have worshipped my first love, my proud, gifted, peerless Edna!  Oh! she will never realize all she threw away when she coldly dismissed me.’  Poor Gordon!  Well, he is married; but his bride might have found cause of disquiet in his restless, abstracted manner on the evening of his wedding.  What do you suppose was St. Elmo’s criticism on this matrimonial mismatch?  ’Poor devil!  Before a year rolls over his head he will feel like plunging into the Atlantic, with Plymouth Rock for a necklace!  Leigh deserves a better fate, and I would rather see him tied to wild horses and dragged across the Andes.’  These pique marriages are terrible mistakes; so, my dear, I trust you will duly repent of your cruelty to poor Gordon.”

As Edna put the letter in her pocket, she wondered whether Gertrude really loved her husband, or whether chagrin at Mr. Murray’s heartless desertion had not goaded the girl to accept Mr. Leigh.

“Perhaps after all, Mr. Murray was correct in his estimate of her character, when he said that she was a mere child, and was capable of no very earnest affection.  I hope so—­I hope so.”

Edna sighed as she tried to assure herself of the probability that the newly married pair would become more attached as time passed; and her thoughts returned to that paragraph in Mrs. Murray’s letter which seemed intentionally mysterious:  “I know of a third instance which will take place ere long.”

Did she allude to her son and her niece?  Edna could not believe this possible, and shook her head at the suggestion; but her lips grew cold, and her fingers locked each other as in a clasp of steel.

When Mr. Manning called, and assisted her into the carriage, he observed an unusual preoccupancy of mind; but after a few desultory remarks she rallied, gave him her undivided attention, and seemed engrossed by his conversation.

It was a fine, sunny day, bright but cool, with a fresh and stiffening west wind ripping the waters of the harbor.

The week had been one of unusual trial, for Felix was sick, and even more than ordinarily fretful and exacting; and weary of writing and of teaching so constantly, the governess enjoyed the brief season of emancipation.

Mr. Manning’s long residence in the city had familiarized him with the beauties of Greenwood, and the history of many who slept dreamlessly in the costly mausoleums which they paused to examine and admire; and when at last he directed the driver to return, Edna sank back in one corner of the carriage and said:  “Some morning I will come with the children and spend the entire day.”

She closed her eyes, and her thoughts travelled swiftly to that pure white obelisk standing in the shadow of Lookout; and melancholy memories brought a sigh to her lips and a slight cloud to the face that for two hours past had been singularly bright and animated.  The silence had lasted some minutes, when Mr. Manning, who was gazing abstractedly out of the window, turned to his companion and said: