to remain there for nearly two years before being discovered and taken off.  This story was not believed.  Mr. Paralette, it is said, who has retained possession of all Mr. Ballantine’s property since his absence, was waited upon by the young woman; but he repulsed her as an impostor, and refused to make the least investigation into her case.  He had his own reasons for this, it is also said.  Several of Mr. Ballantine’s old friends received notes from her; but none believed her story, especially as the man she called her father bore little or no resemblance to Mr. Ballantine.  But it is now said, by many, that loss of reason and great physical suffering had changed him, as these would change any man.  Discouraged, disheartened, and dismayed at the unexpected repulse she met, it is supposed by some, who now begin to half believe the story, that she died in despair.  Others say that the same young woman who called upon Mr. Paralette has occasionally been seen here; And it is also said that two of our most eminent physicians were engaged by a young woman, about whom there was to them something singular and inexplicable, for nearly a year and a half to attend her father, who was out of his mind, but that they failed to give him any relief.  These things are now causing a good deal of talk here in private circles, and I have thought it best to make you aware of the fact.”

From that time until the cars left for New York, Perkins was in a state of strong inward excitement.  Hurriedly arranging his business for an absence of some weeks, he started for the South late in the afternoon, without communicating to any one the real cause of his sudden movement.  After an anxious journey of nearly two weeks, he arrived in New Orleans, and called immediately upon Mr. Paralette, and stated the rumor he had heard.  That gentleman seemed greatly surprised, and even startled at the earnestness of the young man, and more particularly so when he learned precisely the relation in which he stood to the daughter of Mr. Ballantine.

“I remember the fact,” was his reply.  “But then, the young woman was, of course, a mere pretender.”

“But how do you know?” urged Mr. Perkins.  “Did you take any steps to ascertain the truth of her story?”

“Of course not.  Why should I?  An old friend of her father’s called upon them at the hotel, and saw the man that was attempted to be put off by an artful girl as Mr. Ballantine.  But he said the man bore no kind of resemblance to that person.  He was old and white-headed.  He was in his dotage—­a simple old fool—­passive in the hands of a designing woman.”

“Did you see him?”

“No.”

“Strange that you should not!” Perkins replied, looking the man steadily in the face.  “Bearing the relation that you did to Mr. Ballantine, it might be supposed that you would have been the first to see the man, and the most active to ascertain the truth or falsity of the story.”