“This strange gentleman gave the name of Mr. Walls; and he was young and handsome, and very rich.  He spent money like water; he paid the doctor and the landlord and the nurses as if he had been a prince.  He had a pleasant word and jest for every one.  He was hand and glove with Stephen Dane, and heaped presents on presents on his wife.  He gave her silk dresses and gold rings and costly shawls and gay bonnets until people began to talk.  What did he care for their talk? what did Mary Dane, either?  He lingered and lingered.  The talking grew louder, until, at last, it reached the ears of Stephen Dane.  He took it quietly.  ’It’s mighty dull for the likes of you here, Mr. Walls,’ he says to the gentleman, looking him full in the eye.  ’It’s no place for a young gentleman, in my notion.  I think you had better be going.’

“‘Do you?’ says Mr. Walls, back again, as cool as himself.  ’You are right, I dare say.  I’ll settle my bill to-night and be off to-morrow.’

“He did settle his bill at the bar before they parted, took a last glass with Stephen Dane, and walked up to his room, whistling.  Steeple Hill never saw him more.  When morning came he was far away, and Mary Dane with him.”

Again Miriam paused; again Mollie held the wine-cup to her lips; again she drank and went on: 

“I couldn’t tell you, Mollie, if I would, the shock and the scandal that ran through Steeple Hill, and I wouldn’t if I could.  If it were in my power, such horrors would never reach your innocent ears.  But they were gone, and Stephen Dane was like a man mad.  He drank, and drank, and drank until he was blind drunk, and then, in spite of everybody, set off to go after them.  Before he had got ten yards from his own doorstep he fell down in a fit, blood pouring from his month and nostrils.  That night he died.

“The hour of his death, when he knew he had but a few moments to live, he turned every soul out of the room, and made his brother kneel down and take a solemn oath of vengeance.

“‘I’ll never rest easy in my grave, James,’ said the dying man, ’and I’ll never let you rest easy in your life, until you have avenged me on my wronger.’

“Your father knelt down and swore.  It was a bad, bad death-bed, and a bad, bad oath.  But he took it; and Stephen Dane died, with his brother’s hand clasped in his, and his dying eyes fixed on his brother’s face.

“They buried the dead man; and when the sods were piled above him, your father told me of the vow he had made—­the vow he meant to keep.  What could I say? what could I do?  I wept woman’s tears, I said woman’s words.  I pleaded, I reasoned, I entreated—­all in vain.  He would go, and he went.