“I will go in search of him, aunt!” exclaimed Esther, as the clock struck two.  “He cannot leave the city before daylight.  I will find him, and confess all my folly before it is too late.”

“But where will you go, my child?” Mrs. Carlisle asked in a sad voice.

“Where—­where shall I go?” eagerly inquired Mrs. Huntley.

“It is midnight, Esther.  You cannot find him now.”

“But I must see him before he leaves me, perhaps for ever!  It will kill me.  If I wait until morning, it will be too late.”

Mrs. Carlisle bent her eyes to the floor, and for the space of more than a minute remained in deep thought.  She then said, in a calm voice,

“Esther, I cannot believe that Edward will desert you on so slight a provocation.  For a few hours his mind may be blinded with passion, and be swayed by false judgment.  But morning will find him cooler and more reflective.  He will see his error, and repent of any mad act he may have contemplated.  Still, to guard against the worst of consequences, should this salutary change not take place, I think it would be best for you to go early to the boat, and by meeting him prevent a step that may cost you each a life of wretchedness.”

“I will do it!  He shall not go away!  Oh! if I could once more meet him! all would be reconciled on the instant.”

Confident in her own mind that Edward had determined to go away from the city in the morning, and fully resolved upon what she would do, Esther threw herself upon the bed, and in snatches of uneasy slumber passed the remainder of that dreadful night.  At day-dawn she was up, and making preparations for going to the boat to intercept her husband.

“Be self-possessed, my dear niece,” urged Mrs. Carlisle, in a voice that trembled so she could scarcely speak.

Esther tried to reply, but, though her lips and tongue moved, there was no utterance.  Turning away, just as the sun threw his first rays into her chamber window, she went down stairs, and her aunt, no longer able to restrain herself, covered her face with her hands and wept.

On the day before, Esther had laid her gloves on one of the parlour mantels, and she went in to get them.  It was so dark that she could not see, and she, therefore, opened a window and pushed back one of the shutters.  As she did so, a sound between a sigh and a groan fell upon her ear, and caused her to turn with a start.  There lay her husband, asleep upon one of the sofas!  A wild cry that she could not restrain burst from her lips, and, springing toward him, she threw her arms about his neck as he arose, startled, from his recumbent position.

An hour’s reflection, alone in the room he had taken at the hotel, satisfied Huntley that he was wrong in not going home.  By the aid of his night key he entered, silently, at the very time his wife resolved to seek him in the morning, and, throwing himself upon a sofa in the parlour to think what he should next do, thought himself to sleep.