Why did you not take Mr. Addison with you to Crofton, this afternoon, Mary ?" inquired Miss Stanhope.

are

"Miss Prior wisely remembered the proverb, Two company, three none," he said, smiling, not waiting for my reply. "I don't think I could have been cruel enough to spoil her enjoyment by intruding."

"Which knowledge on my part must explain my want of politeness. I did not wish to give Mr. Addison the pain of refusing." "How wonderfully polite you two people are to each other!" said Miss Stanhope, gaily." One would think that you had been studying Lord Chesterfield all the afternoon."

"Addison spoke of leaving to-night, but I have refused to part with him," said Colonel Stanhope. "I can't possibly let you go until Saturday, my dear fellow; for I have put off the man I wanted you to meet until our festivities are over."

"If you let me off this evening I will come again on Saturday," he returned.

"I have something to say in that matter," said Miss Stanhope. "I cannot part with you: I want all the men I can get for tomorrow night." After a pause, she continued: "Adrian is always useless on these occasions, and you are just the one to help me above all others. Come, Mary, join your entreaty to my insisting, and I am sure we shall gain our point. We cannot spare him-can we?"

It was an embarrassing question, but I determined to answer it without compromise to myself-so I said

"Mr. Addison would no doubt be an invaluable aide-de-camp; but I think he ought to be free to please himself."

"You are not half pressing enough, Mary. I shall not employ you as an advocate if you cannot throw more warmth into my cause you should plead as if it were your own," said Miss Stanhope.

Seeing that the conversation was becoming painful to one or both of us, Colonel Stanhope turned it off lightly, remarking— "Of course Addison will stay,-he is too good a fellow to make us all unhappy by going."

I had grown so self-conscious again that I did not dare look up. I felt that my repentance was so plainly written in my eyes, that he must have read it had they met his own, and he would have seen how earnestly I longed for him to stay—that is, if he cared to read or see-a doubt now for ever haunting me; for a strong soul like his could so quickly master every feeling; he would never long remain the slave of a defeat, but rise above it stronger than before.

I was so glad when the weary meal was at an end, and I was free

to expand, no longer frozen by his icy coldness, which was paralysing.

"My dear, go up into the morning room," said Miss Stanhope, when we had left the gentlemen. "I am just going to look around how things are progressing. I am sure the hammering we have had all day has been quite enough to affect the stoutest nerves. I am surprised to find how well Adrian bears it; he forgets it, I think, in Mr. Addison's society. By the way, dear, I thought you were very cool to him at dinner; dont you approve of him?"

Perfectly; he is excellent in his way," I answered, in a tone of assumed indifference.

"Which does not strike you particularly, I suppose? Well, take a rest; you look tired—I shall not be long."

Wearied out with suppressed feeling I was soon asleep. I awoke, not knowing where I was or if it were night or morning -awoke with a start and cry of astonishment, as my eyes fell upon Mr. Addison, who was sitting on the sofa opposite.

Half alarmed, and not in the least responsible for what I said in my scarcely-conscious state, I cried out passionately

"What are you doing here? Why do you haunt me !"

"Don't be frightened," he said, gently; "I found you asleep. I did not disturb, nor do I wish to haunt you, as you say. I came here, and remain here only at Colonel Stanhope's very earnest request, and not for my own pleasure, that you must surely know; though you are good enough to make it more supportable than I ever expected it would be. Some mental, like many physical pains, are only cured by violent means, and I am grateful that you so well understand the treatment, and have not spared me, but tried to cure me!"

I was wide awake now, and stared at him in blank astonishment. "Do explain yourself," I said. "I feel quite innocent of the charge you are making-what do you mean?"

Simply this: that I see you are hard and cruel, when I thought you otherwise; you seem unable to forgive me for having loved you!"

The injustice of his remark, made in proud defiance, so agitated me that I was unable to reply. When our idols turn again and rend us, hope and justice seem to die. It was well for me at that moment that I felt his sting as I did, for it showed me that my god was but mortal, and not the perfect man I took him for.

Some shocks fall upon us with such force that speech, and even sense are crushed, we feel, when passing such times in review, that we were armed with unanswerable argument to prove our innocence, but dumbness held us in its spell. I longed, yet was powerless to

tell him how the coldness which he blamed but hid what I longed, yet trembled intolerably to disclose, and the burden of which was becoming oppressive.

Unable to sit there under the helpless sense of his rebuke I rose from my seat, intending to go to my room; an impulse seized me, as I passed him, to pause and say

'Why can we not be friends?"

I had hardly uttered the healing words which might have made all smooth between us, when the door opened, and Colonel Stanhope coming in, put an end to our painful interview.

Where were you going to, Mary? I can't have any more I wish you and running away to-night-I want some music. Addison would sing one of those duets you used to sing at Southport."

"I "I don't feel able to sing to-night; kindly excuse me,' "I have brought no pleaded, still anxious to leave the room. duets." "That is no reason you should run away from us entirely. Come back and sit down, like a good girl, and sing us something.

"I think you are very unkind to ask me when I don't feel able; perhaps you will?" I said, timidly, as I turned to Mr. Addison; for one moment our eyes met,-there was a kinder expression in his which gave me courage.

"Never mind-I will sing," I said, acting on a second thought. I would tell him all I felt in song.

"I can only attempt something very simple," I said, as I played the opening bars of the old Jacobite song, "My heart is sair!" Very feebly, scarce able to control my voice, I began―

"My heart is sair I daurna tell,
My heart is sair for somebody."

until I reached the climax

"While I live I'll ne'er forget

The parting look o' somebody."

It expressed so thoroughly everything I felt that I sang it with all my soul, thankful for the valve of escape it offered. Often as music has made my heart rejoice, never do I remember it with such gratitude as on that evening. Words and melody had carried me out of myself. I had confided my woes to the sympathetic spirit of song, and had found relief.

"I am afraid Arthur has been more than usually destructive to your peace of mind to-day," said Colonel Stanhope, with an attempt at banter. "You sang that as if you knew what you were saying, and felt every word of it."

Perhaps I did; though I think it rather hard you should make Captain Crofton the author of my supposed miseries," I

answered gaily. My song had done me good-it had given me back my freedom-for awhile, at least. I could have said anything at that moment; all thought of sorrow had vanished. I had hidden it away as we bury the anticipation of death in the midst of rapturous life.

"Now, Addison, do sing us something; Mary has fairly earned it of you," said Colonel Stanhope, as I returned to my seat by the window. Find him some music, Mary."

66

"You forget Mr. Addison can sing almost everything by heart; he is independent of music and accompaniments."

"As well as of most other things," he said, with a short laugh, by no means harsh. He had a wonderfully soft voice in speaking, soft yet firm-no stranger to tenderness either, as I knew. Ah should I ever hear it again as I heard it that day. He went to the piano and sang "The Message,"

"I had a message to send her

To her whom my soul loves best,"

with a power and pathos that made me tremble. When he had finished the last line, which is triumphant-having laid its message on the wings of song, the heart is no longer restless, but is content to wait-we could not speak our thanks.

Colonel Stanhope was very much affected, holding out his hand to him, as he returned to a seat, he said

66

I believe, Addison, you could, if you liked, send a message to the dead with your power of heart and voice."

"I should be satisfied to awake the living; if I could only do that, I, too, would be content to wait," he returned.

I knew he had meant that last remark for me. ever be able to tell him that I was awake, and yet, him, how-after what had passed-was he to know? alone at that moment I must have told; his song upon me I could have knelt at his

How should I

unless I told

Had we been with the influence of feet and asked him to

forgive me for not having known it sooner. Fortunately circumstances save us from yielding to our rashest impulses, which, like dews of night, evaporate in the glare of reality. Still time was slipping by; he was soon going, and once parted, no such opportunity as the present might ever again occur; and now, more than ever, I knew what that would mean for me. It would be the eating canker of a life-long regret, uncheered by hope, unblest by love.

THE next words startled me. They were from Colonel Stanhope, who had been sitting in his chair for some time, wrapt in thought.

"Addison, your song has acted powerfully. I feel as if the c'rcumstances were favourable for a seance, and that some mani. festation would be vouchsafed to me to-night. Would you mind going down stairs and speaking to Catherine about it. Tell her I should like her to come if she will."

As soon as Mr. Addison was gone, Colonel Stanhope called me to him.

"You won't be alarmed, I hope, Mary-remember I approach the subject earnestly; with me it is almost, if not altogether, a religion, whereby from time to time messages have been communicated to me at first from, and then by one I loved. Occa. sionally as faith and knowledge have increased she has appeared to me; but this only after much agonised longing. As Christ says: "This kind comes not but by prayer and fasting.""

"Will you, may you see her to-night ?" I inquired trembling, hoping devoutly I might be no party to any such appearance.

Nay, I think not; but I may receive some beloved message, some consoling assurance. Or it may be for you, my child. Often when the heart is very full of any subject which creates much introspection, together with much longing, which spiritualises the soul until we become unconscious of our bodily frames, such a condition attracts the sympathy of loved and loving spirits, who can then more readily communicate with us. Thus are messages vouchsafed,"

"But if it need such powerful faith, I am hardly qualified to join with you. I reverence, with what may be called politeness more than anything else, the different religious convictions of mankind for the solace they separately afford their adherents; and this is all that I can accord to spiritualism, which, as a faith, I don't believe."

"That matters not in the present instance. It is the scoffer