I tell thee, friend, I have not seen
So likely an ambassador of love;
A day in April never came so sweet,
To show that costly summer was at hand.
—Shakespeare.

Ishmael left Edinboro' by the earliest express train for London, where he arrived at nightfall.

He took a cab and drove immediately to Morley's Hotel in the Strand, where Herman Brudenell was stopping.

Carpet-bag in hand, Ishmael was shown into that gentleman's sitting room.

Mr. Brudenell sat writing at a table, but on hearing Mr. Worth announced and seeing him enter, he started up, threw down his pen, and rushed to welcome the traveler.

"My dear, dear boy, a thousand welcomes!" he exclaimed, heartily shaking Ishmael's hands.

"I am very glad to come and see you again, sir. I hope that you are quite well?" said Ishmael, cordially responding to this warm welcome.

"As well as a solitary man can be, my dear boy. How did you leave our friends? In good health, I trust,"

"Yes; in tolerably good health, considering the circumstances. They are of course somewhat shaken by the terrible events of the last few days."

"I should think so. Heaven! what an ordeal to have passed through.
Poor Claudia. How has she borne it all?"

"With the most admirable firmness. Claudia-Lady Vincent, I should say—has come out of her fiery trial like refined gold," said Ishmael warmly.

"A fiery trial, indeed. Ishmael, I have read the full account of the Banff tragedy, as they call it, in all the morning papers; no two of them agreeing in all particulars. The account in the 'Times' I hold to be the most reliable; it is at least the fullest—it occupies nearly two pages of that great paper."

"You are right; the account in the 'Times' is the true one."

"But, bless my life, I am keeping you standing here, carpet-bag in hand, all this time! Have you engaged your room?"

"No; they say the house is full."

"Not quite! Mine is a double-bedded chamber. You shall share it with me, if you like. What do you say?"

"Thank you, I should like it very much."

"Come in, then, and have a wash and a change of clothes; after which we will have supper. What would you like?"

"Anything at all. I know they cannot send up a bad one here."

Mr. Brudenell touched the bell. The waiter speedily answered it.

"Supper directly, James. Four dozen oysters; a roast fowl; baked potatoes; muffins; a bottle of sherry; and, and, black tea!—that is your milksop beverage, I believe, Ishmael," added Mr. Brudenell, in a low voice, turning to his guest.

"That is my milksop beverage," replied Ishmael good-humoredly.

The waiter went away on his errand. And Mr. Brudenell conducted Ishmael into the adjoining chamber, where the young man found an opportunity of renovating his toilet. When they returned to the sitting room they found the supper served and the waiter in attendance, but it was not until the traveler had done full justice to this meal, and the service was removed, and the waiter was gone, and the father and son were alone together, that they entered upon the confidential topics.

Mr. Brudenell questioned Ishmael minutely upon all the details of the Banff tragedy. And Ishmael satisfied him in every particular. One circumstance in these communications was noticeable—Mr. Brudenell, in all his questionings, never once mentioned the name of the Countess of Hurstmonceux. And even Ishmael avoided bringing it into his answers.

When Mr. Brudenell had learned all that he wanted to know, Ishmael in his turn said:

"I hope, sir, that the business which brought you to England has been satisfactorily settled?"

Mr. Brudenell sighed heavily.

"It has been settled, not very satisfactorily, but after a fashion, Ishmael. I never told you exactly what that business was. I intended to do so; and I will do it now."

Mr. Brudenell paused as if he were embarrassed, and doubtful in what terms to tell so unpleasant a story. Ishmael settled himself to attend.

"It was connected with my mother and sisters, Ishmael. They have been living abroad here for many years, as you have perhaps heard."

"Yes."

"And they have been living far above their means and far above mine. And consequently debts and difficulties and embarrassments have come. Again and again I have made large sacrifices and settled all claims against them. I am sorry to say it of my mother and sisters, Ishmael; but if the truth must be told, their pride and extravagance have ruined them and me, so far as financial ruin goes. If that had been all, it might have been borne. But there was worse to come. About a year ago my sister Eleanor—who had reached an age when single women begin to despair of marriage—formed the acquaintance of a disreputable scoundrel, one Captain Dugald, a younger brother, I hear, of the present Earl of Hurstmonceux—"

"Captain Dugald! I have heard of him!" exclaimed Ishmael.

"No doubt, most people have. He is rather a notorious character. Well, my infatuated sister took a fancy to the fellow; misled him into the belief that she was the mistress of a large fortune; and played her cards so skillfully that—well, in a word, the handsome scamp ran off with her, or rather she ran off with him; for she seems all through to have taken the initiative in her own ruin."

"But I do not understand why she should have run off? She was of ripe age and her own mistress. Who was there to run from?"

"Her mother, her mother; who could not endure the sight of Captain
Dugald, and who had forbidden him her house."

"Ah!"

"Well, they were married at Liverpool. He took her to the United States. At my mother's request I followed them there to reclaim my sister, for report said that the captain had already another wife when he married Eleanor. This report, however, I have ascertained to be without foundation. I could not find them in the United States, and soon gave up the search. Captain Dugald had no love for my sister. He appears to have treated her brutally from the first hour that he got her into his power. And when he learned that she had deceived him,—deceived him in every way, in regard to her fortune, in regard to her age, in regard to her very beauty, which was but the effect of skillful dress,—he conceived a disgust for her, abused her shamefully, and finally abandoned her in poverty, in sickness, and in debt."

"Poor, unhappy lady; what else could she have expected? She must have been mad," said Ishmael.

"Mad—madness don't begin to explain it. She must have been possessed of a devil. When thus left, she sold a few miserable trinkets of jewelry his cupidity had spared her, and took a steerage passage in one of our steamers and followed him back to England; but here lost sight of him, for it seems that he is somewhere on the Continent. She came to my mother's house in London in the condition of a beggar, knowing that she was a pauper, and fearing that she was not a wife. In this state of affairs my mother wrote, summoning me to her assistance. I came over as you know. I have ascertained that my sister's marriage is a perfectly legal one; but I have not succeeded in finding her scoundrel of a husband and bringing him to book. He is still on the Continent somewhere; hiding from his creditors, it is said."

"And his unhappy wife?"

"Is on her voyage to America. I have sent them all home, Ishmael.
They must live quietly at Brudenell Hall."

"But now that the Viscount Vincent is dead, and Captain Dugald becomes the heir presumptive to the earldom of Hurstmonceux, his prospects are so much improved that I should think he would return to England without fear of annoyance from his creditors; such gentry being usually very complaisant to the heirs of rich earldoms."

"I doubt if he will live to inherit the title and estate, Ishmael. He is nearly eaten up by alcohol. Eleanor, I know, will not live long. She is in the last stage of consumption. Her repose at Brudenell Hall may alleviate her sufferings, but cannot save her life," said Mr. Brudenell sadly. "I have only waited until your business here should be concluded, Ishmael, in order to return thither myself. You have nothing more to do. however, but to act for Judge Merlin in this matter of restitution, and then you will be ready to go, I presume."

"Yes; I have something else to do, sir. I have to expose a villain, to vindicate a lady, and to reconcile a long-estranged pair," replied Ishmael, in a nervous tone, yet with smiling eyes.

"Why, what have you been doing but just those things? What was Lord Vincent? What was Claudia? What was your part in that affair? Never, since the renowned Knight of Mancha, the great Don Quixote, lived and died, has there been so devoted a squire of dames, so brave a champion of the wronged, as yourself, Ishmael," said Mr. Brudenell.

"You may laugh, but you shall not laugh me out of my next enterprise, or 'adventure,' as the illustrious personage you have quoted would call it. And, by the way, do you know anything of a fellow-passenger of ours in the late voyage, the German Jew, Ezra Isaacs?"

"No; why?"

"I need him in the prosecution of this adventure."

"I have not seen him since we parted at Liverpool. I know nothing whatever about him."

"Well, then, after I have been at the chambers of Messrs. Hudson, I must go to Scotland Yard, and put the affair in the hands of the detectives, for have Isaacs hunted up I must."

"Is he the villain you are about to expose?"

"No; but he has been the tool of that villain, and I want him for a sort of state's evidence against his principal."

"Ah! I wish you joy of your adventure, Ishmael. It reminds one forcibly of the windmills," said Mr. Brudenell.

Ishmael laughed good-humoredly.

"I think it will do so, sir, when you find that the objects that you have been mistaking for giants are only windmills after all," he said.

"I do not understand you, my dear fellow."

Ishmael took from his breast-pocket the miniature of the Countess of
Hurstmonceux, and opening it and gazing upon it, he said:

"This is the likeness of the injured lady whose honor I have sworn to vindicate."

"Is it Claudia's?" inquired Mr. Brudenell, stretching his hand for it.

"No. it is not Lady Vincent's. Pardon me, upon second thoughts, sir. I wish to tell you this lady's story before I show you her portrait," answered Ishmael, shutting the case and returning it to his pocket.

Mr. Brudenell sat back, looking puzzled and attentive.

"This lady was the young and beautiful widow of an aged peer. She was as pure and noble as she was fair and lovely. She was sought in marriage by many attractive suitors; but in vain, for she would not bestow her hand where she could not bestow her heart. Among the most persevering of these suitors was a profligate fortune-hunter, who, as the near relative of her late husband, had the entre into her house—"

"Ah! I think I have heard this story before," said Mr. Brudenell, with the slightest possible sneer on his handsome lip.

"One side of it, sir, the false side. Hear the other, and the true one. The beautiful widow repulsed this suitor in disgust, and peremptorily forbade him the house. Determined not to be baffled, he resorted to a stratagem that should have sent him to the hulks—that did, in fact, banish him from all decent society. Are you listening, sir?"

"With all my soul," said Mr. Brudenell, whose mocking sneer had disappeared before an earnest interest.

"By tempting the cupidity of a poor kinsman, who was a member of the young widow's family, he managed to get himself secretly admitted to her house and concealed in her dressing room, whose front windows overlooked the street. In the morning this man opened one of these windows, and stood before it half-dressed, in full view of the street, brushing his hair for the entertainment of the passers-by. The glare of light from the open window, shining through the open door into the adjoining bedchamber of the sleeping beauty, awakened her. At sight of the sacrilegious intruder, she was so struck with consternation that she could not speak. He took advantage of his position and her panic, to press his repugnant suit. He plead that his ardent passion and her icy coldness had driven him to desperation and to extremity. He argued that all stratagems were fair in love. He begged her to forgive him and to marry him, and warned her that her reputation was irretrievably compromised if she did not do so."

Ishmael paused, and looked to see what effect this story was having upon Mr. Brudenell. Herman Brudenell was listening with breathless interest.

Ishmael continued, speaking earnestly, for his heart was in his theme:

"But the beautiful and spirited young widow was not one to be terrified into a measure that her soul abhorred. Her first act, on recovering the possession of her senses, was to ring the bell and order the ejectment of the intruder; and despite his attempts at explanation and remonstrance, this order was promptly obeyed, and the lady never saw him afterward. Soon after this she left Edinboro' for the south of England. At Brighton she met with a gentleman who afterward became her husband. But ah! this gentleman, some time subsequent to their marriage, received a one-sided account of that affair in Edinboro'. He was then young, sensitive, and jealous. He believed all that was told him; he asked no explanation of his young wife; he silently abandoned her. And she—faithful to the one love of her life—has lived through all her budding youth and blooming womanhood in loneliness and seclusion, passing her days in acts of charity and devotion. Circumstances have lately placed in my power the means of vindicating this lady's honor, even to the satisfaction of her unbelieving husband."

Ishmael paused, and looked earnestly into the troubled face of
Herman Brudenell.

"Ishmael," he exclaimed, "of course I have known all along that you have been speaking of my wife, Lady Hurstmonceux. If you have not been deceived; if the truth is just what it has been represented to you to be; if she was indeed innocent of all complicity in that nocturnal visit; then, Ishmael, I have done her a great, an unpardonable, an irreparable wrong."

"You have done that lovely lady great wrong indeed, sir; but not an unpardonable, not an irreparable one. She will be as ready to pardon as you to offer reparation. And in her lovely humility she will never know that there has been anything to pardon. Angels are not implacable, sir. If you doubt my judgment in this matter, look on her portrait now," said Ishmael, taking her miniature once more from his coat-pocket, opening it, and laying it before Herman Brudenell.

Mr. Brudenell slowly raised it, and wistfully gazed upon it.

"Is it a faithful portrait, Ishmael?" he asked.

"So faithful that it is like herself seen through a diminishing glass."

"She is very, very beautiful—more beautiful even than she was in her early youth," said Mr. Brudenell, thoughtfully gazing upon the miniature.

"Yes, I can imagine that she is more beautiful now than she was in her early youth; more beautiful with the heavenly beauty of the spirit added to the earthly beauty of the flesh. Look at that picture, dear sir; fancy those charming features, living, smiling, speaking, and you will be better able to judge how beautiful is your wife. Oh, sir! I think that in the times past you never loved that sweet lady as she deserved to be loved; but if you were to meet her now, you would love her as you never loved her before."

"If I were to meet her? Why, supposing that I have wronged her as much as you say, how could I ever venture to present myself before her?"

"How could you ever venture? Oh, sir! because she loves you. There are women, sir, who love but once in all their lives, and then love forever. The Countess of Hurstmonceux is one of these. Sir, since I have lived in daily companionship with her, I have been led to study her with affectionate interest. I have read her life as a wondrous poem. Her soul has been filled with one love. Her heart is the shrine of one idol. And oh, sir! believe me the future holds no hope of happiness so sweet to that lovely lady as a reunion with the husband of her youth."

"Ah, Ishmael! if I could believe this, my own youth would be restored; I should have a motive to live. You said, just now, that in the old sad times I had not loved this lady as she deserved to be loved. No—I married her hastily, impulsively—flattered by her evident preference for me; and just as I was beginning to know all her worth and beauty, lo! this fact of the nocturnal sojourn of the profligate Captain Dugald came to my knowledge—came to my knowledge with a convincing power, beyond all possibility of questioning. Oh, you see, I discovered the bare fact, without the explanation of it! I believed myself the dupe of a clever adventuress, and my love was nipped in the bud. If I could believe otherwise now,—if I could believe that she was innocent in that affair, and that she has loved me all these years, and been true to that love, and is ready and willing to forgive and forget the long, sorrowful past,—Ishmael, instead of being the most desolate, I should be the most contented man alive. I should feel like a shipwrecked sailor, long tossed about on the stormy sea, arriving safe at home at last!" said Mr. Brudenell, gazing most longingly upon the picture he held in his hand.

Ishmael was too wise to interrupt that contemplation by a single word at this moment.

"The thought that such a woman as this, Ishmael,—so richly endowed in beauty of form and mind and heart,—should be my loving companion for life, seems to me too great a hope for mortal man to indulge."

Ishmael did not speak.

"But here is the dilemma, my dear boy! either she did deceive me, or she did not. If she did deceive me, lovely as she is, I wish never to see her again. If she did not deceive me, then I have wronged her so long and so bitterly that she must wish never to see me again!" sighed Mr. Brudenell, as he mournfully closed the case of the miniature.

Then Ishmael spoke:

"Oh, sir! I have resolved to vindicate the honor of this lady, and I will do it. Soon I will have the German Jew, Ezra Isaacs, looked up; for he it was who, tempted by the false representations of Captain Dugald, secretly admitted him to her house and concealed him in her dressing room. And he shall be brought to confess it. Then you will see, sir, the perfect innocence of the countess. And for the rest, if you wish to prove her undiminished love; her perfect willingness to forget the past; her eagerness for a reconciliation—go to her, prove it all; and, oh, sir, be happier in your sober, middle age than ever you hoped to be, even in your sanguine youth."

The young man spoke so fervently, so strongly, so earnestly that Mr. Brudenell seized his hand, and gazing affectionately in his eloquent face, said:

"What a woman's advocate you are, Ishmael!" "It is because a woman's spirit has hovered over me, from the beginning of my life, I think."

"Your angel mother's spirit, Ishmael. Ah, brighter, and sweeter and dearer than all things in my life, is the memory of that pastoral poem of my boyish love. It is the one oasis in the desert of my life."

"Forget it, dear sir; forget it all. Think of your boyhood love as an angel in heaven, and love her only so. Do this for the sake of that sweet lady who has a right to your exclusive earthly devotion."

"Oh strange, and passing strange, that Nora's son should advocate the cause of Nora's rival!" said Herman Brudenell wonderingly.

"Not Nora's rival, sir. An angel in heaven, beaming in the light of God's smile, can never have a rival—least of all, a rival in a pilgrim of this earth. For the rest, if Nora's son speaks, it is because Nora's spirit inspires him," said Ishmael solemnly.

"Your life, indeed, seems to have been angel-guided, and your counsels angel-inspired, Ishmael; and they shall guide me. Yes, Nora's son; in this crisis of my fate your hand shall lead me. And I know that it will lead me into a haven of rest."

Soon after this the father and son retired for the night.

Ishmael, secure in his own happy love and easy in his blameless conscience, soon fell asleep.

Herman Brudenell lay awake, thinking over all that he had heard; blaming himself for his share of the sorrowful past, and seeing always the figure of the beautiful countess in her years of lonely widowhood. It is something for a solitary and homeless man, like Herman Brudenell, to discover suddenly that he has for years been the sole object of a good and beautiful woman's love, and to know that a home as happy and a wife as lovely as his youthful imagination ever pictured were now waiting to receive him, if he would come and take possession.

Early the next morning Ishmael arose, refreshed, from a good night's rest; but Mr. Brudenell got up, weary, from a sleepless pillow.

It was to be a busy day with Ishmael, so, after a hasty breakfast, he took a temporary leave of Mr. Brudenell and set out. His first visit was to the chambers of the Messrs. Hudson, solicitors, Burton Street, Piccadilly. Where all parties are agreed business must be promptly dispatched, despite of even the law's proverbial delays. The Earl of Hurstmonceux and Judge Merlin were quite agreed in this affair of restitution, and therefore their attorneys could have little trouble.

As the reader knows, upon the marriage of the Viscount Vincent and Claudia Merlin, there had been no settlements; therefore the whole of the bride's fortune became the absolute property of the bridegroom. Subsequently, Lord Vincent had died intestate; therefore Claudia as his widow would have been legally entitled to but a portion of that very fortune she herself had brought to him in marriage; all the rest falling to the viscount's family, or rather to its representative, the Earl of Hurstmonceux. It was this legal injustice that the earl wished to rectify, by making over to Lady Vincent all his right, title, and interest in the estate left by the deceased Lord Vincent. This business he had intrusted to his solicitors, giving them full power to act in his name, and Ishmael, with the concurrence of Judge Merlin, made it his business to see that every binding, legal form was observed in the transfer, so that Lady Vincent should rest undisturbed in her possessions by any grasping heir that might succeed the Earl of Hurstmonceux.

When this arrangement with the Messrs. Hudson was satisfactorily completed, Ishmael entered a cab and drove to Scotland Yard. He succeeded in obtaining an immediate interview with Inspector Meadows, to whose hands he committed the task of looking up the German Jew, Ezra Isaacs. Next he drove to Broad Street, to the agency of a celebrated line of ocean steamers. After looking over their programme of steamers advertised to sail, and reading the list of passengers booked for each, he found that he could engage berths for his whole party in a fine steamer to sail that day fortnight, from Liverpool for New York. He secured the berths by paying the passage money down and taking tickets at once. Finally, he re- entered the cab and drove back to his hotel. He found that Mr. Brudenell had walked out. That did not surprise Ishmael. Mr. Brudenell generally did walk out. Like all homeless, solitary, and unoccupied men, Mr. Brudenell had formed rambling habits; and had he been a degree or so lower in the social scale, he must have been classed among the vagrants.

Ishmael sat down in the unoccupied parlor to write to Judge Merlin. He told the judge of the satisfactory completion of his business with the solicitors of the Earl of Hurstmonceux; and that he had the documents effecting the restitution of Lady Vincent's property in his own safe-keeping; that he did not like to trust them to the mail, but would bring them in person when. he should return to Edinboro', which would be as soon as a little affair that he had in hand could be arranged; and he hinted that Mr. Brudenell would probably accompany him to Scotland. Finally, he informed the judge that he had engaged passages for their party in the ocean mail steamer "Columbus," to sail on Saturday, the 15th, from Liverpool for New York. He ended with sending affectionate respects to Lady Vincent and the Countess of Hurstmonceux. Being anxious to catch the afternoon mail at the last moment, Ishmael did not intrust the delivery of this letter to the waiters of the hotel, but took his hat and hurried out to post it himself. By paying the extra penny exacted for late letters he got it into the mail and then walked back to the hotel.

Mr. Brudenell had returned, and at the moment of Ishmael's entrance he was in solemn consultation with the waiter about the dinner. After dinner that day Ishmael went out to visit the tower of London, to him the most interesting of all the ancient buildings in that ancient city. At night he went with Mr. Brudenell to the old classic Drury Lane Theater to see Kean in "Richard III." After that intellectual festival they returned to Morley's to supper and to bed. On Sunday morning they attended divine service at St. Paul's. The next morning, Ishmael, with Mr. Brudenell, paid a visit to Westminster Abbey, where the tombs of the ancient kings and warriors engaged their attention nearly the whole day. It was late in the afternoon when they returned to Morley's, where the first thing Ishmael heard was that a person was waiting for him in the parlor.

Mr. Brudenell went directly to his chamber to change his dress, but Ishmael repaired to the parlor, where he expected to see someone from Scotland Yard.

He found the German Jew sitting there.

"Why, Isaacs? Is this you, already? I am very glad to see you! Mr. Meadows sent you, I suppose?" said Ishmael, advancing and shaking hands with his visitor.

"Mishter Meators? Who is he? No, Mishter Meators tit not zend me here; no one tit; I gome myzelf. I saw your name in te list of arrivals at dish house, bublished in tish morningsh babers. Ant I zaid—dish is te name of von drue shentlemans; ant I'll gall to see him; and here I am," replied the Jew, cordially returning Ishmael's shake of the hand.

"Thank you, Isaacs, for your good opinion of me. Sit down. I have been very anxious to see you, to speak to you on a subject that I must broach at once, lest we should be interrupted before we have discussed it," said Ishmael, who was desirous of bringing Isaacs to confession before the entrance of Mr. Brudenell.

"Sbeak ten!" said the Jew, settling himself in the big armchair.

"Isaacs, you had a beautiful kinswoman of whom you used to speak to me on our voyage; but you never told me her name," said Ishmael gravely, seating himself near the Jew.

"Titn't I, verily? Vell, her name vas Berenice, daughter of Zillah; Zillah vas mine moder's shister, and vas very fair to look upon. She marriet mit a rish Lonton Shew, and tiet leafing von fair daughter Berenice, mine kinsvoman, who marriet mit an English lort; very olt, very boor, put very mush in love mit my kinsvoman. He marriet her pecause zhe was fair to look upon and very rish; her fader made her marry him pecause he was a lort; he zoon tied and left her a witow, ant zhe never marriet again; zhe left te country and vas away many years ant I have nod zeen her zince. My fair kinswoman! Zhe hat a great wrong done her!" said the Jew, dropping his chin upon his chest and falling into sad and penitential reverie.

"Yes, Isaacs," said Ishmael, rising and laying his hand solemnly on the breast of the Jew. "Yes, Isaacs, she had a great wrong done her, a greater wrong than even you can imagine; a wrong so great in its devastating effects upon her life that you cannot even estimate its enormity! But, Isaacs, you can do something to right this wrong!"

"I! Fader Abraham, what can I?" exclaimed the Jew, impressed and frightened by the earnestness of Ishmael's words.

"You can make a full disclosure of the circumstances under which the miscreant Dromlie Dugald obtained access to Lady Hurstmonceux's private apartments."

The Jew gazed up in the young man's face, as though he was unable to withdraw his eyes; he seemed to be held spellbound by the powerful magnetism of Ishmael's spirit.

"Isaacs," continued the young man, "whatever may be the nature of these disclosures, I promise you that you shall be held free of consequences-I promise you; and you know the value of my promise."

The Jew did not answer and did not remove his eyes from the earnest, eloquent face of Ishmael.

"So you see, Isaacs, that your disclosures, while they will deliver the countess from the suspicions under which her happiness has drooped for so many years, can do you no injury And now, Isaacs, I ask you, as man speaking to man, a question that I adjure you to answer, as you shall answer at that great day of account, when quick and dead shall stand before the bar of God, and the secret of all hearts shall be revealed—did you admit Dromlie Dugald to the private apartments of the Countess of Hurstmonceux, without the knowledge or the consent of her ladyship?"

"Cot forgive me, I tit!" exclaimed the Jew, in a low terrified voice.

"That will do, Isaacs," said Ishmael, ringing the bell.

A waiter came.

"Is there an unoccupied sitting room that I can have the use of for a short time?" inquired Ishmael.

"Yes, sir."

"Show me to it immediately, then."

The waiter led the way, and Ishmael, beckoning the Israelite to accompany him, followed to a comfortable little parlor, warmed by a bright little fire, such as they kept always ready for chance guests.

"Writing materials, James," said Ishmael.

The man went for them; and while he was gone, Ishmael said:

"We might have been interrupted in the other room, Isaacs; that is the reason why I have brought you here."

When the waiter had returned with the writing materials, and arranged them on the table, and again had withdrawn from the room, Ishmael drew a chair to the table, seated himself, took a pen, and said:

"Now Isaacs, sit down near me, and relate, as faithfully as you can, all the circumstances attending the concealment of Dromlie Dugald in Lady Hurstmonceux's apartments."

The Jew, as if acting under the spell of a powerful spirit, did as he was ordered. He drew a chair to the table, seated himself opposite Ishmael, and—to use a common phrase—"made a clean breast of it."

I will not attempt to give his confession in detail. I will only give the epitome of it. He acknowledged that he had been bribed by Captain Dugald to favor his (the captain's) addresses to the beautiful young widow. But he solemnly declared that he had supposed himself to be acting as much for the lady's good as for his own interest, when he took the captain's money and admitted him freely to the house of his kinswoman, where he himself was staying, a temporary guest, and where he received her suitor as his visitor.

Farther, he more solemnly declared that on that fatal evening when he secretly admitted the captain to the house, and guided him to the boudoir of the countess, he had not the remotest suspicion of the nefarious purpose of the suitor. He thought Dugald merely wished for an opportunity for pressing his suit. He had no idea that the unscrupulous villain designed to conceal himself in the closet of the dressing room, and so pass the night in Lady Hurstmonceux's apartments, and show himself in the morning in dishabille at her open window, for the benefit of all the passengers through the street.

He affirmed that when in the morning he heard of this infamous abuse of confidence on the part of his patron, he had not had courage to meet his kinswoman at breakfast, but had decamped from the house in great haste, and had never seen the countess since that eventful day.

He said that he had heard how much she had suffered from the affair, at least for a short time; and that afterwards he had heard she had left the country; that he had since supposed the whole circumstance had been forgotten, and he did not even now understand how his disclosures should serve her, since no one now remembered the escapade of Captain Dugald.

As Isaacs spoke, Ishmael took down the statement in writing. When it was finished he turned to the Jew and said:

"You are mistaken in one thing—nay, indeed, in two things, Isaacs! The first is, in the supposition that your disclosures cannot now serve the countess, since the world has long ago done her full justice. It is true that the world has done her full justice, for there is no lady living more highly esteemed than is the Countess of Hurstmonceux. So if the world were only in question, Isaacs, I need never have troubled you to speak. But there is an individual in question; and this brings me to your second mistake in the matter; namely, in the supposition that the countess never married again. She did marry again; hut, a few months subsequent to her marriage, her husband heard the story of Captain Dugald's adventure, as it was then circulated and believed; and he thought himself the dupe of a cunning adventuress, and estranged himself from his wife from that day until this."

"Fader Abraham!" exclaimed the Jew, raising both his hands in consternation.

"Providence has lately put me in possession of all the facts in this case, and has enabled me to pave the way for a reconciliation between the long-severed pair—supposing that you will have the moral courage to do your kinswoman justice."

"Fader Abraham, I vill do her shustice! I vill do her more as shustice. I vill tell te whole truth. I vill tell more as te whole truth, and shwear to it. I vill do anyding. I vould do anyding alt te time, if I had known it," said the Jew earnestly.

"Thank you, Isaacs, I only want the simple truth; more than that would do us harm instead of good. This is the simple truth, I hope, that I have taken down from your lips?"

"Yesh, tat ish te zimple truth!"

"I will read the whole statement to you, Isaacs, and then you will be able to see whether I have taken down your words correctly," said Ishmael. And he took up the manuscript and read it carefully through, pausing frequently to give the Jew an opportunity of correcting him, if necessary.

"Dat ish all right," said Isaacs, when the reading was finished.

"Now sign it, Isaacs."

The Jew affixed his signature.

"Now, Isaacs that is all I want of you for the present; but should you be required to make oath to the truth of this, I suppose that you will be found ready to do so."

"Fader Abraham! yes, I vill do anyding at all, or anyding else, to serve mine kinswoman," said the Jew, rising.

"Thank you, Isaacs. Now tell me where I shall find you, in case you shall be wanted?"

"I am lotging mit mine frient, Samuel Phineas, Butter Lane,
Burrough."

"I will remember. Thank you, Isaacs. You have done your kinswoman and her friends good service. She will be grateful to you. I have no doubt she will send for you. Would you like to come to her?"

"Mit all my feet. Vere ish she?"

"At her country-seat, Cameron Court, near Edinboro'."

"I ton't know id."

"No, you don't know it. It is a comparatively recent purchase of her ladyship, I believe," said Ishmael, rising to accompany the Jew from the room.

As they went out they rang the bell, to warn the waiter that they had evacuated the apartment. In the hall Isaacs bade him good- afternoon, and Ishmael turned into the sitting room occupied in common by himself and Mr. Brudenell. He found the table laid for dinner and Mr. Brudenell walking impatiently up and down the floor.

"Ah, you are there! I was afraid you would be late, and the fish and the soup would be spoiled, but here you are in the very nick of time," he said, as he touched the bell. "Dinner immediately," he continued, addressing himself to the waiter, who answered his summons. But it was not until after dinner was over, and the cloth removed, and Mr. Brudenell had finished his bottle of claret and smoked out his principe, that Ishmael told him of his interview with Isaacs, and laid the written statement of the Jew before him. Mr. Brudenell read it carefully through, with the deepest interest. When he had finished it, he slowly folded it up and placed it in his breast pocket, dropped his head upon his chest, and remained in deep thought and perfect silence.

After the lapse of a few moments Ishmael spoke:

"If you think it needful, sir, Isaacs is ready to go before a magistrate and make oath to the truth of that statement."

"It is not needful, Ishmael; I have not the least doubt of its perfect truth. It is not of that I am thinking; but—of my wife. How will she receive me? One thing is certain, that having deeply injured her, I must go to her and acknowledge the wrong and ask her forgiveness. But, oh, Ishmael, what atonement will that be for years of cruel injustice and abandonment? None, none! No, I feel that I can make her no atonement," said Mr. Brudenell bitterly.

"No, sir; you can make her no atonement, but—you can make her happy. And that is all she will need," said Ishmael gravely and sweetly.

"If I thought I could, Ishmael, I would hasten to her at once. In any case, however, I must go to her, acknowledge the wrong I have done her and ask for pardon. But, ah! how will she receive me?"

"Only go and see for yourself, sir, I implore you," said Ishmael earnestly.

"When do you return to Scotland, Ishmael?"

"When you are ready to accompany me, sir; I am waiting only for you," answered Ishmael, smiling.

"Then we will go by the early express train to-morrow morning," said
Mr. Brudenell.

"Very well, sir; I shall be ready," smiled Ishmael.

Mr. Brudenell rang for tea. And when it was set on the table he ordered the waiter to call him at five o'clock the next morning, to have his bill ready, and get a fly to the door to take them to the Great Northern Railroad Station in time to meet the six o'clock express train for Edinboro'.

After tea the two gentlemen remained conversing some little time longer, and then retired to their bed-chamber, where, being without the help and hindrance of a valet, they packed their own portmanteaus. And then they went to bed early in order to secure a long and good night's rest, preparatory to their proposed journey of the next morning.