“Thank Heaven I’m in time to stop her! She’ll have to stay with me now; but she will find a way of making it more a punishment for me than for her, I expect. What an ass I am to care about her--I mean, to have cared about her! I’ll just show her the difference now. She shall see if it wasn’t better to have a churlish husband for a slave than for a master. She despised me, did she, and thought me a fool for letting her do what she liked with me? Yes, that is the way with women. Well, now it is her turn to do what I like; and I sha’n’t be so soft about it either. I’ll just----Confound her, I’ve a good mind to let her go off with him, and snap my fingers at her and be rid of her! Ay, and I would, too, only she is my wife, worse luck, and I must do for my honor what I wouldn’t do for her. No, that I wouldn’t! Oh, good Heaven, will she never love me? I’m not good enough for her; but I’m not such a cur as that fellow!” As the minutes dragged on, a hope began to rise within him that she was not coming, after all, while he could see, to his joy, that the anxiety of the man he was watching had grown keener. Still they heard no sound, though they listened intently, the one in hope, the other in deadliest fear. At last Harry saw Colonel Richardson turn his head quickly, as if his ear had caught some expected sound; then he laid his hand upon the latch of the gate. Still Harry heard nothing. But a minute later, through the falling snow, he saw above him, swiftly approaching down the soft, white track of the pathway, a woman’s figure; and with a silent curse and a heart heavy within him, his eyes turned quickly to the man who was stealing his treasure. Colonel Richardson had raised the latch of the gate, opened it, and stood inside, waiting. Harry’s anger blazed up with fresh intensity. “I’ll shoot him like a dog!” thought he. And he stepped out from the shrubbery on to the pathway, drew out his revolver, and covered the other man with it as steadily as he had ever aimed at a partridge. Then he stood still, waiting for the other to turn and see him. But Colonel Richardson’s attention was fixed on the rapidly approaching figure. Harry would not look at her. It was not until the two had met that his eyes, in watching the man, fell upon the woman also. “I could not get away before; the boys were all over the house,” she was whispering, deprecatingly. His hand with the revolver dropped to his side as he sprung forward and in a few strides reached them and dragged her away. “Lilian!” * * * * * At twenty minutes to twelve that night Annie was roused from sleep by knocking at her door. “What is it?” she cried, sleepily. But the answer startled her into wakefulness. “Annie, Annie, open the door, for Heaven’s sake!” It was her husband’s voice, but hoarse, feeble, and broken. For one instant she paused. But there came another faltering knock, and Harry’s voice again, more feebly still, called: