startled eyes of the girl who watched him in ill-repressed anxiety.

At length, sitting down beside her, he seized her soft fingers with a
grasp of which he was hardly aware. Then instantly relaxing the rigor
of his clasp, he pleaded:

"Let me hold this pure little hand while I confess to you, my only love,
that your clear eyes have read my soul--that I have deceived you--that
I love you beyond all else this world contains; but that the most cruel
fate man ever before suffered, keeps me from you, unless, indeed, your
love will help me to remove the barrier."

And while the young girl listened, with drooping head, he told her of
his hated engagement--of the painful circumstances that had betrayed him
into compliance.

"But I never dreamed of this sort of Nemesis! I could not have been in
my senses to thus barter my freedom forever."

Slowly withdrawing her hand, the girl said, still in the same low tones:

"And you do not love your betrothed?"

"Love her?" he echoed. "I tell you, Lina, I have never even seen her.
Her people have been abroad for an age. She was in New York a few weeks
ago and, I understand, took offense at my continued absence from her
side, and went back to England. This is what she left for me;" and
plunging his hand into his breast pocket he selected from his note-case
a fragrant little billet-doux, formally desiring Dr. Gardner to explain
his strange conduct at his leisure--that the next opportunity granted