To-morrow came, gray and overcast. The fine weather which had lasted almost since their leaving New York showed signs of breaking up. Miss Stuart's ankle was so much better that she was able to limp downstairs at eleven, A. M., to breakfast, and resume her flirtation with Captain Hammond where it had broken off last night. Miss Darrell had a headache and did not appear. And, in the absence of his idol and day star, Sir Victor collapsed and ate his morning meal in silence and sadness.

Breakfast over, he walked to one of the windows, looking out at the rain, which was beginning to drift against the glass, and wondering, drearily, how he was to drag through the long hours without Edith. He might go and play billiards with the other fellows; but no, he was too restless even for that. What was he to do to kill time? It was a relief when a servant came with a message from his aunt.

"My lady's compliments, Sir Victor, and will you please step upstairs at once."

"Now for the grand secret," he thought; "the skeleton in the family closet—the discovery of the mysterious woman in black."

The woman in black was nowhere visible when he entered his aunt's apartments. Lady Helena sat alone, her face pale, her eyes heavy and red as though with weeping, but all the anger, all the excitement of yesterday gone.

"My dear aunt," the young man said, really concerned, "I am sorry to see you looking so ill. And—surely you have not been crying?"

"Sit down," his aunt replied. "Yes, I have been crying. I have had good reason to cry for many years past. I have sent for you, Victor, to tell you all—at least all it is advisable to tell you at present. And, before I begin, let me apologize if anything I may have said yesterday on the subject of your engagement has wounded you."

"Dear Lady Helena, between you and me there can be no talk of pardon. It was your right to object if you saw cause, and no doubt it is natural that Edith's want of birth and fortune would weigh with you. But they do not weigh with me, and I know the happiness of my life to be very near your heart. I have only to say again that that happiness lies entirely with her—that without her I should be the most miserable fellow alive—to hear you withdraw every objection and take my darling to your arms as your daughter."

She sighed heavily as she listened.

"A wilful man must have his way. You are, as you told me yesterday, your own master, free to do as you please. To Miss Darrell personally I have no objection; she is beautiful, well-bred, and, I believe, a noble girl. Her poverty and obscure birth are drawbacks in my eyes, but, since they are not so in yours, I will allude to them no more. The objections I made yesterday to your marriage I would have made had your bride been a duke's daughter. I had hoped—it was an absurd hope—that you would not think of marriage for many years to come, perhaps not at all."

"But, Aunt Helena—"

"Do I not say it was an absurd hope? The fact is, Victor, I have been a coward—a nervous, wretched coward from first to last. I shut my eyes to the truth. I feared you might fall in love with this girl, but I put the fear away from me. The time has come when the truth must be spoken, when my love for you can shield you no longer. Before you marry you must know all. Do you remember, in the heat of my excitement yesterday, telling you you had no right to the title you bear? In one sense I spoke the truth. Your father—" she gasped and paused.

"My father?" he breathlessly repeated.

"Your father is alive."

He sat and looked at her—stunned. What was she saying? His father alive, after all those years! and he not Sir Victor Catheron! He half rose—ashen pale.

"Lady Helena, what is this? My father alive—my father, whom for twenty years—since I could think at all—I have thought dead! What vile deception is here?"

"Sit down, Victor; you shall hear all. There is no vile deception—the deception, such as it is, has been by his own desire. Your father lives, but he is hopelessly insane."

He sat looking at her, pale, stern, almost confounded.

"He—he never recovered from the shock of his wife's dreadful death," went on her ladyship, her voice trembling. "Health returned after that terrible brain fever, but not reason. We took him away—the best medical aid everywhere was tried—all in vain. For years he was hopelessly, utterly insane, never violent, but mind and memory a total blank. He was incurable—he would never reclaim his title, but his bodily health was good, and he might live for many years. Why then deprive you of your rights, since in no way you defrauded him? The world was given to understand he was dead, and you, as you grew up, took his place as though the grave had indeed closed over him. But legally, as you see for yourself, you have no claim to it."

Still he sat gazing at her—still he sat silent, his lips compressed, waiting for the end.

"Of late years, gleams of reason have returned, fitfully and at uncertain times. On these rare occasions he has spoken of you, has expressed the desire that you should still be kept in ignorance, that he shall ever be to the world dead. You perceive, therefore, though it is my duty to tell you this, it need in no way alarm you, as he will never interfere with your claims."

Still he sat silent—a strange, intent listening expression on his face.

"You recollect the lady who came here yesterday," she continued. "Victor, looking far back into the past, have you no recollection of some one, fair and young, who used to bend over you at night, hear you say your baby prayers, and sing you to sleep? Try and think."

He bent his head in assent.

"I remember," he answered.

"Do you recall how she looked—has her face remained in your memory?"

"She had dark eyes and hair, and was handsome. I remember no more."

She looked at him wistfully.

"Victor, have you no idea who that woman was—none?"

"None," he replied coldly. "How could I, since she was not my mother.
I never heard her name. Who was she?"

"She was the lady you saw yesterday."

"Who was the lady I saw yesterday?"

She paused a moment, then replied, still with that wistful glance on his face:

"Inez Catheron."

"What?" Again he half-started to his feet. "The woman who was my mother's rival and enemy, who made her life wretched, who was concerned in her murder! Whom you aided to escape from Chesholm jail! The woman who, directly or indirectly, is guilty of her death!"

"Sir Victor Catheron, how dare you!" Lady Helen also started to her feet, her face flushing with haughty anger. "I tell you Inez Catheron has been a martyr—not a murderess. She was your mother's rival, as she had a right to be—was she not your father's plighted wife, long before he ever saw Ethel Dobb? She was your mother's rival. It was her only fault, and her whole life has been spent in expiating it. Was it not atonement sufficient, that for the crime of another, she should be branded with life-long infamy, and banished forever from home and friends?"

"If the guilt was not hers it was her brother's, and she was privy to it," the young man retorted, with sullen coldness.

"Who are you, that you should say whether it was or not? The assassin is known to Heaven, and Heaven has dealt with him. Accuse no one—neither Juan Catheron nor his sister—all human judgment is liable to err. Of your mother's death Inez Catheron is innocent—by it her whole life has been blighted. To your father, that life has been consecrated. She has been his nurse, his companion, his more than sister or mother all those years. I loved him, and I could not have done what she has done. He used her brutally—brutally I say—and her revenge has been life-long devotion and sacrifice. All those years she has never left him. She will never leave him until he dies."

She sank back in her seat, trembling, exhausted. He listened in growing wonder.

"You believe me?" she demanded imperiously.

"I believe you," he replied sadly. "My dear aunt, forgive me. I believe all you have said. Can I not see her and thank her too?"

"You shall see her. It is for that she has remained. Stay here; I will send her to you. She deserves your thanks, though all thanks are but empty and vain for such a life-long martyrdom as hers."

She left him hastily. Profound silence fell. He turned and looked out at the fast-falling rain, at the trees swaying in the fitful wind, at the dull, leaden sky. Was he asleep and dreaming? His father alive! He sat half dazed, unable to realize it.

"Victor!"

He had not heard the door open, he had not heard her approach, but she stood beside him. All in black, soft, noiseless black, a face devoid of all color; large, sad, soft eyes, and hair white as winter snow—that was the woman Sir Victor Catheron saw as he turned round. The face, with all its settled sadness and pallor, was still the face of a beautiful woman, and in weird contradiction to its youth and beauty, were the smooth bands of abundant hair—white as the hair of eighty. The deep, dusk eyes, once so full of pride and fire, looked at him with the tender, saddened light, long, patient suffering had wrought; the lips, once curved in haughtiest disdain, had taken the sweetness of years of hopeless pain. And so, after three-and-twenty years, Victor Catheron saw the woman, whose life his father's falsity and fickleness had wrecked.

"Victor!"

She held out her hand to him shyly, wistfully. The ban of murder had been upon her all these years. Who was to tell that in his inmost heart he too might not brand her as a murderess? But she need not have doubted. If any suspicion yet lingered in his mind, it vanished as he looked at her.

"Miss Catheron!" He grasped her hand, and held it between both his own. "I have but just heard all, for the first time, as you know. That my father lives—that to him you have nobly consecrated your life. He has not deserved it at your hands; let my father's son thank you with all his soul!"

"Ah, hush," she said softly. "I want no thanks. Your poor father! Aunt Helena has told you how miserably all his life has been wrecked—a life once so full of promise."

"She has told me all, Miss Catheron."

"Not Miss Catheron," she interposed, with a smile that lit her worn face into youth and beauty; "not Miss Catheron, surely—Inez, Cousin Inez, if you will. It is twenty-three years—do you know it?—since any one has called me Miss Catheron before. You can't fancy how oddly it sounds."

He looked at her in surprise.

"You do not bear your own name? And yet I might have known it, lying as you still do—"

"Under the ban of murder." She shuddered slightly as she said it. "Yes, when I fled that dreadful night from Chesholm prison, and made my way to London, I left my name behind me. I took at first the name of Miss Black. I lived in dingy lodgings in that crowded part of London, Lambeth; and for the look of the thing, took in sewing. It was of all those years the most dreary, the most miserable and lonely time of my probation. I lived there four months; then came the time of your father's complete restoration to bodily health, and confirmation of the fear that his mind was entirely gone. What was to be done with him? Lady Helena was at a loss to know. There were private asylums, but she disliked the idea of shutting him up in one. He was perfectly gentle, perfectly harmless, perfectly insane. Lady Helena came to see me, and I, pining for the sight of a familiar face, sick and weary to death of the wretched neighborhood in which I lived, proposed the plan that has ever since been the plan of my life. Let Lady Helena take a house, retired enough to be safe, sufficiently suburban to be healthy; let her place Victor there with me; let Mrs. Marsh, my old friend and housekeeper at Catheron Royals, become my housekeeper once more; let Hooper the butler take charge of us, and let us all live together. I thought then, and I think still, it was the best thing for him and for me that could have been suggested. Aunt Helena acted upon it at once; she found a house, on the outskirts of St. John's Wood—a large house, set in spacious grounds, and inclosed by a high wall, called 'Poplar Lodge.' It suited us in every way; it combined all the advantages of town and country. She leased it from the agent for a long term of years, for a 'Mr. and Mrs. Victor,' Mr. Victor being in very poor health. Secretly and by night we removed your father there, and since the night of his entrance he has never passed the gates. From the first—in the days of my youth and my happiness—my life belonged to him; it will belong to him to the end. Hooper and Marsh are with me still, old and feeble now; and of late years I don't think I have been unhappy."

She sighed and looked out at the dull, rain-beaten day. The young man listened in profound pity and admiration. Not unhappy! Branded with the deadliest crime man can commit or the law punish—an exile, a recluse, the life-long companion of an insane man and two old servants! No wonder that at forty her hair was gray—no wonder all life and color had died out of that hopeless face years ago. Perhaps his eyes told her what was passing in his mind; she smiled and answered that look.

"I have not been unhappy, Victor; I want you to believe it. Your father was always more to me than all the world beside—he is so still. He is but the wreck of the Victor I loved, and yet I would rather spend my life by his side than elsewhere on earth. And I was not quite forsaken. Aunt Helena often came and brought you. It seems but yesterday since I had you in my arms rocking you asleep, and now—and now they tell me you are going to be married."

The sensitive color rose over his face for a second, then faded, leaving him very pale.

"I was going to be married," he answered slowly, "but she does not know this. My father lives—the title and inheritance are his, not mine. Who is to tell what she may say now?"

The dark, thoughtful eyes looked at him earnestly.

"Does she love you?" she asked; "this Miss Darrell? I need hardly inquire whether you love her."

"I love her so dearly that if I lose her—" He paused and turned his face away from her in the gray light. "I wish I had known this from the first; I ought to have known. It may have been meant in kindness, but I believe it was a mistake. Heaven knows how it will end now."

"You mean to say, then, that in the hour you lose your title and inheritance you also lose Miss Darrell? Is that it?"

"I have said nothing of the kind. Edith is one of the noblest, the truest of women; but can't you see—it looks as though she had been deceived, imposed upon. The loss of title and wealth would make a difference to any woman on earth."

"Very little to a woman who loves, Victor. I hope—I hope—this young girl loves you?"

Again the color rose over his face—again he turned impatiently away.

"She will love me," he answered; "she has promised it, and Edith
Darrell is a girl to keep her word."

"So," Miss Catheron said, softly and sadly, "it is the old French proverb over again, 'There is always one who loves, and one who is loved.' She has owned to you that she is not in love with you, then? Pardon me, Victor, but your happiness is very near to me."

"She has owned it," he answered, "with the rare nobility and candor that belongs to her. Such affection as mine will win its return—'love begets love,' they say. It must."

"Not always, Victor—ah, not always, else what a happy woman I had been! But surely she cares for no one else?"

"She cares for no one else," he answered, doggedly enough, but in his inmost heart that never-dying jealousy of Charley Stuart rankled. "She cares for no one else—she has told me so, and she is pride, and truth, and purity itself. If I lose her through this, then this secret of insanity will have wrecked forever still another life."

"If she is what you picture her," Inez said steadily, "no loss of rank or fortune would ever make her give you up. But you are not to lose either—you need not even tell her, if you choose."

"I can have no secrets from my plighted wife—Edith must know all. But the secret will be as safe with her as with me."

"Very well," she said quietly; "you know what the result will be if by any chance 'Mrs. Victor' and Inez Catheron are discovered to be one. But it shall be exactly as you please. Your father is as dead to you, to all the world, as though he lay in the vaults of Chesholm church, by your mother's side."

"My poor mother! my poor, murdered, unavenged mother! Inez Catheron, you are a noble woman—a brave woman; was it well to aid your brother to escape?—was it well, for the sake of saving the Catheron honor and the Catheron name, to permit a most cruel and cowardly murder to go unavenged?"

What was it that looked up at him out of her eyes? Infinite pity, infinite sorrow, infinite pain.

"My brother," she repeated softly, as if to herself; "poor Juan! he was the scapegoat of the family always. Yes, Sir Victor, it was a cruel and cowardly murder, and yet I believe in my soul we did right to screen the murderer from the world. It is in the hands of the Almighty—there let it rest."

There was a pause—then:

"I shall return with you to London and see my father," he said, as one who claims a right.

"No," she answered firmly; "it is impossible. Stay! Hear me out—it is your father's own wish."

"My father's wish! But—"

"He cannot express a wish, you would say. Of late years, Victor, at wide intervals, his reason has returned for a brief space—all the worse for him."

"The worse for him!" The young man looked at her blankly. "Miss
Catheron, do you mean to say it is better for him to be mad?"

"Much better—such madness as his. He does not think—he does not suffer. Memory to him is torture; he loved your mother, Victor—and he lost her—terribly lost her. With memory returns the anguish and despair of that loss as though it were but yesterday. If you saw him as I see him, you would pray as I do, that his mind might be blotted out forever."

"Good Heaven! this is terrible."

"Life is full of terrible things—tragedies, secrets—this is one of them. In these rare intervals of sanity he speaks of you—it is he who directed, in case of your marriage, that you should be told this much—that you are not to be brought to see him, until—"

She paused.

"Until—"

"Until he lies upon his death-bed. That day will be soon, Victor—soon, soon. Those brief glimpses of reason and memory have shortened life. What he suffers in these intervals no words of mine can tell. On his death-bed you are to see him—not before; and then you shall be told the story of your mother's death. No, Victor, spare me now—all I can tell you I have told. I return home by the noon-day train; and, before I go, I should like to see this girl who is to be your wife. See, I will remain by this window, screened by the curtain. Can you not fetch her by some pretence or other beneath it, that I may look and judge for myself?"

"I can try," he said, turning to go. "I have your consent to tell her my father is alive? I will tell her no more—it is not necessary she should know you are his keeper."

"That much you may tell her—it is her right. When I have seen her, come to me and say good-by."

"I shall not say good-by until I say it at Chester Station. Of course, I shall see you off. Wait here; if Edith is able to come out you shall see her. She kept her room this morning with headache."

He left her, half-dazed with what he had heard. He went to the drawing-room—the Stuarts and Captain Hammond were there—not Edith.

"Has Edith come down?" he asked. "I wish to speak to her for a moment."

"Edith is prowling about in the rain, somewhere, like an uneasy ghost," answered Trixy; "no doubt wet feet, and discomfort, and dampness generally are cures for headache; or, perhaps, she's looking for you."

He hardly waited to hear her out before he started in pursuit. As if favored by fortune, he caught a glimpse of Edith's purple dress among the trees in the distance. She had no umbrella, and was wandering about pale and listless in the rain.

"Edith," Sir Victor exclaimed, "out in all this downpour without an umbrella? You will get your death of cold."

"I never take cold," she answered indifferently. "I always liked to run out in the rain ever since I was a child. I must be an amphibious sort of animal, I think. Besides, the damp air helps my headache."

He drew her hand within his arm and led her slowly in the direction of the window where the watcher stood.

"Edith," he began abruptly, "I have news for you. To call it bad news would sound inhuman, and yet it has half-stunned me. It is this—my father is alive."

"Sir Victor!"

"Alive, Edith—hopelessly insane, but alive. That is the news Lady Helena and one other, have told me this morning. It has stunned me; I repeat—is it any wonder? All those years I have thought him dead, and to-day I discover that from first to last I have been deceived."

She stood mute with surprise. His father alive—madness in the family. Truly it would have been difficult for Sir Victor or any one else to call this good news. They were directly beneath the window. He glanced up—yes, a pale face gleamed from behind the curtain, gazing down at that other pale face by Sir Victor's side. Very pale, very set just now.

"Then if your father is alive, he is Sir Victor and not you?"

Those were the first words she spoke; her tone cold, her glance unsympathetic.

His heart contracted.

"He will never interfere with my claim—they assure me of that. Alive in reality, he is dead, to the world. Edith, would it make any difference—if I lost title and estate, would I also lose you?"

The beseeching love in his eyes might have moved her, but just at present she felt as though a stone lay in her bosom instead of a heart.

"I am not a sentimental sort of girl, Sir Victor," she answered steadily. "I am almost too practical and worldly, perhaps. And I must own it would make a difference. I have told you I am not in love with you—as yet—you have elected to take me and wait for that. I tell you now truthfully, if you were not Sir Victor Catheron, I would not marry you. It is best I should be honest, best I should not deceive you. You are a thousand times too good for so mercenary a creature as I am, and if you leave me it will only be serving me right. I don't want to break my promise, to draw back, but I feel in the mood for plain speaking this morning. If you feel that you can't marry me on those terms—and I don't deserve that you should—now is the time to speak. No one will be readier than I to own that it serves me right."

He looked and listened, pale to the lips.

"Edith, in Heaven's name, do you wish me to give you up?"

"No, I wish nothing of the sort. I have promised to marry you, and I am ready to keep that promise; but if you expect love or devotion from me, I tell you frankly I have neither to give. If you are willing still to take me, and"—smiling—"I see you are—I am still ready to be your wife—your true and faithful wife from the first—your loving wife, I hope, in the end."

They said no more. He led her back to the house, then left her. He hastened to Miss Catheron, more sombre even than when he had quitted her.

"Well," he said briefly, "you saw her?"

"I saw her. It is a beautiful face, a proud face, a truthful face, and yet—"

"Go on," he said impatiently. "Don't try to spare me. I am growing accustomed to unpleasant truths."

"I may be wrong, but something in her face tells me she does not love you, and," under her breath, "never will."

"It will come in time. With or without love, she is willing to be my wife—that is happiness enough for the present."

"You told her all?"

"I told her my father was alive and insane—no more. It will make no difference in our plans—none. We are to be married the first of September. The secret is safe with her."

The door opened, and Lady Helena came hastily in.

"If you wish to catch the 12.50 train, Inez," she said, "you must go at once. It is a long drive from this to the station. The brougham is waiting—shall I accompany you?"

"I will accompany her," said Sir Victor. "You had better return to our guests. They will begin to feel themselves neglected."

Miss Catheron left the room. In five minutes she reappeared, closely veiled, as when he had met her on the stairs. The adieux were hastily made. He gave her his arm and led her down to the close brougham. As they passed before the drawing-room windows, Miss Stuart uttered an exclamation:

"Oh! I say! where is Sir Victor going in the rain, and who is the dismal-looking lady in black? Edith, who is it? You ought to know."

"I don't know," Edith answered briefly, not looking up from her book.

"Hasn't Sir Victor told you?"

"I haven't asked Sir Victor."

"Oh, you haven't, and he hasn't told? Well, all I have to say is, that when I'm engaged I hope the object of my affections will keep no secrets from me."

"As if he could!" murmurs Captain Hammond.

"I declare, he is going off with her. Edith, do come and look. There! they are driving away together, as fast as they can go."

But Edith never stirred. If she felt the slightest curiosity on the subject, her face did not show it.

They drove rapidly through the rain, and barely caught the train at that. He placed her hurriedly in an empty carriage, a moment before it started. As it flew by he caught one last glimpse of a veiled face, and a hand waving farewell. Then the train and the woman were out of sight.

Like a man who walks in his sleep, Sir Victor Catheron turned, re-entered the brougham, and was driven home.