Jack and his Woes.--The
Vengeance of Miss Phillips.--Ladies who refuse to allow their Hearts to
be Broken.--Noble Attitude of the Widow.--Consolations of Louie.

XXXIV. Jack's Tribulations.--They Rise Up in the very face of the Most
Astonishing Good Fortunes.--For, what is like a Legacy?--And this comes
to Jack!--Seven Thousand Pounds Sterling per Annum!--But what's the use
of it all?--Jack comes to Grief!--Woe! Sorrow! Despair! All the Widow!
--Infatuation.--A mad proposal.--A Madman, a Lunatic, an Idiot, a March
Hare, and a Hatter, all rolled into one, an that one the Lucky yet
Unfortunate Jack.

XXXV. "Louis!"--Platonic Friendship.--Its results.--Advice may be given too
Freely, and Consolation may be sought for too Eagerly.--Two Inflammable
Hearts should not be allowed to Come Together.--The Old, Old Story.--A
Breakdown, and the results all around.--The Condemned Criminal.--The
slow yet sure approach of the Hour of Execution.

XXXVI. A Friend's Apology for a Friend.--Jack down at the bottom of Deep
Abyss of Woe.--His Despair.--The Hour and the Man!--Where is the Woman!--A
Sacred Spot.--Old Fletcher.--The Toll of the Bell.--Meditations on each
Successive Stroke.--A wild search.--The Pretty Servant-maid, and her
Pretty Story.--Throwing Gold About.

XXXVII. My own affairs.--A Drive and how it came off.--Varying Moods.--The
Excited, the Gloomy, and the Gentlemanly.--Straying about
Montmorency.--Revisiting a memorable Scene.--Effect of said Scene.--A
Mute Appeal and an Appeal in Words.--Result of the Appeals.--"Will You
Turn Away?"--Grand Result.--Climax.--Finale.--A General Understanding
all round, and a Universal Explanation of Numerous Puzzles.

XXXVIII. Grand Conclusion.--Wedding-rings and Ball-rings.--St. Malachi's.
--Old Fletcher in his glory.--No Humbug this time.--Messages sent
everywhere.--All the town Agog.--Quebec on the Rampage.--St. Malachi's
Crammed.--Galleries Crowded.--White Favors Everywhere.--The Widow happy
with the Chaplain.--The Double Wedding.--First couple--JACK AND LOUIE!
--Second ditto--MACRORIE AND MARION!--Colonel Berton and O'Halloran
giving away the brides.--Strange Association of the British Officer and
the Fenian.--Jack and Macrorie, Louie and Marion.--Brides and
Bridegrooms.--Epithalamicm.--Wedding in high life.--Six Officiating
Clergymen.--All the elite of Quebec take part.--All the Clergy, all the
Military, and Everybody who amounts to any thing.--The Band of the
Bobtails Discourse Sweet Music, and all that sort of thing, You Know.




THE LADY OF THE ICE.




CHAPTER I.


CONSISTING MERELY OF INTRODUCTORY MATTER.


This is a story of Quebec. Quebec is a wonderful city.

I am given to understand that the ridge on which the city is built is
Laurentian; and the river that flows past it is the same. On this (not
the river, you know) are strata of schist, shale, old red sand-stone,
trap, granite, clay, and mud. The upper stratum is ligneous, and is
found to be very convenient for pavements.

It must not be supposed from this introduction that I am a geologist. I
am not. I am a lieutenant in her Majesty's 129th Bobtails. The Bobtails
are a gay and gallant set, and I have reason to know that we are well
remembered in every place we have been quartered.

Into the vortex of Quebeccian society I threw myself with all the
generous ardor of youth, and was keenly alive to those charms which the
Canadian ladies possess and use so fatally. It is a singular fact, for
which I will not attempt to account, that in Quebeccian society one
comes in contact with ladies only. Where the male element is I never
could imagine. I never saw a civilian. There are no young men in
Quebec; if there are any, we officers are not aware of it. I've often
been anxious to see one, but never could make it out. Now, of these
Canadian ladies I cannot trust myself to speak with calmness. An
allusion to them will of itself be eloquent to every brother officer. I
will simply remark that, at a time when the tendencies of the Canadians
generally are a subject of interest both in England and America, and
when it is a matter of doubt whether they lean to annexation or British
connection, their fair young daughters show an unmistakable tendency
not to one, but to both, and make two apparently incompatible
principles really inseparable.

You must understand that this is my roundabout way of hinting that the
unmarried British officer who goes to Canada generally finds his
destiny tenderly folding itself around a Canadian bride. It is the
common lot. Some of these take their wives with them around the world,
but many more retire from the service, buy farms, and practise love in
a cottage. Thus the fair and loyal Canadiennes are responsible for the
loss of many and many a gallant officer to her majesty's service.
Throughout these colonial stations there has been, and there will be, a
fearful depletion, among the numbers of these brave but too impressible
men. I make this statement solemnly, as a mournful fact. I have nothing
to say against it; and it is not for one who has had an experience like
mine to hint at a remedy. But to my story:

Every one who was in Quebec during the winter of 18--, if he went into
society at all, must have been struck by the appearance of a young
Bobtail officer, who was a joyous and a welcome guest at every house
where it was desirable to be. Tall, straight as an arrow, and
singularly well-proportioned, the picturesque costume of the 129th
Bobtails could add but little to the effect already produced by so
martial a figure. His face was whiskerless; his eyes gray; his
cheek-bones a little higher than the average; his hair auburn; his nose
not Grecian--or Roman--but still impressive: his air one of quiet dignity,
mingled with youthful joyance and mirthfulness. Try--O reader!--to
bring before you such a figure. Well--that's me.

Such was my exterior; what was my character? A few words will suffice
to explain:--bold, yet cautious; brave, yet tender; constant, yet
highly impressible; tenacious of affection, yet quick to kindle into
admiration at every new form of beauty; many times smitten, yet
surviving the wound; vanquished, yet rescued by that very
impressibility of temper--such was the man over whose singular
adventures you will shortly be called to smile or to weep.

Here is my card:


Lieut. Alexander Macrorie
129th Bobtails.


And now, my friend, having introduced you to myself, having shown you
my photograph, having explained my character, and handed you my card,
allow me to lead you to




CHAPTER II.


MY QUARTERS, WHERE YOU WILL BECOME ACQUAINTED WITH OLD JACK RANDOLPH,
MY MOST INTIMATE FRIEND, AND ONE WHO DIVIDES WITH ME THE HONOR OF BEING
THE HERO OF MY STORY.


I'll never forget the time. It was a day in April.

But an April day in Canada is a very different thing from an April day
in England. In England all Nature is robed in vivid green, the air is
balmy; and all those beauties abound which usually set poets
rhapsodizing, and young men sentimentalizing, and young girls
tantalizing. Now, in Canada there is nothing of the kind. No Canadian
poet, for instance, would ever affirm that in the spring a livelier
iris blooms upon the burnished dove; in the spring a young man's fancy
lightly turns to thoughts of love. No. For that sort of thing--the
thoughts of love I mean--winter is the time of day in Canada. The fact
is, the Canadians haven't any spring. The months which Englishmen
include under that pleasant name are here partly taken up with
prolonging the winter, and partly with the formation of a new and
nondescript season. In that period Nature, instead of being darkly,
deeply, beautifully green, has rather the shade of a dingy, dirty,
melancholy gray. Snow covers the ground--not by any means the
glistening white robe of Winter--but a rugged substitute, damp, and
discolored. It is snow, but snow far gone into decay and decrepitude--
snow that seems ashamed of itself for lingering so long after wearing
out its welcome, and presenting itself in so revolting a dress--snow,
in fact, which is like a man sinking into irremediable ruin and
changing its former glorious state for that condition which is
expressed by the unpleasant word "slush." There is no an object, not a
circumstance, in visible Nature which does not heighten the contrast.
In England there is the luxuriant foliage, the fragrant blossom, the
gay flower; in Canada, black twigs--bare, scraggy, and altogether
wretched--thrust their repulsive forms forth into the bleak air--there,
the soft rain-shower falls; here, the fierce snow-squall, or maddening
sleet!--there, the field is traversed by the cheerful plough; here, it
is covered with ice-heaps or thawing snow; there, the rivers run
babbling onward under the green trees; here, they groan and chafe under
heaps of dingy and slowly-disintegrating ice-hummocks; there, one's
only weapon against the rigor of the season is the peaceful umbrella;
here, one must defend one's self with caps and coats of fur and
india-rubber, with clumsy leggings, ponderous boots, steel-creepers,
gauntlets of skin, iron-pointed alpenstocks, and forty or fifty other
articles which the exigencies of space and time will not permit me to
mention. On one of the darkest and most dismal of these April days, I
was trying to kill time in my quarters, when Jack Randolph burst in
upon my meditations. Jack Randolph was one of Ours--an intimate friend
of mine, and of everybody else who had the pleasure of his
acquaintance. Jack was in every respect a remarkable man--physically,
intellectually, and morally. Present company excepted, he was certainly
by all odds the finest-looking fellow in a regiment notoriously filled
with handsome men; and to this rare advantage he added all the
accomplishments of life, and the most genial nature in the world. It
was difficult to say whether he was a greater favorite with men or with
women. He was noisy, rattling, reckless, good-hearted, generous,
mirthful, witty, jovial, daring, open-handed, irrepressible,
enthusiastic, and confoundedly clever. He was good at every thing, from
tracking a moose or caribou, on through all the gamut of rinking,
skating, ice-boating, and tobogganing, up to the lightest
accomplishments of the drawing-room. He was one of those lucky dogs who
are able to break horses or hearts with equal buoyancy of soul. And it
was this twofold capacity which made him equally dear to either sex.

A lucky dog? Yea, verily, that is what he was. He was welcomed at every
mess, and he had the _entree_ of every house in Quebec. He could drink
harder than any man in the regiment, and dance down a whole regiment of
drawing-room knights. He could sing better than any amateur I ever
heard; and was the best judge of a meerschaum-pipe I ever saw. Lucky?
Yes, he was--and especially so, and more than all else--on account of
the joyousness of his soul. There was a contagious and a godlike
hilarity in his broad, open brow, his frank, laughing eyes, and his
mobile lips. He seemed to carry about with him a bracing moral
atmosphere. The sight of him had the same effect on the dull man of
ordinary life that the Himalayan air has on an Indian invalid; and yet
Jack was head-over-heels in debt. Not a tradesman would trust him.
Shoals of little bills were sent him every day. Duns without number
plagued him from morning to night. The Quebec attorneys were sharpening
their bills, and preparing, like birds of prey, to swoop down upon him.
In fact, taking it altogether, Jack had full before him the sure and
certain prospect of some dismal explosion.

On this occasion, Jack--for the first time in our acquaintance--seemed
to have not a vestige of his ordinary flow of spirits. He entered
without a word, took up a pipe, crammed some tobacco into the bowl,
flung himself into an easy-chair, and began--with fixed eyes and set
lips--to pour forth enormous volumes of smoke.

My own pipe was very well under way, and I sat opposite, watching him
in wonder. I studied his face, and marked there what I had never before
seen upon it--a preoccupied and troubled expression. Now, Jack's
features, by long indulgence in the gayer emotions, had immovably
moulded themselves into an expression of joyousness and hilarity.
Unnatural was it for the merry twinkle to be extinguished in his eyes;
for the corners of the mouth, which usually curled upward, to settle
downward; for the general shape of feature, cut-line of muscle, set of
lips, to undertake to become the exponents of feelings to which they
were totally unaccustomed. On this occasion, therefore, Jack's face did
not appear so much mournful as dismal; and, where another face might
have elicited sympathy, Jack's face had such a grewsomeness, such an
utter incongruity between feature and expression, that it seemed only
droll.

I bore this inexplicable conduct as long as I could, but at length I
could stand it no longer.

"My dear Jack," said I, "would it be too much to ask, in the mildest
manner in the world, and with all possible regard for your feelings,
what, in the name of the Old Boy, happens to be up just now?"

Jack took the pipe from his mouth, sent a long cloud of smoke forward
in a straight line, then looked at me, then heaved a deep sigh, and
then--replaced the pipe, and began smoking once more.

Under such circumstances I did not know what to do next, so I took up
again the study of his face.

"Heard no bad news, I hope," I said at length, making another venture
between the puffs of my pipe.

A shake of the head.

Silence again.

"Duns?"

Another shake.

Silence.

"Writs?"

Another shake.

Silence.

"Liver?"

Another shake, together with a contemptuous smile.

"Then I give it up," said I, and betook myself once more to my pipe.

After a time, Jack gave a long sigh, and regarded me fixedly for some
minutes, with a very doleful face. Then he slowly ejaculated:

"Macrorie!"

"Well?"

"It's a woman!"

"A woman? Well. What's that? Why need that make any particular
difference to you, my boy?"

He sighed again, more dolefully than before.

"I'm in for it, old chap," said he.

"How's that?"

"It's all over."

"What do you mean?"

"Done up, sir--dead and gone!"

"I'll be hanged if I understand you."

"_Hic jacet_ Johannes Randolph."

"You're taking to Latin by way of making yourself more intelligible, I
suppose."

"Macrorie, my boy--"

"Well?"

"Will you be going anywhere near Anderson's to-day--the stone-cutter, I
mean?"

"Why?"

"If you should, let me ask you to do a particular favor for me. Will
you?"

"Why, of course. What is it?"

"Well--it's only to order a tombstone for me--plain, neat--four feet by
sixteen inches--with nothing on it but my name and date. The sale of my
effects will bring enough to pay for it. Don't you fellows go and put
up a tablet about me. I tell you plainly, I don't want it, and, what's
more, I won't stand it."

"By Jove!" I cried; "my dear fellow, one would think you were raving.
Are you thinking of shuffling off the mortal coil? Are you going to
blow your precious brains out for a woman? Is it because some fair one
is cruel that you are thinking of your latter end? Will you, wasting
with despair, die because a woman's fair?"

"No, old chap. I'm going to do something worse."

"Something worse than suicide! What's that? A clean breast, my boy."

"A species of moral suicide."

"What's that? Your style of expression to-day is a kind of secret
cipher. I haven't the key. Please explain."

Jack resumed his pipe, and bent down his head; then he rubbed his broad
brow with his unoccupied hand; then he raised himself up, and looked at
me for a few moments in solemn silence; then he said, in a low voice,
speaking each, word separately and with thrilling emphasis:




CHAPTER III.


"MACRORIE--OLD CHAP--I'M--GOING--TO--BE--MARRIED!!!"


At that astounding piece of intelligence, I sat dumb and stared fixedly
at Jack for the space of half an hour, he regarded me with a mournful
smile. At last my feelings found expression in a long, solemn,
thoughtful, anxious, troubled, and perplexed whistle.

I could think of only one thing. It was a circumstance which Jack had
confided to me as his bosom-friend. Although he had confided the same
thing to at least a hundred other bosom-friends, and I knew it, yet, at
the same time, the knowledge of this did not make the secret any the
less a confidential one; and I had accordingly guarded it like my
heart's blood, and all that sort of thing, you know. Nor would I even
now divulge that secret, were it not for the fact that the cause for
secrecy is removed. The circumstance was this: About a year before, we
had been stationed at Fredericton, in the Province of New Brunswick.
Jack had met there a young lady from St. Andrews, named Miss Phillips,
to whom he had devoted himself with his usual ardor. During a
sentimental sleigh-ride he had confessed his love, and had engaged
himself to her; and, since his arrival at Quebec, he had corresponded
with her very faithfully. He considered himself as destined by Fate to
become the husband of Miss Phillips at some time in the dim future, and
the only marriage before him that I could think of was this. Still I
could not understand why it had come upon him so suddenly, or why, if
it did come, he should so collapse under the pressure of his doom.

"Well," said I, after I had rallied somewhat, "I didn't think it was to
come off so soon. Some luck has turned up, I suppose."

"Luck!" repeated Jack, with an indescribable accent.

"I assure you, though I've never had the pleasure of seeing Miss
Phillips, yet, from your description, I admire her quite fervently, and
congratulate you from the bottom of my heart."

"Miss Phillips!" repeated Jack, with a groan.

"What's the matter, old chap?"

"It isn't--_her_!" faltered Jack.

"What!"

"She'll have to wear the willow."

"You haven't broken with her--have you?" I asked.

"She'll have to forgive and forget, and all that sort of thing. If it
was Miss Phillips, I wouldn't be so confoundedly cut up about it."

"Why--what is it? who is it? and what do you mean?"

Jack looked at me. Then he looked down, and frowned. Then he looked at
me again; and then he said, slowly, and with powerful effort:




CHAPTER IV.


"IT'S--THE--THE WIDOW! IT'S MRS.--FINNIMORE!!!"


Had a bombshell burst--but I forbear. That comparison is, I believe,
somewhat hackneyed. The reader will therefore be good enough to
appropriate the point of it, and understand that the shock of this
intelligence was so overpowering, that I was again rendered speechless.

"You see," said Jack, after a long and painful silence, "it all
originated out of an infernal mistake. Not that I ought to be sorry for
it, though. Mrs. Finnimore, of course, is a deuced fine woman. I've
been round there ever so long, and seen ever so much of her; and all
that sort of thing, you know. Oh, yes," he added, dismally; "I ought to
be glad, and, of course, I'm a deuced lucky fellow, and all that;
but--"

He paused, and an expressive silence followed that "but."

"Well, how about the mistake?" I asked.

"Why, I'll tell you. It was that confounded party at Doane's. You know
what a favorite of mine little Louie Berton is--the best little thing
that ever breathed, the prettiest, the--full of fun, too. Well, we're
awfully thick, you know; and she chaffed me all the evening about my
engagement with Miss Phillips. She had heard all about it, and is crazy
to find out whether it's going on yet or not. We had great fun--she
chaffing and questioning, and I trying to fight her off. Well; the
dancing was going on, and I'd been separated from her for some time,
and was trying to find her again, and I saw some one standing in a
recess of one of the windows, with a dress that was exactly like
Louie's. Her back was turned to me, and the curtains half concealed
her. I felt sure that it was Louie. So I sauntered up, and stood for a
moment or two behind her. She was looking out of the window; one hand
was on the ledge, and the other was by her side, half behind her. I
don't know what got into me; but I seized her hand, and gave it a
gentle squeeze.

"Well, you know, I expected that it would be snatched away at once. I
felt immediately an awful horror at my indiscretion, and would have
given the world not to have done it. I expected to see Louie's flashing
eyes hurling indignant fire at me, and all that. But the hand didn't
move from mine at all!"

Jack uttered this last sentence with the doleful accents of a
deeply-injured man--such an accent as one would employ in telling of a
shameful trick practised upon his innocence. "It lay in mine," he
continued. "There it was; I had seized it; I had it; I held it; I had
squeezed it; and--good Lord!--Macrorie, what was I to do? I'll tell you
what I did--I squeezed it again. I thought that now it would go; but it
wouldn't. Well, I tried it again. No go. Once more--and once again. On
my soul, Macrorie, it still lay in mine. I cannot tell you what
thoughts I had. It seemed like indelicacy. It was a bitter thing to
associate indelicacy with one like little Louie; but--hang it!--there
was the awful fact. Suddenly, the thought struck me that the hand was
larger than Louie's. At that thought, a ghastly sensation came over me;
and, just at that moment, the lady herself turned her face, blushing,
arch, with a mischievous smile. To my consternation, and to my--well,
yes--to my horror, I saw Mrs. Finnimore!"

"Good Lord!" I exclaimed.

"A stronger expression would fail to do justice to the occasion," said
Jack, helping himself to a glass of beer. "For my part, the thrill of
unspeakable horror that was imparted by that shock is still strong
within me. There, my boy, you have my story. I leave the rest to your
imagination."

"The rest? Why, do you mean to say that this is all?"

"All!" cried Jack, with a wild laugh. "All? My dear boy, it is only the
faint beginning; but it implies all the rest."

"What did she say?" I asked, meekly.

"Say--say? What! After--well, never mind. Hang it! Don't drive me into
particulars. Don't you see? Why, there I was. I had made an assault,
broken through the enemy's lines, thought I was carrying every thing
before me, when suddenly I found myself confronted, not by an inferior
force, but by an overwhelming superiority of numbers--horse, foot, and
artillery, marines, and masked batteries--yes, and baggage-wagons--all
assaulting me in front, in flank, and in the rear. Pooh!"

"Don't talk shop, Jack."

"Shop? Will you be kind enough to suggest some ordinary figure of
speech that will give an idea of my situation? Plain language is quite
useless. At least, I find it so."

"But, at any rate, what did she say?"

"Why," answered Jack, in a more dismal voice than ever, "she said, 'Ah,
Jack!'--she called me Jack!--'Ah, Jack! I saw you looking for me. I
knew you would come after me.'"

"Good Heavens!" I cried; "and what did you say?"

"Say? Heavens and earth, man! what could I say? Wasn't I a gentleman?
Wasn't she a lady? Hadn't I forced her to commit herself? Didn't I have
to assume the responsibility and pocket the consequences? Say! Oh,
Macrorie! what is the use of imagination, if a man will not exercise
it?"

"And so you're in for it?" said I, after a pause.

"To the depth of several miles," said Jack, relighting his pipe, which
in the energy of his narrative had gone out.

"And you don't think of trying to back out?"

"I don't see my way. Then, again, you must know that I've been trying
to see if it wouldn't be the wisest thing for me to make the best of my
situation."

"Certainly it would, if you cannot possibly get out of it."

"But, you see, for a fellow like me it may be best not to get out of
it. You see, after all, I like her very well. She's an awfully fine
woman--splendid action. I've been round there ever so much; we've
always been deuced thick; and she's got a kind of way with her that a
fellow like me can't resist. And, then, it's time for me to begin to
think of settling down. I'm getting awfully old. I'll be twenty-three
next August. And then, you know, I'm so deuced hard up. I've got to the
end of my rope, and you are aware that the sheriff is beginning to be
familiar with my name. Yes, I think for the credit of the regiment I'd
better take the widow. She's got thirty thousand pounds, at least."

"And a very nice face and figure along with it," said I, encouragingly.

"That's a fact, or else I could never have mistaken her for poor little
Louie, and this wouldn't have happened. But, if it had only been little
Louie--well, well; I suppose it must be, and perhaps it's the best
thing."

"If it had been Louie," said I, with new efforts at encouragement, "it
wouldn't have been any better for you."

"No; that's a fact. You see, I was never so much bothered in my life. I
don't mind an ordinary scrape; but I can't exactly see my way out of
this."

"You'll have to break the news to Miss Phillips."

"And that's not the worst," said Jack, with a sigh that was like a
groan.

"Not the worst? What can be worse than that?"

"My dear boy, you have not begun to see even the outside of the
peculiarly complicated nature of my present situation. There are other
circumstances to which all these may be playfully represented as a
joke."

"Well, that is certainly a strong way of putting it."

"Couldn't draw it mild--such a situation can only be painted in strong
colors. I'll tell you in general terms what it is. I can't go into
particulars. You know all about my engagement to Miss Phillips. I'm
awfully fond of her--give my right hand to win hers, and all that sort
of thing, you know. Well, this is going to be hard on her, of course,
poor thing! especially as my last letters have been more tender than
common. But, old chap, that's all nothing. There's another lady in the
case!"

"What!" I cried, more astonished than ever.

Jack looked at me earnestly, and said, slowly and solemnly:




CHAPTER V.


"FACT, MY BOY--IT IS AS I SAY.--THERE'S ANOTHER LADY IN THE CASE, AND
THIS LAST IS THE WORST SCRAPE OF ALL!"


"Another lady?" I faltered.

"Another lady!" said Jack.

"Oh!" said I.

"Yes," said he.

"An engagement, too!"

"An engagement? I should think so--and a double-barrelled one, too. An
engagement--why, my dear fellow, an engagement's nothing at all
compared with this. This is something infinitely worse than the affair
with Louie, or Miss Phillips, or even the widow. It's a bad case--yes--
an infernally bad case--and I don't see but that I'll have to throw up
the widow after all."

"It must be a bad case, if it's infinitely worse than an engagement, as
you say it is. Why, man, it must be nothing less than actual marriage.
Is that what you're driving at? It must be. So you're a married man,
are you?"

"No, not just that, not quite--as yet--but the very next thing to it?"

"Well, Jack, I'm sorry for you, and all that I can say is, that it is a
pity that this isn't Utah. Being Canada, however, and a civilized
country, I can't see for the life of me how you'll ever manage to pull
through."

Jack sighed dolefully.

"To tell the truth," said he, "it's this last one that gives me my only
trouble. I'd marry the widow, settle up some way with Miss Phillips,
smother my shame, and pass the remainder of my life in peaceful
obscurity, if it were not for _her_."

"You mean by _her_, the lady whose name you don't mention."

"Whose name I don't mention, nor intend to," said Jack, gravely. "Her
case is so peculiar that it cannot be classed with the others. I never
breathed a word about it to anybody, though it's been going on for six
or eight months."

Jack spoke with such earnestness, that I perceived the subject to be
too grave a one in his estimation to be trifled with. A frown came over
his face, and he once more eased his mind by sending forth heavy clouds
of smoke, as though he would thus throw off the clouds of melancholy
that had gathered deep and dark over his soul.

"I'll make a clean breast of it, old chap," said he, at length, with a
very heavy sigh. "It's a bad business from beginning to end."

"You see," said he, after a long pause, in which he seemed to be
collecting his thoughts--"it began last year--the time I went to New
York, you know. She went on at the same time. She had nobody with her
but a deaf old party, and got into some row at the station about her
luggage. I helped her out of it, and sat by her side all the way. At
New York I kept up the acquaintance. I came back with them, that is to
say, with her, and the deaf old party, you know, and by the time we
reached Quebec again we understood one another.

"I couldn't help it--I'll be hanged if I could! You see, Macrorie, it
wasn't an ordinary case. She was the loveliest little girl I ever saw,
and I found myself awfully fond of her in no time. I soon saw that she
was fond of me too. All my other affairs were a joke to this. I wanted
to marry her in New York, but the thought of my debts frightened me out
of that, and so I put it off. I half wish now I hadn't been so
confoundedly prudent. Perhaps it is best, though. Still I don't know.
Better be the wife of a poor devil, than have one's heart broken by a
mean devil. Heigho!"

H E I G H O are the letters which are usually employed to represent a
sigh. I use them in accordance with the customs of the literary world.

"Well," resumed Jack, "after my return I called on her, and repeated my
call several times. She was all that could be desired, but her father
was different. I found him rather chilly, and not at all inclined to
receive me with that joyous hospitality which my various merits
deserved. The young lady herself seemed sad. I found out, at last, that
the old gentleman amused himself with badgering her about me; and
finally she told me, with tears, that her father requested me to visit
that house no more. Well, at that I was somewhat taken aback; but,
nevertheless, I determined to wait till the old gentleman himself
should speak. You know my peculiar coolness, old chap, that which you
and the rest call my happy audacity; and you may believe that it was
all needed under such circumstances as these. I went to the house twice
after that. Each time my little girl was half laughing with joy, half
crying with fear at seeing me; and each time she urged me to keep away.
She said we could write to one another. But letter-writing wasn't in my
line. So after trying in vain to obey her, I went once more in
desperation to explain matters.

"Instead of seeing her, I found the old fellow himself. He was simply
white, hot with rage--not at all noisy, or declamatory, or vulgar--but
cool, cutting, and altogether terrific. He alluded to my gentlemanly
conduct in forcing myself where I had been ordered off; and informed me
that if I came again he would be under the unpleasant necessity of
using a horsewhip. That, of course, made me savage. I pitched into him
pretty well, and gave it to him hot and heavy, but, hang it! I'm no
match for fellows of that sort; he kept so cool, you know, while I was
furious--and the long and the short of it is, that I had to retire in
disorder, rowing on him some mysterious vengeance or other, which I
have never been able to carry out.

"The next day I got a letter from her. It was awfully sad, blotted with
tears, and all that. She implored me to write her, told me she couldn't
see me, spoke about her father's cruelty and persecution--and ever so
many other things not necessary to mention. Well, I wrote back, and she
answered my letter, and so we got into the way of a correspondence
which we kept up at a perfectly furious rate. It came hard on me, of
course, for I'm not much at a pen; my letters were short, as you may
suppose, but then they were full of point, and what matters quantity so
long as you have quality, you know? Her letters, however, poor little
darling, were long and eloquent, and full of a kind of mixture of love,
hope, and despair. At first I thought that I should grow reconciled to
my situation in the course of time, but, instead of that, it grew worse
every day. I tried to forget all about her, but without success. The
fact is, I chafed under the restraint that was on me, and perhaps it
was that which was the worst of all. I dare say now if I'd only been in
some other place--in Montreal, for instance--I wouldn't have had such a
tough time of it, and might gradually have forgotten about her; but the
mischief of it was, I was here--in Quebec--close by her, you may say,
and yet I was forbidden the house. I had been insulted and threatened.
This, of course, only made matters worse, and the end of it was, I
thought of nothing else. My very efforts to get rid of the bother only
made it a dozen times worse. I flung myself into ladies' society with
my usual ardor, only worse; committed myself right and left, and seemed
to be a model of a gay Lothario. Little did they suspect that under a
smiling face I concealed a heart of ashes--yes, old boy--ashes! as I'm
a living sinner. You see, all the time, I was maddened at that
miserable old scoundrel who wouldn't let me visit his daughter--me,
Jack Randolph, an officer, and a gentleman, and, what is more, a
Bobtail! Why, my very uniform should have been a guarantee for my
honorable conduct. Then, again, in addition to this, I hankered after
her, you know, most awfully. At last I couldn't stand it any longer, so
I wrote her a letter. It was only yesterday. And now, old chap, what do
you think I wrote?"

"I don't know, I'm sure," said I, mistily; "a declaration of love,
perhaps--"

"A declaration of love? pooh!" said Jack; "as if I had ever written any
thing else than that. Why, all my letters were nothing else. No, my
boy--this letter was very different. In the first place, I told her
that I was desperate--then I assured her that I couldn't live this way
any longer, and I concluded with a proposal as desperate as my
situation. And what do you think my proposal was?"

"Proposal? Why, marriage, of course; there is only one kind of proposal
possible under such circumstances. But still that's not much more than
an engagement, dear boy, for an engagement means only the same thing,
namely, marriage."

"Oh, but this was far stronger--it was different, I can tell you, from
any mere proposal of marriage. What do you think it was? Guess."

"Can't. Haven't an idea."

"Well," said Jack--




CHAPTER VI.


"I IMPLORED HER TO RUN AWAY WITH ME, AND HAVE A PRIVATE MARRIAGE,
LEAVING THE REST TO FATE. AND I SOLEMNLY ASSURED HER THAT, IF SHE
REFUSED, I WOULD BLOW MY BRAINS OUT ON HER DOOR-STEPS.--THERE, NOW!
WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?"


Saying the above words, Jack leaned back, and surveyed me with the
stern complacency of despair. After staring at me for some time, and
evidently taking some sort of grim comfort out of the speechlessness to
which he had reduced me by his unparalleled narrative, he continued his
confessions:

"Last night, I made that infernal blunder with the widow--confound
her!--that is, I mean of course, bless her! It's all the same, you
know. To-day you behold the miserable state to which I am reduced.
To-morrow I will get a reply from _her_. Of course, she will consent to
fly. I know very well how it will be. She will hint at some feasible
mode, and some convenient time. She will, of course, expect me to
settle it all up, from her timid little hints; and I must settle it up,
and not break my faith with her. And now, Macrorie, I ask you, not
merely as an officer and a gentleman, but as a man, a fellow-Christian,
and a sympathizing friend, what under Heaven am I to do?"

He stopped, leaned back in his chair, lighted once more his
extinguished pipe, and I could see through the dense volumes of smoke
which he blew forth, his eyes fixed earnestly upon me, gleaming like
two stars from behind gloomy storm-clouds.

I sat in silence, and thought long and painfully over the situation. I
could come to no conclusion, but I had to say something, and I said it.

"Put it off," said I at last, in a general state of daze.

"Put what off?"

"What? Why, the widow--no, the--the elopement, of course. Yes," I
continued, firmly, "put off the elopement."

"Put off the elopement!" ejaculated Jack. "What! after proposing it so
desperately--after threatening to blow my brains out in front of her
door?"

"That certainly is a consideration," said I, thoughtfully; "but can't
you have--well, brain-fever--yes, that's it, and can't you get some
friend to send word to her?"

"That's all very well; but, you see, I'd have to keep my room. If I
went out, she'd hear of it. She's got a wonderful way of hearing about
my movements. She'll find out about the widow before the week's over.
Oh, no! that's not to be done."

"Well, then," said I, desperately, "let her find it out. The blow would
then fall a little more gently."

"You seem to me," said Jack, rather huffily, "to propose that I should
quietly proceed to break her heart. No! Hang it, man, if it comes to
that I'll do it openly, and make a clean breast of it, without shamming
or keeping her in suspense."

"Well, then," I responded, "why not break off with the widow?"

"Break off with the widow!" cried Jack, with the wondering accent of a
man who has heard some impossible proposal.

"Certainly; why not?"

"Will you be kind enough to inform me what thing short of death could
ever deliver me out of her hands?" asked Jack, mildly.

"Elope, as you proposed."

"That's the very thing I thought of; but the trouble is, in that case
she would devote the rest of her life to vengeance. 'Hell hath no fury
like a woman wronged,' you know. She'd move heaven and earth, and never
end, till I was drummed out of the regiment. No, my boy. To do that
would be to walk with open eyes to disgrace, and shame, and infamy,
with a whole community, a whole regiment, and the Horse-Guards at the
back of them, all banded together to crush me. Such a fate as this
would hardly be the proper thing to give to a wife that a fellow
loves."

"Can't you manage to make the widow disgusted with you?"

"No, I can't," said Jack, peevishly. "What do you mean?"

"Why, make it appear as though you only wanted to marry her for her
money."

"Oh, hang it, man! how could I do that? I can't play a part, under any
circumstances, and that particular part would be so infernally mean,
that it would be impossible. I'm such an ass that, if she were even to
hint at that, I'd resent it furiously.

"Can't you make her afraid about your numerous gallantries?"

"Afraid? why she glories in them. So many feathers in her cap, and all
that, you know."

"Can't you frighten her about your debts and general extravagance--hint
that you're a gambler, and so on?"

"And then she'd inform me, very affectionately, that she intends to be
my guardian angel, and save me from evil for all the rest of my life."

"Can't you tell her all about your solemn engagement to Miss Phillips?"

"My engagement to Miss Phillips? Why, man alive, she knows that as well
as you do."

"Knows it! How did she find it out?"

"How? Why I told her myself."

"The deuce you did!"

Jack was silent.

"Well, then," said I, after some further thought, "why not tell her
every thing?"

"Tell her every thing?"

"Yes--exactly what you've been telling me. Make a clean breast of it."

Jack looked at me for some time with a curious expression.

"My dear boy," said he, at length, "do you mean to say that you are
really in earnest in making that proposition?"

"Most solemnly in earnest," said I.

"Well," said Jack, "it shows how mistaken I was in leaving any thing to
your imagination. You do not seem to understand," he continued,
dolefully, "or you will not understand that, when a fellow has
committed himself to a lady as I did, and squeezed her hand with such
peculiar ardor, in his efforts to save himself and do what's right, he
often overdoes it. You don't seem to suspect that I might have overdone
it with the widow. Now, unfortunately, that is the very thing that I
did. I did happen to overdo it most confoundedly. And so the melancholy
fact remains that, if I were to repeat to her, verbatim, all that I've
been telling you, she would find an extraordinary discrepancy between
such statements and those abominably tender confessions in which I
indulged on that other occasion. Nothing would ever convince her that I
was not sincere at that time; and how can I go to her now and confess
that I am a humbug and an idiot? I don't see it. Come, now, old fellow,
what do you think of that? Don't you call it rather a tough situation?
Do you think a man can see his way out of it? Own up, now. Don't you
think it's about the worst scrape you ever heard of? Come, now, no
humbug."

The fellow seemed actually to begin to feel a dismal kind of pride in
the very hopelessness of his situation, and looked at me with a gloomy
enjoyment of my discomfiture.

For my part, I said nothing, and for the best of reasons: I had nothing
to say. So I took refuge in shaking my head.

"You see," Jack persisted, "there's no help for it. Nobody can do any
thing. There's only one thing, and that you haven't suggested."

"What's that?" I asked, feebly.

Jack put the tip of his forefinger to his forehead, and snapped his
thumb against his third.

"I haven't much, brains to speak of," said he, "but if I did happen to
blow out what little I may have, it would be the easiest settlement of
the difficulty. It would be cutting the knot, instead of attempting the
impossible task of untying it. Nobody would blame me. Everybody would
mourn for me, and, above all, four tender female hearts would feel a
pang of sorrow for my untimely fate. By all four I should be not
cursed, but canonized. Only one class would suffer, and those would be
welcome to their agonies. I allude, of course, to my friends the Duns."

To this eccentric proposal, I made no reply whatever.

"Well," said Jack, thoughtfully, "it isn't a bad idea. Not a bad idea,"
he repeated, rising from his chair and putting down his pipe, which had
again gone out owing to his persistent loquacity. "I'll think it over,"
he continued, seriously. "You bear in mind my little directions about
the head-stone, Macrorie, four feet by eighteen inches, old fellow,
very plain, and, mark me, only the name and date. Not a word about the
virtues of the deceased, etc. I can stand a great deal, but that I will
not stand. And now, old chap, I must be off; you can't do me any good,
I see."

"At any rate, you'll wait till to-morrow," said I, carelessly.

"Oh, there's no hurry," said he. "Of course, I must wait till then.
I'll let you know if any thing new turns up."

And saying this, he took his departure.




CHAPTER VII.


CROSSING THE ST. LAWRENCE.--THE STORM AND THE BREAK-UP.--A WONDERFUL
ADVENTURE.--A STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.--WHO IS SHE?--THE ICE-RIDGE.--FLY FOR
YOUR LIFE!


On the following day I found myself compelled to go on some routine
duty cross the river to Point Levy. The weather was the most abominable
of that abominable season. It was winter, and yet not Winter's self.
The old gentleman had lost all that bright and hilarious nature; all
that sparkling and exciting stimulus which he owns and holds here so
joyously in January, February, and even March. He was decrepit, yet
spiteful; a hoary, old, tottering, palsied villain, hurling curses
at all who ventured into his evil presence. One look outside showed me
the full nature of all that was before me, and revealed the old tyrant
in the full power of his malignancy. The air was raw and chill. There
blew a fierce, blighting wind, which brought with it showers of
stinging sleet. The wooden pavements were overspread with a thin layer
of ice, so glassy that walking could only be attempted at extreme
hazard; the houses were incrusted with the same cheerful coating; and,
of all the beastly weather that I had ever seen, there had never
been any equal to this. However, there was no escape from it; and so,
wrapping myself up as well as I could, I took a stout stick with a
sharp iron ferrule, and plunged forth into the storm.

On reaching the river, the view was any thing but satisfactory. The
wind here was tremendous, and the sleet blew down in long, horizontal
lines, every separate particle giving its separate sting, while the
accumulated stings amounted to perfect torment. I paused for a while to
get a little shelter, and take breath before venturing across.

There were other reasons for pausing. The season was well advanced, and
the ice was not considered particularly safe. Many things conspired to
give indications of a break-up. The ice on the surface was soft,
honey-combed, and crumbling. Near the shore was a channel of open
water. Farther out, where the current ran strongest, the ice was heaped
up in hillocks and mounds, while in different directions appeared
crevices of greater or less width. Looking over that broad surface as
well as I could through the driving storm, where not long before I
had seen crowds passing and repassing, not a soul was now visible.

This might have been owing to the insecurity of the ice; but it might
also have been owing to the severity of the weather. Black enough, at
any rate, the scene appeared; and I looked forth upon it from my
temporary shelter with the certainty that this river before me was a
particularly hard road to travel.

"Ye'll no be gangin' ower the day, sew-erly?" said a voice near me.

I turned and saw a brawny figure in a reefing-jacket and "sou'-wester."
He might have been a sailor, or a scowman, or a hibernating raftsman.

"Why?" said I.

He said nothing, but shook his head with solemn emphasis.

I looked for a few moments longer, and hesitated. Yet there was no
remedy for it, bad as it looked. After being ordered forward, I did not
like to turn back with an excuse about the weather. Besides, the ice
thus far had lasted well. Only the day before, sleds had crossed. There
was no reason why I should not cross now. Why should I in particular be
doomed to a catastrophe more than any other man? And, finally, was not
McGoggin there? Was he not always ready with his warmest welcome? On a
stormy day, did he not always keep his water up to the boiling-point,
and did not the very best whiskey in Quebec diffuse about his chamber
its aromatic odor?

I moved forward. The die was cast.

The channel near the shore was from six to twelve feet in width, filled
with floating fragments. Over this I scrambled in safety. As I
advanced, I could see that in one day a great change had taken place.
The surface-ice was soft and disintegrated, crushing readily under the
feet. All around me extended wide pools of water. From beneath these
arose occasional groaning sounds--dull, heavy crunches, which seemed to
indicate a speedy break-up. The progress of the season, with its thaws
and rains, had been gradually weakening the ice; along the shore its
hold had in some places at least been relaxed; and the gale of wind
that was now blowing was precisely of that description which most
frequently sweeps away resistlessly the icy fetters of the river, and
sets all the imprisoned waters free. At every step new signs of this
approaching break-up became visible. From time to time I encountered
gaps in the ice, of a foot or two in width, which did not of themselves
amount to much, but which nevertheless served to show plainly the state
of things.

My progress was excessively difficult. The walking was laborious on
account of the ice itself and the pools through which I had to wade.
Then there were frequent gaps, which sometimes could only be traversed
by a long detour. Above all, there was the furious sleet, which drove
down the river, borne on by the tempest, with a fury and unrelaxing
pertinacity that I never saw equalled. However, I managed to toil
onward, and at length reached the centre of the river. Here I found a
new and more serious obstacle. At this point the ice had divided; and
in the channel thus formed there was a vast accumulation of ice-cakes,
heaped up one above the other in a long ridge, which extended as far as
the eye could reach. There were great gaps in it, however, and to cross
it needed so much caution, and so much effort, that I paused for a
while, and, setting my back to the wind, looked around to examine the
situation.

Wild enough that scene appeared. On one side was my destination, but
dimly visible through the storm; on the other rose the dark cliff of
Cape Diamond, frowning gloomily over the river, crowned with the
citadel, where the flag of Old England was streaming straight out at
the impulse of the blast, with a stiffness that made it seem as though
it had been frozen in the air rigid in that situation. Up the river all
was black and gloomy; and the storm which burst from that quarter
obscured the view; down the river the prospect was as gloomy, but one
thing was plainly visible--a wide, black surface, terminating the gray
of the ice, and showing that there at least the break-up had begun, and
the river had resumed its sway.

A brief survey showed me all this, and for a moment created a strong
desire to go back. Another moment, however, showed that to go forward
was quite as wise and as safe. I did not care to traverse again what I
had gone over, and the natural reluctance to turn back from the
half-way house, joined to the hope of better things for the rest of the
way, decided me to go forward.

After some examination, I found a place on which to cross the central
channel. It was a point where the heaps of ice seemed at once more easy
to the foot, and more secure. At extreme risk, and by violent efforts,
I succeeded in crossing, and, on reaching the other side, I found the
ice more promising. Then, hoping that the chief danger had been
successfully encountered, I gathered up my energies, and stepped out
briskly toward the opposite shore.

It was not without the greatest difficulty and the utmost discomfort
that I had come thus far. My clothes were coated with frozen sleet; my
hair was a mass of ice; and my boots were filled with water. Wretched
as all this was, there was no remedy for it, so I footed it as best I
could, trying to console myself by thinking over the peaceful pleasures
which were awaiting me at the end of my journey in the chambers of the
hospitable McGoggin.

Suddenly, as I walked along, peering with half-closed eyes through the
stormy sleet before me, I saw at some distance a dark object
approaching. After a time, the object drew nearer, and resolved itself
into a sleigh. It came onward toward the centre of the river, which it
reached at about a hundred yards below the point where I had crossed.
There were two occupants in the sleigh, one crouching low and muffled
in wraps; the other the driver, who looked like one of the common
_habitans_. Knowing the nature of the river there, and wondering what
might bring a sleigh out at such a time, I stopped, and watched them
with a vague idea of shouting to them to go back. Their progress thus
far from the opposite shore, so far at least as I could judge, made me
conclude that the ice on this side must be comparatively good, while my
own journey had proved that on the Quebec side it was utterly
impossible for a horse to go.

As they reached the channel where the crumbled ice-blocks lay floating,
heaped up as I have described, the sleigh stopped, and the driver
looked anxiously around. At that very instant there came one of those
low, dull, grinding sounds I have already mentioned, but very much
louder than any that I had hitherto heard. Deep, angry thuds followed,
and crunching sounds, while beneath all there arose a solemn murmur
like the "voice of many waters." I felt the ice heave under my feet,
and sway in long, slow undulations, and one thought, quick as
lightning, flashed horribly into my mind. Instinctively I leaped
forward toward my destination, while the ice rolled and heaved beneath
me, and the dread sounds grew louder at every step.

Scarcely had I gone a dozen paces when a piercing scream arrested me. I
stopped and looked back. For a few moments only had I turned away, yet
in that short interval a fearful change had taken place. The long ridge
of ice which had been heaped up in the mid-channel had increased to
thrice its former height, and the crunching and grinding of the vast
masses arose above the roaring of the storm. Far up the river there
came a deeper and fuller sound of the same kind, which, brought down by
the wind, burst with increasing terrors upon the ear. The ridge of ice
was in constant motion, being pressed and heaped up in ever-increasing
masses, and, as it heaped itself up, toppling over and falling with a
noise like thunder. There could be but one cause for all this, and the
fear which had already flashed through my brain was now confirmed to my
sight. The ice on which I stood was breaking up!

As all this burst upon my sight, I saw the sleigh. The horse had
stopped in front of the ridge of ice in the mid-channel, and was
rearing and plunging violently. The driver was lashing furiously and
trying to turn the animal, which, frenzied by terror, and maddened by
the stinging sleet, refused to obey, and would only rear and kick.
Suddenly the ice under the sleigh sank down, and a flood of water
rolled over it, followed by an avalanche of ice-blocks which had
tumbled from the ridge. With a wild snort of terror, the horse turned,
whirling round the sleigh, and with the speed of the wind dashed back
toward the shore. As the sleigh came near, I saw the driver upright and
trying to regain his command of the horse, and at that instant the
other passenger started erect. The cloak fell back. I saw a face pale,
overhung with dishevelled hair, and filled with an anguish of fear. But
the pallor and the fear could not conceal the exquisite loveliness of
that woman-face, which was thus so suddenly revealed in the midst of
the storm and in the presence of death; and which now, beautiful beyond
all that I had ever dreamed of, arose before my astonished eyes. It was
from her that the cry had come but a few moments before. As she passed
she saw me, and another cry escaped her. In another moment she was far
ahead.

And now I forgot all about the dangers around me, and the lessening
chances of an interview with McGoggin. I hurried on, less to secure my
own safety than to assist the lady. And thus as I rushed onward I
became aware of a new danger which arose darkly between me and the
shore. It was a long, black channel, gradually opening itself up, and
showing in its gloomy surface a dividing line between me and life. To
go back seemed now impossible--to go forward was to meet these black
waters.

Toward this gulf the frightened horse ran at headlong speed. Soon he
reached the margin of the ice. The water was before him and headed him
off. Terrified again at this, he swerved aside, and bounded up the
river. The driver pulled frantically at the reins. The lady, who had
fallen back again in her seat, was motionless. On went the horse, and,
at every successive leap in his mad career, the sleigh swung wildly
first to one side and then to the other. At last there occurred a curve
in the line of ice, and reaching this the horse turned once more to
avoid it. In doing so, the sleigh was swung toward the water. The
shafts broke. The harness was torn asunder. The off-runner of the
sleigh slid from the ice--it tilted over; the driver jerked at the
reins and made a wild leap. In vain. His feet were entangled in the fur
robes which dragged him back. A shriek, louder, wilder, and far more
fearful than before, rang out through the storm; and the next instant
down went the sleigh, with its occupants into the water, the driver
falling out, while the horse, though free from the sleigh, was yet
jerked aside by the reins, and before he could recover himself fell
with the rest into the icy stream.

All this seemed to have taken place in an instant. I hurried on, with
all my thoughts on this lady who was thus doomed to so sudden and so
terrible a fate. I could see the sleigh floating for a time, and the
head of the horse, that was swimming. I sprang to a place which seemed
to give a chance of assisting them, and looked eagerly to see what had
become of the lady. The sleigh drifted steadily along, one of that
box-shaped kind called _pungs_, which are sometimes made so tight that
they can resist the action of water, and float either in crossing a
swollen stream, or in case of breaking through the ice. Such boat-like
sleighs are not uncommon; and this one was quite buoyant. I nothing of
the driver. He had probably sunk at once, or had been drawn under the
ice. The horse, entangled in the shafts, had regained the ice, and had
raised one foreleg to its surface, with which he was making furious
struggles to emerge from the water, while snorts of terror escaped him.
But where was the lady? I hurried farther up, and, as I approached, I
could see something crouched in a heap at the bottom of the floating
sleigh. Was it she--or was it only the heap of buffalo-robes? I could
not tell.

The sleigh drifted on, and soon. I came near enough to see that the
bundle had life. I came close to where it floated. It was not more that
six yards off, and was drifting steadily nearer, I walked on by the
edge of the ice, and shouted. There was no answer. At length I saw a
white hand clutching the side of the sleigh. A thrill of exultant hope
passed through me. I shouted again and again, but my voice was lost in
the roar of the crashing ice and the howling gale. Yet, though my voice
had not been heard, I was free from suspense, for I saw that the lady
thus far was safe, and I could wait a little longer for the chance of
affording her assistance. I walked on, then, in silence, watching the
sleigh which continued to float. We travelled thus a long distance--I,
and the woman who had thus been so strangely wrecked in so strange a
bark. Looking back, I could no longer see any signs of the horse. All
this time the sleigh was gradually drifted nearer the edge of the ice
on which I walked, until at last it came so near that I reached out my
stick, and, catching it with the crooked handle, drew it toward me. The
shock, as the sleigh struck against the ice, roused its occupant. She
started up, stood upright, stared for a moment at me, and then, at the
scene around. Then she sprang out, and, clasping her hands, fell upon
her knees, and seemed to mutter words of prayer. Then she rose to her
feet, and looked around with a face of horror. There was such an
anguish of fear in her face, that I tried to comfort her. But my
efforts were useless.

"Oh! there a no hope! The river is breaking up!" she moaned. "They told
me it would. How mad I was to try to cross!"

Finding that I could do nothing to quell her fears, I began to think
what was best to be done. First of all, I determined to secure the
sleigh. It might be the means of saving us, or, if not, it would at any
rate do for a place of rest. It was better than the wet ice for the
lady. So I proceeded to pull it on the ice. The lady tried to help me,
and, after a desperate effort, the heavy pung was dragged from the
water upon the frozen surface. I then made her sit in it, and wrapped
the furs around her as well as I could.

She submitted without a word. Her white face was turned toward mine;
and once or twice she threw upon me, from her dark, expressive eyes, a
look of speechless gratitude. I tried to promise safety, and encouraged
her as well as I could, and she seemed to make an effort to regain her
self-control.

In spite of my efforts at consolation, her despair affected me. I
looked all around to see what the chances of escape might be. As I took
that survey, I perceived that those chances were indeed small. The
first thing that struck me was, that Cape Diamond was far behind the
point where I at present stood. While the sleigh had drifted, and I had
walked beside it, our progress had been down the river; and since then
the ice, which itself had all this time been drifting, had borne us on
without ceasing. We were still drifting at the very moment that I
looked around. We had also moved farther away from the shore which I
wished to reach, and nearer to the Quebec side. When the sleigh had
first gone over, there had not been more than twenty yards between the
ice and the shore; but now that shore was full two hundred yards away.
All this tune the fury of the wind, and the torment of the blinding,
stinging sleet, had not in the least abated; the grinding and roaring
of the ice had increased; the long ridge had heaped itself up to a
greater height, and opposite us it towered up in formidable masses.

I thought at one time of intrusting myself with my companion to the
sleigh, in the hope of using it as a boat to gain the shore. But I
could not believe that it would float with both of us, and, if it
would, there were no means of moving or guiding it. Better to remain on
the ice than to attempt that. Such a refuge would only do as a last
resort. After giving up this idea, I watched to see if there was any
chance of drifting back to the shore, but soon saw that there was
none. Every moment drew us farther off. Then I thought of a score of
desperate undertakings, but all of them were given up almost as soon as
they suggested themselves.

All this time the lady had sat in silence--deathly pale, looking around
with that same anguish of fear which I had noticed from the first, like
one who awaits an inevitable doom. The storm beat about her pitilessly;
occasional shudders passed through her; and the dread scene around
affected me far less than those eyes of agony, that pallid face, and
those tremulous white lips that seemed to murmur prayers. She saw, as
well as I, the widening sheet of water between us and the shore on the
one side, and on the other the ever-increasing masses of crumbling ice.

At last I suddenly offered to go to Quebec, and bring back help for
her. So wild a proposal was in the highest degree impracticable; but I
thought that it might lead her to suggest something. As soon as she
heard it, she evinced fresh terror.

"Oh, sir!" she moaned, "if you have a human heart, do not leave me! For
God's sake, stay a little longer."

"Leave you!" I cried; "never while I have breath. I will stay with you
to the last."

But this, instead of reassuring her, merely had the effect of changing
her feelings. She grew calmer.

"No," said she, "you must not. I was mad with fear. No--go. You at
least can save yourself. Go--fly--leave me!"

"Never!" I repeated. "I only made that proposal--not thinking to save
you, but merely supposing that you would feel better at the simple
suggestion of something."

"I implore you," she reiterated. "Go--there is yet time. You only risk
your life by delay. Don't waste your time on me."

"I could not go if I would," I said, "and I swear I would not go if I
could," I cried, impetuously. "I hope you do not take me for any thing
else than a gentleman."

"Oh, sir, pardon me. Can you think that?--But you have already risked
your life once by waiting to save mine--and, oh, do not risk it by
waiting again."

"Madame," said I, "you must not only not say such a thing, but you must
not even think it. I am here with you, and, being a gentleman, I am
here by your side either for life or death. But come--rouse yourself.
Don't give up. I'll save you, or die with you. At the same time, let me
assure you that I haven't the remotest idea of dying."

She threw at me, from her eloquent eyes, a look of unutterable
gratitude, and said not a word.

I looked at my watch. It was three o'clock. There was no time to lose.
The day was passing swiftly, and at this rate evening would come on
before one might be aware. The thought of standing idle any longer,
while the precious hours were passing, was intolerable. Once more I
made a hasty survey, and now, pressed and stimulated by the dire
exigencies of the hour, I determined to make an effort toward the
Quebec side. On that side, it seemed as though the ice which drifted
from the other shore was being packed in an unbroken mass. If so, a way
over it might be found to a resolute spirit.

I hastily told my companion my plan. She listened with a faint smile.

"I will do all that I can," said she, and I saw with delight that the
mere prospect of doing something had aroused her.

My first act was to push the sleigh with its occupant toward the
ice-ridge in the centre of the river. The lady strongly objected, and
insisted on getting out and helping me. This I positively forbade. I
assured her that my strength was quite sufficient for the undertaking,
but that hers was not; and if she would save herself, and me, too, she
must husband all her resources and obey implicitly. She submitted under
protest, and, as I pushed her along, she murmured the most touching
expressions of sympathy and of gratitude. But pushing a sleigh over the
smooth ice is no very difficult work, and the load that it contained
did not increase the labor in my estimation. Thus we soon approached
that long ice-ridge which I have so frequently mentioned. Here I
stopped, and began to seek a place which might afford a chance for
crossing to the ice-field on the opposite side.

The huge ice-blocks gathered here, where the fields on either side were
forced against one another, grinding and breaking up. Each piece was
forced up, and, as the grinding process continued, the heap rose
higher. At times, the loftiest parts of the ridge toppled over with a
tremendous crash, while many other piles seemed about to do the same.
To attempt to pass that ridge would be to encounter the greatest peril.
In the first place, it would be to invite an avalanche; and then,
again, wherever the piles fell, the force of that fall broke the
field-ice below, and the water rushed up, making a passage through it
quite as hazardous as the former. For a long time I examined without
seeing any place which was at all practicable. There was no time,
however, to be discouraged; an effort had to be made, and that without
delay; so I determined to try for myself, and test one or more places.
One place appeared less dangerous than others--a place where a pile of
uncommon size had recently fallen. The blocks were of unusual size, and
were raised up but a little above the level of the ice on which I
stood. These blocks, though swaying slowly up and down, seemed yet to
be strong enough for my purpose. I sprang toward the place, and found
it practicable. Then I returned to the lady. She was eager to go. Here
we had to give up the sleigh, since to transport that also was not to
be thought of.

"Now," said I, "is the time for you to exert all your strength."

"I am ready," said she.

"Hurry, then."

At that moment there burst a thunder-shock. A huge pile farther down
had fallen, and bore down the surface-ice. The water rushed boiling and
seething upward, and spread far over. There was not a moment to lose.
It was now or never; so, snatching her hand, I rushed forward. The
water was up to my knees, and sweeping past and whirling back with a
furious impetuosity. Through that flood I dragged her, and she followed
bravely and quickly. I pulled her up to the first block, then onward to
another. Leaping over a third, I had to relinquish her hand for a
moment, and then, extending mine once more, I caught hers, and she
sprang after me. All these blocks were firm, and our weight did not
move their massive forms. One huge piece formed the last stage in our
hazardous path. It overlapped the ice on the opposite side. I sprang
down, and the next instant the lady was by my side. Thank Heaven! we
were over.

Onward then we hurried for our lives, seeking to get as far as possible
from that dangerous channel of ice-avalanches and seething waters; and
it was not till a safe distance intervened, that I dared to slacken my
pace so as to allow my companion to take breath. All this time she had
not spoken a word, and had shown a calmness and an energy which
contrasted strongly with her previous lethargy and terror.

I saw that the ice in this place was rougher than it had been on the
other side. Lumps were upheaved in many places. This was a good sign,
for it indicated a close packing in this direction, and less danger of
open water, which was the only thing now to be feared. The hope of
reaching the shore was now strong within me. That shore, I could
perceive, must be some distance below Quebec; but how far I could not
tell. I could see the dark outline of the land, but Quebec was now no
longer perceptible through the thick storm of sleet.

For a long time, my companion held out nobly, and sustained the rapid
progress which I was trying to keep up; but, at length, she began to
show evident signs of exhaustion. I saw this with pain, for I was
fearful every moment of some new circumstance which might call for
fresh exertion from both of us. I would have given any thing to have
had the sleigh--which we were forced to relinquish. I feared that her
strength would fail at the trying moment. The distance before us was
yet so great that we seemed to have traversed but little. I insisted on
her taking my arm and leaning on me for support, and tried to cheer her
by making her look back and see how far we had gone. She tried to
smile; but the smile was a failure. In her weakness, she began to feel
more sensibly the storm from which she had been sheltered to some
extent before she left the sleigh. She cowered under the fierce pelt of
the pitiless sleet, and clung to me, trembling and shivering with cold.

On and on we walked. The distance seemed interminable. The lady kept up
well, considering her increasing exhaustion, saying nothing whatever;
but her quick, short breathing was audible, as she panted with fatigue.
I felt every shudder that ran through her delicate frame. And yet I did
not dare to stop and give her rest; for, aside from the imminent danger
of losing our hope of reaching land, a delay, even to take breath,
would only expose her the more surely to the effect of the cold. At
last, I stopped for a moment, and drew off my overcoat. This, in spite
of her protestations, I forced her to put on. She threatened, at one
time, to sit down on the ice and die, rather than do it.

"Very well, madame," said I. "Then, out of a punctilio, you will
destroy, not only yourself, but me. Do I deserve this?"

At this, tears started to her eyes. She submitted.

"Oh, sir," she murmured, "what can I say? It's for your sake that I
refuse. I will submit. God bless you--who sent you to my help! God
forever bless you!"

I said nothing.

On and on!

Then her steps grew feebler--then her weight rested on me more heavily.

On and on!

She staggered, and low moans succeeded to her heavy panting. At last,
with a cry of despair, she fell forward.

I caught her in my arms, and held her up.

"Leave me!" she said, in a faint voice. "I cannot walk any farther."

"No; I will wait for a while."

"Oh, leave me! Save yourself! Or go ashore, and bring help!"

"No; I will go ashore with you, or not at all."

She sighed, and clung to me.

After a time, she revived a little, and insisted on going onward. This
time she walked for some distance. She did this with a stolid, heavy
step, and mechanically, like an automaton moved by machinery. Then she
stopped again.

"I am dizzy," said she, faintly.

I made her sit down on the ice, and put myself between her and the
wind. That rest did much for her. But I was afraid to let her sit more
than five minutes. Her feet were saturated, and, in spite of my
overcoat, she was still shivering.

"Come," said I; "if we stay any longer, you will die."

She staggered up. She clung to me, and I dragged her on. Then, again,
she stopped.

I now tried a last resort, and gave her some brandy from my flask. I
had thought of it often, but did not wish to give this until other
things were exhausted; for, though the stimulus is an immediate remedy
for weakness, yet on the ice and in the snow the reaction is dangerous
to the last degree. The draught revived her wonderfully.

Starting once more, with new life, she was able to traverse a very
great distance; and at length, to my delight, the shore began to appear
very near. But now the reaction from the stimulant appeared. She sank
down without a word; and another draught, and yet another, was needed
to infuse some false strength into her. At length, the shore seemed
close by us. Here she gave out utterly.

"I can go no farther," she moaned, as she fell straight down heavily
and suddenly on the ice.

"Only one more effort," I said, imploringly. "Take some more brandy."

"It is of no use. Leave me! Get help!"

"See--the shore is near. It is not more than a few rods away."

"I cannot."

I supported her in my arms, for she was leaning on her hand, and slowly
sinking downward. Once more I pressed the brandy upon her lips, as her
head lay on my shoulder. Her eyes were closed. Down on her marble face
the wild storm beat savagely; her lips were bloodless, and her teeth
were fixed convulsively. It was only by an effort that I could force
the brandy into her mouth. Once more, and for the last time, the fiery
liquid gave her a momentary strength. She roused herself from the
stupor into which she was sinking, and, springing to her feet with a
wild, spasmodic effort, she ran with outstretched hands toward the
shore. For about twenty or thirty paces she ran, and, before I could
overtake her, she fell once more.

I raised her up, and again supported her. She could move no farther. I
sat by her side for a little while, and looked toward the shore. It was
close by us now; but, as I looked, I saw a sight which made any further
delay impossible.

Directly in front, and only a few feet away, was a dark chasm lying
between us and that shore for which we had been striving so earnestly.
It was a fathom wide; and there flowed the dark waters of the river,
gloomily, warningly, menacingly! To me, that chasm was nothing; but how
could she cross it? Besides, there was no doubt that it was widening
every moment.

I started up.

"Wait here for a moment," said I, hurriedly.

I left her half reclining on the ice, and ran hastily up and down the
chasm. I could see that my fears were true. The whole body of ice was
beginning to break away, and drift from this shore also, as it had done
from the other. I saw a place not more than five feet wide. Back I
rushed to my companion. I seized her, and, lifting her in my arms,
without a word, I carried her to that place where the channel was
narrowest; and then, without stopping to consider, but impelled by the
one fierce desire for safety, I leaped forward, and my feet touched the
opposite side.

With a horrible crash, the ice broke beneath me, and I went down. That
sound, and the awful sensation of sinking, I shall never forget. But
the cake of ice which had given way beneath my feet, though it went
down under me, still prevented my sinking rapidly. I flung myself
forward, and held up my almost senseless burden as I best could with
one arm, while with the other I dug my sharp-pointed stick into the ice
and held on for a moment. Then, summoning up my strength, I passed my
left arm under my companion, and raised her out of the water upon the
ice. My feet seemed sucked by the water underneath the shelf of ice
against which I rested; but the iron-pointed stick never slipped, and I
succeeded. Then, with a spring, I raised myself up from the water, and
clambered out.

My companion had struggled up to her knees, and grasped me feebly, as
though to assist me. Then she started to her feet The horror of sudden
death had done this, and had given her a convulsive energy of recoil
from a hideous fate. Thus she sprang forward, and ran for some
distance. I hastened after her, and, seizing her arm, drew it in mine.
But at that moment her short-lived strength failed her, and she sank
once more. I looked all around--the shore was only a few yards off. A
short distance away was a high, cone-shaped mass of ice, whose white
sheen was distinct amid the gloom. I recognized it at once.

"Courage, courage!" I cried. "We are at Montmorency. There is a house
not far away. Only one more effort."

She raised her head feebly.

"Do you see it? Montmorency! the ice-cone of the Falls!" I cried,
eagerly.

Her head sank back again.

"Look! look! We are saved! we are near houses!"

The only answer was a moan. She sank down lower. I grasped her so as to
sustain her, and she lay senseless in my arms.

There was now no more hope of any further exertion from her. Strength
and sense had deserted her. There was only one thing to be done.

I took her in my arms, and carried her toward the shore. How I
clambered up that steep bank, I do not remember. At any rate, I
succeeded in reaching the top, and sank exhausted there, holding my
burden under the dark, sighing evergreens.

Rising once mere. I raised her up, and made my way to a house. The
inmates were kind, and full of sympathy. I committed the lady to their
care, and fell exhausted on a settee in front of the huge fireplace.




CHAPTER VIII.


I FLY BACK, AND SEND THE DOCTOR TO THE RESCUE.--RETURN TO THE SPOT.
--FLIGHT OF THE BIRD.--PERPLEXITY, ASTONISHMENT, WONDER, AND DESPAIR.
--"PAS UN MOT, MONSIEUR!"


A long time passed, and I waited in great anxiety. Meanwhile, I had
changed my clothes, and sat by the fire robed in the picturesque
costume of a French _habitant_, while my own saturated garments were
drying elsewhere. I tried to find out if there was a doctor anywhere in
the neighborhood, but learned that there was cone nearer than Quebec.
The people were such dolts, that I determined to set out myself for the
city, and either send a doctor or fetch one. After immense trouble, I
succeeded in getting a horse; and, just before starting, I was
encouraged by hearing that the lady had recovered from her swoon, and
was much better, though somewhat feverish.

It was a wild journey.

The storm was still raging; the road was abominable, and was all one
glare of frozen sleet, which had covered it with a slippery surface,
except where there rose disintegrated ice-hummocks and heaps of
slush--the _debris_ of giant drifts. Moreover, it was as dark as Egypt.
My progress, therefore, was slow. A boy went with me as far as the main
road, and, after seeing me under way, he left me to my own devices. The
horse was very aged, and, I fear, a little rheumatic. Besides, I have
reason to believe that he was blind. That did not make any particular
difference, though; for the darkness was so intense, that eyes were as
useless as they would be to the eyeless fishes of the Mammoth Cave. I
don't intend to prolong my description of this midnight ride. Suffice
it to say that the horse walked all the way, and, although it was
midnight when I started, it was near morning when I reached my
quarters.

I hurried at once to the doctor, and, to his intense disgust, roused
him and implored his services. I made it a personal matter, and put it
in such an affecting light, that he consented to go; but he assured me
that it was the greatest sacrifice to friendship that he had ever made
in his life. I gave him the most explicit directions, and did not leave
him till I saw him on horseback, and trotting, half asleep, down the
street.

Then I went to my room, completely used up after such unparalleled
exertions. I got a roaring fire made, established myself on my sofa
immediately in front of it, and sought to restore my exhausted frame by
hot potations. My intention was to rest for a while, till I felt
thoroughly warmed, and then start for Montmorency to see about the
lady. With this in my mind, and a pipe in my mouth, and a tumbler of
toddy at my elbow, I reclined on my deep, soft, old-fashioned, and
luxurious sofa; and, thus situated, I fell off before I knew it into an
exceedingly profound sleep.

When I awoke, it was broad day. I started up, looked at my watch, and,
to my horror, found that it was half-past twelve. In a short time, I
had flung off my _habitant_ clothes, dressed myself, got my own horse,
and galloped off as fast as possible.

I was deeply vexed at myself for sleeping so long; but I found comfort
in the thought that the doctor had gone on before. The storm had gone
down, and the sky was clear. The sun was shining brightly. The roads
were abominable, but not so bad as they had been, and my progress was
rapid. So I went on at a rattling pace, not sparing my horse, and
occupying my mind with thoughts of the lady whom I had saved, when
suddenly, about three miles from Quebec, I saw a familiar figure
advancing toward me.

It was the doctor!

He moved along slowly, and, as I drew nearer, I saw that he looked very
much worn out, very peevish, and very discontented.

"Well, old man," said I, "how did you find her?"

"Find her?" growled the doctor--"I didn't find her at all. If this is a
hoax," he continued, "all I can say, Macrorie, is this, that it's a
devilish stupid one."

"A hoax? What--didn't find her?" I gasped.

"Find her? Of course not. There's no such a person. Why, I could not
even find the house."

"What--do you mean? I--I don't understand--" I faltered.

"Why," said the doctor, who saw my deep distress and disappointment, "I
mean simply this: I've been riding about this infernal country all day,
been to Montmorency, called at fifty houses, and couldn't find anybody
that knew any thing at all about any lady whatever."

At this, my consternation was so great that I couldn't say one single
word. This news almost took my breath away. The doctor looked sternly
at me for some time, and then was about to more on.

This roused me.

"What!" I cried; "you're not thinking of going back?"

"Back? Of course, I am. That's the very thing I'm going to do."

"For God's sake, doctor," I cried, earnestly, "don't go just yet! I
tell you, the lady is there, and her condition is a most perilous one.
I told you before how I saved her, I left there at midnight, last
night, in spite of my fatigue, and travelled all night to get you. I
promised her that you would be there early this morning. It's now
nearly two in the afternoon. Good Heavens! doctor, you won't leave a
fellow in such a fix?"

"Macrorie," said the doctor, "I'm half dead with fatigue. I did it for
your sake, and I wouldn't have done it for another soul--no, not even
for Jack Randolph. So be considerate, my boy."

"Doctor," I cried, earnestly, "it's a case of life and death!"

A long altercation now followed; but the end of it was that the doctor
yielded, and, in spite of his fatigue, turned back, grumbling and
growling.

So we rode back together--the doctor, groaning and making peevish
remarks; I, oblivious of all this, and careless of my friend's
discomfort. My mind was full of visions of the lady--the fair unknown.
I was exceeding anxious and troubled at the thought that all this time
she had been alone, without any medical assistance. I pictured her to
myself as sinking rapidly into fever and delirium. Stimulated by all
these thoughts, I hurried on, while the doctor with difficulty
followed. At length, we arrived within half a mile of the Falls; but I
could not see any signs of the house which I wished to find, or of the
road that led to it. I looked into all the roads that led to the river;
but none seemed like that one which I had traversed.

The doctor grew every moment more vexed.

"Look here now, Macrorie," said he, at last--"I'll go no farther--no,
not a step. I'm used up. I'll go into the nearest house, and wait."

Saying this, he turned abruptly, and went to a house that was close by
I then dismounted, went to the upper bank of the Montmorency, where it
joins the St. Lawrence below the Falls, and looked down.

The ice was all out. The place which yesterday had been the scene of my
struggle for life was now one vast sheet of dark-blue water. As I
looked at it, an involuntary shudder passed through me; for now I saw
the full peril of my situation.

Looking along the river, I saw the place where I must have landed, and
on the top of the steep bank I saw a house which seemed to be the one
where I had found refuge. Upon this, I went back, and, getting the
doctor, we went across the fields to this house. I knocked eagerly at
the door. It was opened, and in the person of the _habitant_ before me
I recognized my host of the evening before.

"How is madame?" I asked, hurriedly and anxiously.

"Madame?"

"Tea, madame--the lady, you know."

"Madame? She is not here."

"Not here!" I cried.

"Non, monsieur."

"Not here? What! Not here?" I cried again. "But she must be here.
Didn't I bring her here last night?"

"Certainly, monsieur; but she's gone home."

At this, there burst from the doctor a peal of laughter--so loud, so
long, so savage, and so brutal, that I forgot in a moment all that he
had been doing for my sake, and felt an almost irresistible inclination
to punch his head. Only I didn't; and, perhaps, it was just as well.
The sudden inclination passed, and there remained nothing but an
overwhelming sense of disappointment, by which I was crushed for a few
minutes, while still the doctor's mocking laughter sounded in my ears.

"How was it?" I asked, at length--"how did she get off? When I left,
she was in a fever, and wanted a doctor."

"After you left, monsieur, she slept, and awoke, toward morning, very
much better. She dressed, and then wanted us to get a conveyance to
take her to Quebec. We told her that you had gone for a doctor, and
that she had better wait. But this, she said, was impossible. She
would not think of it. She had to go to Quebec as soon as possible, and
entreated us to find some conveyance. So we found a wagon at a
neighbor's, threw some straw in it and some skins over it, and she went
away."

"She went!" I repeated, in an imbecile way.

"Oui, monsieur."

"And didn't she leave any word?"

"Monsieur?"

"Didn't she leave any message for--for me?"

"Non, monsieur."

"Not a word?" I asked, mournfully and despairingly.

The reply of the _habitant_ was a crushing one:

"_Pas un mot_, _monsieur_!"

The doctor burst into a shriek of sardonic laughter.




CHAPTER IX.


BY ONE'S OWN FIRESIDE.--THE COMFORTS OF A BACHELOR.--CHEWING THE CUD
OF SWEET AND BITTER FANCY.--A DISCOVERY FULL OF MORTIFICATION AND
EMBARRASSMENT.--JACK RANDOLPH AGAIN.--NEWS FROM THE SEAT OF WAR.


By six o'clock in the evening I was back in my room again. The doctor
had chaffed me so villanously all the way back that my disappointment
and mortification had vanished, and had given place to a feeling of
resentment. I felt that I had been ill-treated. After saving a girl's
life, to be dropped so quietly and so completely, was more than flesh
and blood could stand. And then there was that confounded doctor. He
fairly revelled in my situation, and forgot all about his fatigue.
However, before I left him, I extorted from him a promise to say
nothing about it, swearing if he didn't I'd sell out and quit the
service. This promise he gave, with the remark that he would reserve
the subject for his own special use.

Once within my own room, I made myself comfortable in my own quiet way,
viz.:


1. A roaring, red-hot fire.
2. Curtains close drawn.
3. Sofa pulled up beside said fire.
4. Table beside sofa.
5. Hot water.
6. Whiskey.
7. Tobacco.
8. Pipes.
9. Fragrant aromatic steam.
10. Sugar.
11. Tumblers.
12. Various other things not necessary to mention, all of which
contributed to throw over my perturbed spirit a certain divine calm.

Under such circumstances, while every moment brought forward some new
sense of rest and tranquillity, my mind wandered back in a kind of lazy
reverie over the events of the past two days.

Once more I wandered over the crumbling ice; once more I floundered
through the deep pools of water; once more I halted in front of that
perilous ice-ridge, with my back to the driving storm and my eyes
searching anxiously for a way of progress. The frowning cliff, with its
flag floating out stiff in the tempest, the dim shore opposite, the
dark horizon, the low moan of the river as it struggled against its icy
burden, all these came back again. Then, through all this, I rushed
forward, scrambling over the ice-ridge, reaching the opposite plain to
hurry forward to the shore. Then came the rushing sleigh, the recoiling
horse, the swift retreat, the mad race along the brink of the icy edge,
the terrible plunge into the deep, dark water. Then came the wild,
half-human shriek of the drowning horse, and the sleigh with its
despairing freight drifting down toward me. Through all this there
broke forth amid the clouds of that reverie, the vision of that pale,
agonized face, with its white lips and imploring eyes--the face of her
whom I had saved.

So I had saved her, had I? Yes, there was no doubt of that. Never
would I lose the memory of that unparalleled journey to Montmorency
Fall, as I toiled on, dragging with me that frail, fainting, despairing
companion. I had sustained her; I had cheered her; I had stimulated
her; and, finally, at that supreme moment, when, she fell down in sight
of the goal, I had put forth the last vestige of my own strength in
bearing her to a place of safety.

And so she had left me.

Left me--without a word--without a hint--without the remotest sign of
any thing like recognition, not to speak of gratitude!

_Pas un mot_!

Should I ever see her again?

This question, which was very natural under the circumstances, caused
me to make an effort to recall the features of my late companion.
Strange to say, my effort was not particularly successful. A white,
agonized face was all that I remembered, and afterward a white,
senseless face, belonging to a prostrate figure, which I was trying to
raise. This was all. What that face might look like in repose, I found
it impossible to conjecture.

And now here was a ridiculous and mortifying fact. I found myself
haunted by this white face and these despairing eyes, yet for the life
of me I could not reduce that face to a natural expression so as to
learn what it might look like in common life. Should I know her again
if I met her? I could not say. Would she know me? I could not answer
that. Should I ever be able to find her? How could I tell?

Baffled and utterly at a loss what to do toward getting the identity of
the subject of my thoughts, I wandered off into various moods. First I
became cynical, but, as I was altogether too comfortable to be morose,
my cynicism was of a good-natured character. Then I made merry over my
own mishaps and misadventures. Then I reflected, in a lofty,
philosophic frame of mind, upon the faithlessness of woman, and,
passing from this into metaphysics, I soon boozed off into a gentle, a
peaceful, and a very consoling doze. When I awoke, it was morning, and
I concluded to go to bed.

On the morrow, at no matter what o'clock, I had just finished
breakfast, when I heard a well-known footstep, and Jack Randolph burst
in upon me in his usual style.

"Well, old chap," he cried, "where the mischief have you been for the
last two days, and what have you been doing with yourself? I heard that
you got back from Point Levi--though how the deuce you did it I can't
imagine--and that you'd gone off on horseback nobody knew where. I've
been here fifty times since I saw you last. Tell you what, Macrorie, it
wasn't fair to me to give me the slip this way, when you knew my
delicate position, and all that. I can't spare you for a single day. I
need your advice. Look here, old fellow, I've got a letter."

And saying this, Jack drew a letter from his pocket, with a grave face,
and opened it.

So taken up was Jack with his own affairs, that he did not think of
inquiring into the reasons of my prolonged absence. For my part, I
listened to him in a dreamy way, and, when he drew out the letter, it
was only with a strong effort that I was able to conjecture what it
might be. So much had passed since I had seen him, that our last
conversation had become very dim and indistinct in my memory.

"Oh," said I, at last, as I began to recall the past, "the letter--
h'm--ah--the--the widow. Oh, yes, I understand."

Jack looked at me in surprise.

"The widow?" said he. "Pooh, man! what are you talking about? Are you
crazy? This is from _her_--from Miss--that is--from the other one,
you know."

"Oh, yes," said I, confusedly. "True--I remember. Oh, yes--Miss
Phillips."

"Miss Phillips!" cried Jack. "Hang it, man, what's the matter with you
to-day? Haven't I told you all about it? Didn't I tell you what I
wouldn't breathe to another soul--that is, excepting two or three?--and
now, when I come to you at the crisis of my fate, you forget all about
it."

"Nonsense!" said I, "The fact is, I went to bed very late, and am
scarcely awake yet. Go on, old boy, I'm all right. Well, what does she
say?"

"I'll be hanged if you know what you're talking about," said Jack,
pettishly.

"Nonsense! I'm all right now; go on."

"You don't know who this letter is from."

"Yes, I do."

"Who is it?" said Jack, watching me with jealous scrutiny.

"Why," said I, "it's that other one--the--hang it! I don't know her
name, so I'll call her Number Three, or Number Four, whichever you
like."

"You're a cool hand, any way," said Jack, sulkily. "Is this the way you
take a matter of life and death?"

"Life and death?" I repeated.

"Life and death!" said Jack. "Yes, life and death. Why, see here,
Macrorie, I'll be hanged if I don't believe that you've forgotten every
word I told you about my scrape. If that's the case, all I can say is,
that I'm not the man to force my confidences where they are so very
unimportant." And Jack made a move toward the door.

"Stop, Jack," said I. "The fact is, I've been queer for a couple of
days. I had a beastly time on the river. Talk about life and death!
Why, man, it was the narrowest scratch with me you ever saw. I didn't
go to Point Levi at all."

"The deuce you didn't!"

"No; I pulled up at Montmorency."

"The deuce you did! How's that?"

"Oh, never mind; I'll tell you some other time. At any rate, if I seem
dazed or confused, don't notice it. I'm coming round. I'll only say
this, that I've lost a little of my memory, and am glad I didn't lose
my life. But go on. I'm up to it now, Jack. You wrote to Number Three,
proposing to elope, and were staking your existence on her answer. You
wished me to order a head-stone for you at Anderson's, Four feet by
eighteen inches, with nothing on it but the name and date, and not a
word about the virtues, et cetera. There, you see, my memory is all
right at last. And now, old boy, what does she say? When did you get it?"

"I got it this morning," said Jack. "It was a long delay. She is always
prompt. Something must have happened to delay her. I was getting quite
wild, and would have put an end to myself if it hadn't been for Louie.
And then, you know, the widow's getting to be a bit of a bore. Look
here--what do you think of my selling out, buying a farm in Minnesota,
and taking little Louie there?"

"What!" I cried. "Look here, Jack, whatever you do, don't, for Heaven's
sake, get poor little Louie entangled in your affairs."

"Oh, don't you fret," said Jack, dolefully. "No fear about her. She's
all right, so far.--But, see here, there's the letter."

And saying this, he tossed over to me the letter from "Number Three,"
and, filling a pipe, began smoking vigorously.

The letter was a singular one. It was highly romantic, and full of
devotion. The writer, however, declined to accept of Jack's
proposition. She pleaded her father; she couldn't leave him. She
implored Jack to wait, and finally subscribed herself his till death.
But the name which she signed was "Stella," and nothing more; and this
being evidently a pet name or a _nom de plume_, threw no light whatever
upon her real personality.

"Well," said Jack, after I had read it over about nine times, "what do
you think of that?"

"It gives you some reprieve, at any rate," said I.

"Reprieve?" said Jack. "I don't think it's the sort of letter that a
girl should write to a man who told her that he was going to blow his
brains out on her doorstep. It doesn't seem to be altogether the right
sort of thing under the circumstances."

"Why, confound it, man, isn't this the very letter that you wanted to
get? You didn't really want to run away with her? You said so
yourself."

"Oh, that's all right; but a fellow likes to be appreciated."

"So, after all, you wanted her to elope with you?"

"Well, not that, exactly. At the same time, I didn't want a point-blank
refusal."

"You ought to be glad she showed so much sense. It's all the better for
you. It is an additional help to you in your difficulties."

"I don't see how it helps me," said Jack, in a kind of growl. "I don't
see why she refused to run off with a fellow."

Now such was the perversity of Jack that he actually felt ill-natured
about this letter, although it was the very thing that he knew was best
for him. He was certainly relieved from one of his many difficulties,
but at the same time he was vexed and mortified at this rejection of
his proposal. And he dwelt upon his disappointment until at length he
brought himself to believe that "Number Three's" letter was something
like a personal slight, if not an insult.

He dropped in again toward evening.

"Macrorie," said he, "there's one place where I always find sympathy.
What do you say, old fellow, to going this evening to--




CHAPTER X.


"BERTON'S?--BEST PLACE IN THE TOWN.--GIRLS ALWAYS GLAD TO SEE A
FELLOW.--PLENTY OF CHAT, AND LOTS OF FUN.--NO END OF LARKS, YOU KNOW,
AND ALL THAT SORT OF THING."


In order to get rid of my vexation, mortification, humiliation, and
general aggravation, I allowed Jack to persuade me to go that evening
to Colonel Berton's. Not that it needed much persuasion. On the
contrary, it was a favorite resort of mine. Both of us were greatly
addicted to dropping in upon that hospitable and fascinating household.
The girls were among the most lively and genial good fellows that girls
could ever be. Old Berton had retired from the army with enough fortune
of his own to live in good style, and his girls had it all their own
way. They were essentially of the military order. They had all been
brought up, so to speak, in the army, and their world did not extend
beyond it. There were three of them--Laura, the eldest, beautiful,
intelligent, and accomplished, with a strong leaning toward Ritualism;
Juna, innocent, childish, and kitten-like; and Louie, the universal
favorite, absurd, whimsical, fantastic, a desperate tease, and as
pretty and graceful as it is possible for any girl to be. An aunt did
the maternal for them, kept house, chaperoned, duennaed, and generally
overlooked them. The colonel himself was a fine specimen of the _vieux
militaire_. He loved to talk of the life which he had left behind, and
fight his battles over again, and all his thoughts were in the army.
But the girls were, of course, the one attraction in his hospitable
house. The best of it was, they were all so accustomed to homage, that
even the most desperate attentions left them heart-whole, in maiden
mediation, fancy free. No danger of overflown sentiment with them. No
danger of blighted affections or broken hearts. No nonsense there, my
boy. All fair, and pleasant, and open, and above-board, you know.
Clear, honest eyes, that looked frankly into yours; fresh, youthful
faces; lithe, elastic figures; merry laughs; sweet smiles; soft,
kindly voices, and all that sort of thing. In short, three as kind,
gentle, honest, sound, pure, and healthy hearts as ever beat.

The very atmosphere of this delightful house was soothing, and the
presence of these congenial spirits brought a balm to each of us, which
healed our wounded hearts. In five minutes Jack was far away out of
sight of all his troubles--and in five minutes more I had forgotten all
about my late adventure, and the sorrows that had resulted from it.

After a time, Jack gravitated toward Louie, leaving me with Laura,
talking mediaevalism. Louie was evidently taking Jack to task, and very
energetically too. Fragments of their conversation reached my ears from
time to time. She had heard something about Mrs. Finnimore, but what it
was, and whether she believed it or not, could not be perceived from
what she said. Jack fought her off skilfully, and, at last, she made an
attack from another quarter. "Oh, Captain Randolph," said she, "what a
delightful addition we're going to have to our Quebec society!"

"Ah!" said Jack, "what is that?"

"How very innocent! Just as if you are not the one who is most
concerned."

"I?"

"Of course. You. Next to me."

"I don't understand."

"Come, now, Captain Randolph, how very ridiculous to pretend to be so
ignorant!"

"Ignorant?" said Jack; "ignorant is not the word. I am in Egyptian
darkness, I assure you."

"Egyptian darkness--Egyptian nonsense! Will it help you any if I tell
you her name?"

"Her name! Whose name? What 'her'?"

Louie laughed long and merrily.

"Well," said she, at length, "for pure, perfect, utter, childlike
innocence, commend me to Captain Randolph! And now, sir," she resumed,
"will you answer me one question?"

"Certainly--or one hundred thousand."

"Well, what do you think of Miss Phillips?"

"I think she is a very delightful person," said Jack fluently--"the
most delightful I have ever met with, present company excepted."

"That is to be understood, of course; but what do you think of her
coming to live here?"

"Coming to live here!"

"Yes, coming to live here," repeated Louie, playfully imitating the
tone of evident consternation with which Jack spoke.

"What? Miss Phillips?"

"Yes, Miss Phillips."

"Here?"

"Certainly."

"Not here in Quebec?"

"Yes, here in Quebec--but I _must_ say that you have missed your
calling in life. Why do you not go to New York and make your fortune as
an actor? You must take part in our private theatricals the next time
we have any."

"I assure you," said Jack, "I never was so astonished in my life."

"How well you counterfeit!" said Louie; "never mind. Allow me to
congratulate you. We'll overlook the little piece of acting, and regard
rather the delightful fact. Joined once more--ne'er to part--hand to
hand--heart to heart--memories sweet--ne'er to fade--all my own--
fairest maid! And then your delicious remembrances of Sissiboo."

"Sissiboo?" gasped Jack.

"Sissiboo," repeated Louie, with admirable gravity. "_Her_ birth-place,
and hence a sacred spot. She used to be called 'the maid of Sissiboo'.
But, in choosing a place to live in, let me warn you against Sissiboo.
Take some other place. You've been all over New Brunswick and Nova
Scotia. Take Petitcodiac, or Washe Aemoak, or Shubenacadie, or
Memramcook, or Rechebucto, or Chiputnecticook, or the Kennebecasis
Valley. At the same time, I have my preferences for Piserinco, or Quaco."

At all this, Jack seemed for a time completely overwhelmed, and sat
listening to Louie with a sort of imbecile smile. Her allusion to Miss
Phillips evidently troubled him, and, as to her coming to Quebec, he
did not know what to say. Louie twitted him for some time longer, but
at length he got her away into a corner, where he began a conversation
in a low but very earnest tone, which, however, was sufficiently
audible to make his remarks understood by all in the room.

And what was he saying?

He was disclaiming all intentions with regard to Miss Phillips.

And Louie was listening quietly!

Perhaps believing him!!

The scamp!!!

And now I noticed that Jack's unhappy tendency to--well, to
_conciliate_ ladies--was in full swing.

Didn't I see him, then and there, slyly try to take poor little Louie's
hand, utterly forgetful of the disastrous result of a former attempt on
what he believed to be that same hand? Didn't I see Louie civilly draw
it away, and move her chair farther off from his? Didn't I see him
flush up and begin to utter apologies? Didn't I hear Louie begin to
talk of operas, and things in general; and soon after, didn't I see her
rise and come over to Laura, and Nina, and me, as we were playing
dummy? Methinks I did. Oh, Louie! Oh, Jack! Is she destined to be
Number Four! or, good Heavens! Number Forty? Why, the man's mad! He
engages himself to every girl he sees!

Home again.

Jack was full of Louie.

"Such fun! such life! Did you ever see any thing like her?"

"But the widow, Jack?"

"Hang the widow!"

"Miss Phillips?"

"Bother Miss Phillips!"

"And Number Three?"

Jack's face grew sombre, and he was silent for a time. At length a
sudden thought seized him.

"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "I got a letter to-day, which I haven't
opened. Excuse me a moment, old chap."

So saying, he pulled a letter from his pocket, opened it, and read it.

He told me the contents.

It was from Miss Phillips, and she told her dearest Jack that her
father was about moving to Quebec to live.




CHAPTER XI.


"MACRORIE, MY BOY, HAVE YOU BEEN TO ANDERSON'S YET?"--"NO."--"WELL,
THEN, I WANT YOU ATTEND TO THAT BUSINESS OF THE STONE TO-MORROW. DON'T
FORGET THE SIZE--FOUR FEET BY EIGHTEEN INCHES; AND NOTHING BUT THE NAME
AND DATE. THE TIME'S COME AT LAST. THERE'S NO PLACE FOR ME BUT THE COLD
GRAVE, WHERE THE PENSIVE PASSER-BY MAY DROP A TEAR OVER THE MOURNFUL
FATE OF JACK RANDOLPH. AMEN. R. I. P."


Such was the remarkable manner in which Jack Randolph accosted me, as
he entered my room on the following day at about midnight. His face was
more rueful than ever, and, what was more striking, his clothes and
hair seemed neglected. This convinced me more than any thing that he
had received some new blow, and that it had struck home.

"You seem hard hit, old man," said I. "Where is it? Who is it?"

Jack groaned.

"Has Miss Phillips come?"

"No."

"Is it the widow?"

"No."

"Number Three?"

Jack shook his head.

"Not duns?"

"No."

"Then I give up."

"It's Louie," said Jack, with an expression of face that was as near an
approximation to what is called sheepishness as any thing I ever saw.

"Louie?" I repeated.

"Yes--"

"What of her? What has she been doing? How is it possible? Good
Heavens! you haven't--" I stopped at the fearful suspicion that came to
me.

"Yes, I have!" said Jack, sulkily. "I know what you mean. I've proposed
to her."

I started up from the sofa on which I was lounging--my pipe dropped to
the ground--a tumbler followed. I struck my clinched fist on the table.

"Randolph!" said I, "this is too much. Confound it, man! Are you mad,
or are you a villain? What the devil do you mean by trifling with the
affections of that little girl? By Heavens! Jack Randolph, if you carry
on this game with her, there's not a man in the regiment that won't
join to crush you."

"Pitch in," said Jack quietly, looking at me at the same time with
something like approval. "That's the right sort of thing. That's just
what I've been saying to myself. I've been swearing like a trooper at
myself all the way here. If there's any one on earth that every fellow
ought to stand up for, it's little Louie. And now you see the reason
why I want you to attend to that little affair of the gravestone."

At Jack's quiet tone, my excitement subsided. I picked up my pipe
again, and thought it over.

"The fact is, Jack," said I, after about ten minutes of profound
smoking, "I think you'll have to carry out that little plan of yours.
Sell out as soon as you can, and take Louie with you to a farm in
Minnesota."

"Easier said than done," said Jack, sententiously.

"Done? why, man, it's easy enough. You can drop the other three, and
retire from the scene. That'll save Louie from coming to grief."

"Yes; but it won't make her come to Minnesota."

"Why not? She's just the girl to go anywhere with a fellow."

"But not with Jack Randolph."

"What humbug are you up to now? I don't understand you."

"So I see," said Jack, dryly. "You take it for granted that because I
proposed, Louie accepted. Whereas, that didn't happen to be the case. I
proposed, but Louie disposed of me pretty effectually."

"Mittened?" cried I.

"Mittened!" said Jack, solemnly. "Hence the gravestone."

"But how, in the name of wonder, did that happen?"

"Easily enough. Louie happens to have brains. That's the shortest way
to account for her refusal of my very valuable devotions. But I'll tell
you all about it, and, after that, we'll decide about the headstone.

"You see, I went up there this evening, and the other girls were off
somewhere, and so Louie and I were alone. The aunt was in the room, but
she soon dozed off. Well, we had great larks, no end of fun--she
chaffing and twitting me about no end of things, and especially the
widow; so, do you know, I told her I had a great mind to tell her how
it happened; and excited her curiosity by saying it all originated in a
mistake. This, of course, made her wild to know all about it, and so I
at last told her the whole thing--the mistake, you know, about the
hand, and all that--and my horror. Well, hang me, if I didn't think
she'd go into fits. I never saw her laugh so much before. As soon as
she could speak, she began to remind me of the approaching advent of
Miss Phillips, and asked me what I was going to do. She didn't appear
to be at all struck by the fact that lay at the bottom of my
disclosures; that it was her own hand that had caused the mischief, but
went on at a wild rate about my approaching 'sentimental seesaw,' as
she called it, when my whole time would have to be divided between my
two _fiancees_. She remarked that the old proverb called man a pendulum
between a smile and a tear, but that I was the first true case of a
human pendulum which she had ever seen.

"Now the little scamp was so perfectly fascinating while she was
teasing me, that I felt myself overcome with a desperate fondness for
her; so, seeing that the old aunt was sound asleep, I blurted out all
my feelings. I swore that she was the only--"

"Oh, omit all that. I know--but what bosh to say to a sensible girl!"

"Well, you know, Louie held her handkerchief to her face, while I was
speaking, and I--ass, dolt, and idiot that I was--felt convinced that
she was crying. Her frame shook with convulsive shivers, that I took
for repressed sobs. I saw the little hand that held the little white
handkerchief to her face--the same slender little hand that was the
cause of my scrape with Mrs. Finnimore--and, still continuing the
confession of my love, I thought I would soothe her grief. I couldn't
help it. I was fairly carried away. I reached forward my hand, and
tried to take hers, all the time saying no end of spooney things.

"But the moment I touched her baud, she rolled her chair back, and
snatched it away--

"And then she threw back her head--

"And then there came such a peal of musical laughter, that I swear it's
ringing in my ears yet.

"What made it worse was, not merely what she considered the fun of my
proposal, but the additional thought that suddenly flashed upon her,
that I had just now so absurdly mistaken her emotion. For, confound it
all! as I reached out my hand, I said a lot of rubbish, and, among
other things, implored her to let me wipe her tears. This was
altogether too much. Wipe her tears! And, Heavens and earth, she was
shaking to pieces all the time with nothing but laughter. Wipe her
tears! Oh, Macrorie! Did you _ever_ hear of such an ass?

"Well, you know she couldn't get over it for ever so long, but laughed
no end, while I sat utterly amazed at the extent to which I had made an
ass of myself. However, she got over it at last.

"'Well,' said I, 'I hope you feel better.'

"'Thanks, yea; but don't get into a temper. Will you promise to answer
me one question?'

"'Certainly; most happy. If you think it worth while to do any thing
else but laugh at me, I ought to feel flattered.'

"'Now, that's what I call temper, and you must be above such a thing.
After all, I'm only a simple little girl, and you--that is, _it_ was so
awfully absurd.'

"And here she seemed about to burst forth afresh. But she didn't.

"'What I was going to ask,' she began, in a very grave way, 'what I was
going to ask is this, If it is a fair question, how many of these
little entanglements do you happen to have just now?'

"'Oh, Louie!' I began, in mournful and reproachful tones.

"'Oh don't, don't,' she cried, covering her face, 'don't begin; I can't
stand it. If you only knew how absurd you look when you are
sentimental. You are always so funny, you know; and, when you try to be
solemn, it looks so awfully ridiculous! Now, don't--I really cannot
stand it. Please-ple-e-e-e-e-ease don't, like a good Captain Randolph.'

"At this she clasped her hands and looked at me with such a grotesque
expression of mock entreaty, that I knocked under, and burst out
laughing.

"She at once settled herself comfortably in her easy-chair.

"'Now that's what I call,' said she, placidly, 'a nice, good, sensible,
old-fashioned Captain Randolph, that everybody loves, and in whose
affairs all his innumerable friends take a deep interest. And now let
me ask my question again: How many?'

"'How many what?' said I.

"'Oh, you know very well.'

"'How can I know, when you won't say what you mean?'

"'How many entanglements?'

"'Entanglements?'

"'Yes. Engagements, if you wish me to be so very explicit.'

"'What nonsense! Why you know all about it, and the cause--'

"'Ah, now, that is not frank; it isn't friendly or honest,' said the
little witch. 'Come, now. Are there as many as--as--fifty?'

"'Nonsense!'

"'Twenty, then?'

"'How absurd!'

"'Ten?'

"'Of course not.'

"'Five?'

"'No.'

"'Four?'

"'Why, haven't I told you all?'

"'Four,' she persisted.

"'No--'

"'Three, then--'

"'It isn't fair,' said I,' to press a fellow this way.'

"'Three?' she repeated.

"I was silent. I'm not very quick, and was trying, in a dazed way, to
turn it off.

"'Three!' she cried. 'Three! I knew it. Oh, tell me all about it. Oh,
do tell me! Oh, do--please tell me all. Oh, do, ple-e-e-ease tell me.'

"And then she began, and she teased and she coaxed, and coaxed and
teased, until at last--"

Jack hesitated.

"Well," said I.

"Well," said he.

"You didn't really tell her," said I.

"Yes, but I did," said he.

"You didn't--you couldn't."

"I'll be hanged if I didn't!"

"Not about Number Three?"

"Yes, Number Three," said Jack, looking at me with a fixed and slightly
stony stare.

Words were useless, and I sought expression for my feelings in the more
emphatic whistle, which now was largely protracted.

"And how did she take it?" I asked, at length, as soon as I found voice
to speak.

"As usual. Teased me, no end. Alluded to my recent proposal. Asked me
if I had intended her to be Number Four, and declared her belief that I
had thirty rather than three. Finally, the aunt waked up, and wanted to
know what we were laughing at. Whereupon Louie said that she was
laughing at a ridiculous story of mine, about an Indian juggler who
could jeep three oranges in the air at the same time.

"'Captain Randolph,' said she 'you know all about Frederick the Great,
of course?'

"'Of course," I said, 'and Alexander the Great also, and Julius Caesar,
and Nebuchadnezzar, as the poet says.'

'"Perhaps you remember,' said Louie, in a grave tone, for her aunt was
wide awake now, 'that the peculiar excellence of the genius of that
great monarch consisted in his successful efforts to encounter the
coalition raised against him. Though subject to the attacks of the
three united powers of France, Austria, and Russia, he was still able
to repel them, and finally rescued himself from destruction. Three
assailants could not overpower him, and surely others may take courage
from his example.'

"And after that little speech I came away, and here I am."

For some time we sat in silence. Jack did not seem to expect any
remarks from me, but appeared to be rapt in his own thoughts. For my
part, I had nothing whatever to say, and soon became equally rapt in my
meditations.

And what were they about?

What? Why, the usual subject which had filled my mind for the past few
days--my adventure on the river, and my mysterious companion.
Mysterious though she was, she was evidently a lady, and, though I
could not be sure about her face, I yet could feel sure that she was
beautiful. So very romantic an adventure had an unusual charm, and this
charm was heightened to a wonderful degree by the mystery of her sudden
and utter disappearance.

And now, since Jack had been so very confidential with me, I determined
to return that confidence, and impart my secret to him. Perhaps he
could help me. At any rate, he was the only person to whom I could
think of telling it. So you see--




CHAPTER XII.


MY ADVENTURES REHEARSED TO JACK RANDOLPH.--"MY DEAR FELLOW, YOU DON'T
SAY SO!"--"'PON MY LIFE, YES."--"BY JOVE! OLD CHAP, HOW CLOSE YOU'VE
BEEN! YOU JUST HAVE NO END OF SECRETS. AND WHAT'S BECOME OF THE LADY?
WHO IS SHE?"


Who is she? Ay. Who, indeed? Hadn't I been torturing my brain for
seventy-nine hours, sleeping as well as waking, with that one
unanswered and apparently unanswerable question?

"Who is she?" repeated Jack.

"Well," said I, "that's the very thing that I wish to find out, and I
want you to help me in it. I told you that she didn't leave any
message--"

"But, didn't you find out her name?"

"No."

"By Jove! You're a queer lot. Why, I'd have found out her name the
first thing."

"But I didn't--and now I want your help to find out not only her name,
but herself."

At this Jack rose, loaded his pipe solemnly, and, with the air of one
who is making preparations for a work of no common kind, lighted it,
flung himself back in the easy-chair, and sent forth vast volumes of
smoke, which might have been considered as admirably symbolical of the
state of our minds.

"Well, Macrorie," said he, at last, "I'll tell you what I'd do. I'd go
round to all the hotels, and examine the lists."

"Pooh!"

"Well, then, take the directory and hunt up all the names."

"Nonsense!"

"Why 'nonsense?'"

"Because I don't know her name. Didn't I impress that upon your mind?"

"By Jove!" cried Jack Randolph, after which he again relapsed into
silence.

"See here, Macrorie," said he, at length.

"I have it."

"What?"

"Go round next Sunday to all the churches."

"What's the use of that?"

"Go round to the churches," repeated Jack, "scan every bonnet--and
then, if you don't see her, why then, why--go to the photographic
saloons. You'll be sure to find her picture there. By Jove! Why,
Macrorie, the game's all in your own hands. These photographic saloons
are better than a whole force of detective police. There's your chance,
old man. You'll find her. Do that, and you're all right. Oh,
yes--you'll find her, as sure as my name's Jack Randolph."

"No go, Jack," said I. "You see I couldn't recognize her even if I were
to see her."

"Couldn't what?"

"Couldn't recognize her."

"You surely would know her if you saw her."

"I don't think I should."

"Well, of all the confounded fixes that ever I met with, this is the
greatest!"

"That's the peculiarity of my present situation."

Jack relapsed into smoky silence.

"The fact is," said Jack, after a brief pause, "we've got to go to work
systematically. Now, first of all, I want to know what she looks
like."

"Well, that's the very thing I don't know."

"Nonsense! You must know something about it. Is she a blonde or a
brunette? You can answer that, at least."

"I'm not sure that I can."

"What! don't you know even the color of her complexion?"

"When I saw her, she was as white as a sheet. Even her lips were
bloodless. You see, she was frightened out of her wits."

"Well, then, her hair--her hair, man! Was that dark or light?"

"I didn't see it."

"Didn't see it?"

"No. You see it was covered by her hood. Think of that driving sleet.
She had to cover herself up as much as she could from the terrible
pelting of the storm."

"Well, then, I'll ask only one question more," said Jack, dryly. "I
hope you'll be able to answer it. A great deal depends upon it. In
fact, upon a true answer to this question the whole thing rests. Gather
up all your faculties now, old chap, and try to answer me correctly. No
shirking now--no humbug, for I won'