A few days passed, and the two children were sent into the city and placed in the charge of a free woman, with instructions to keep them secreted for several weeks.  This movement being discovered by Romescos, was the first signal for an onset of creditors.  Graspum, always first to secure himself, in this instance compelled Marston to succumb to his demands by threatening to disclose the crime Lorenzo had committed.  Forcing him to fulfil the obligation in the bond, he took formal possession of the plantation.  This increased the suspicion of fraud; there was a mystery somewhere,—­nobody could solve it.  Marston, even his former friends declared, was a swindler.  He could not be honestly indebted in so large an amount to Graspum; nor could he be so connected with such persons without something being wrong somewhere.  Friends began to insinuate that they had been misled; and not a few among those who had enjoyed his hospitality were first inclined to scandalise his integrity.  Graspum had foreseen all this, and, with Romescos, who had purloined the bill of sale, was prepared to do any amount of swearing.  Marston is a victim of circumstances; his proud spirit prompts him to preserve from disgrace the name of his family, and thus he the more easily yielded to the demands of the betrayer.  Hence, Graspum, secure in his ill-gotten booty, leaves his victim to struggle with those who come after him.

A few weeks pass over, and the equity of Graspum’s claim is questioned:  his character for honour being doubted, gives rise to much comment.  The whole thing is denounced-proclaimed a concerted movement to defraud the rightful creditors.  And yet, knowing the supremacy of money over law in a slave state, Graspum’s power, the revenge his followers inflict, and their desperate character, not one dare come forward to test the validity of the debt.  They know and fear the fierce penalty:  they are forced to fall back,—­to seize his person, his property, his personal effects.

In this dilemma, Marston repairs to the city, attempts to make an arrangement with his creditors, singularly fails; he can effect nothing.  Wherever he goes his salutation meets a cold, measured response; whisper marks him a swindler.  The knife stabs deep into the already festered wound.  Misfortune bears heavily upon a sensitive mind; but accusation of wrong, when struggling under trials, stabs deepest into the heart, and bears its victim suffering to the very depths of despair.

To add to this combination of misfortunes, on his return to the plantation he found it deserted,—­a sheriff’s keeper guarding his personal effects, his few remaining negroes seized upon and marched into the city for the satisfaction of his debts.  Clotilda has been seized upon, manacled, driven to the city, committed to prison.  Another creditor has found out the hiding-place of the children; directs the sheriff, who seizes upon them, like property of their kind, and drags them to prison.  Oh, that prison walls were made for torturing the innocent!