At the end of a year, Warburton had not only become dissipated in his habits, but had connected himself with a set of gamblers, who, as he proved to be a skilful hand, and not at all squeamish, resolved to send him on a trip down the Ohio and Mississippi, to New Orleans, for mutual benefit.  To this he had not the slightest objection.  He told his wife that he was going to New Orleans on business for the Stage Office, and would probably be gone all winter.  Unkind as he had grown, it was hard parting.  Gladly would she have taken all the risk of fatigue, to have accompanied him with her babe but four months old, but he would listen to no such proposal.  When he did go, she felt sick at heart, and, as the thought flashed across her mind that he might probably desert her, helpless and friendless as she was, it seemed as if the fever of her mind would end in madness.

Regularly, however, for several months, she heard from him, and each time he enclosed her money; but little more than was sufficient to meet expenses.  In the last letter she received, he hinted that he might return home in a few weeks.  At the usual time of receiving a letter, she waited day after day, hoping and almost fearing to receive one—­anxious to hear from him, and yet fearing that he might have changed his mind as to his contemplated return.

Week after week passed, and there were no tidings.  Day after day she went to the post-office with an anxious heart, which throbbed quicker and quicker as the clerk mechanically and carelessly turned over letter after letter, and at last pronounced the word “none,” with professional indifference.  Then it would seem to stop, and lie like a motionless weight in her bosom, and she would steal away paler and sicker than when she came.  At last, her distress of mind became so great, that she went, reluctantly, to the stage-office, to inquire if they had heard from him recently.  To her hesitating, anxious inquiry, she received the brief reply that they knew nothing of him.

“But is he not in the employment of this office?”

“I hope not,” was the short, sneering reply of one of the clerks.

“What do you mean, sir?” she asked, in an excited tone—­“he is my husband.”

The manner of the man instantly changed.  “Nothing, ma’am.—­It was only a thoughtless reply.  He is not, however, in our employment, and never has been.”

Mrs. Warburton turned pale as ashes.  A chair was instantly handed to her, and a glass of water, and every kind attention offered.

At this moment a man entered, who eyed Mrs. W. with a vulgar stare.  The person who had first spoken to Mrs. W. took him aside, and after conversing in whispers for a few moments, turned to her and said that he had just learned that her husband had joined a band of traders, and was now on his way to Mexico.

“How do you know?” was the quick reply.

“This gentleman has just told me.”