Then very rapidly he repeated in substance the story he had told her father, touching as lightly as possible on Adelaide’s duplicity, but still making the matter plain to Alice and clear to him, who, with clasped hands and wildly beating heart, listened breathlessly to the strange tale he heard. Richard Howland was undeceived at last, and the girl he had almost loved was revealed to him in her true character, as an artful, designing woman. The father, who he supposed was dead, stood there, a living, breathing man, identical, he was sure, with the agent of whom he had often heard, and, worse than all, the people against whom she had breathed her dark insinuations, were innocent of evil; the wrong was on the other side, and he had been her dupe; had even thought it possible to call that girl his wife. His wife! how he loathed the very idea now that he knew her guilt, and how his conscience smote him for having ever wronged in thought the helpless old blind man and his gentle, fair-haired daughter. They had suffered, too, from his neglect, but he could make amends for that, and his heart went out in pity toward Alice as he contrasted her former life with her present dreary lot. The party was forgotten, and while Adelaide, in a most impatient mood, watched each fresh arrival, he, for whom she watched in vain, smoothed the tumbled pillow, bathed the burning brow, or brought the cooling draught, and then spoke words of comfort to the weeping Alice, who read upon his face, and that of Mr. Huntington, a confirmation of her fears. But not that night did Mr. Warren die, though the physician, for whom Mr. Huntington was sent, would give no hope. The disease had assumed a most alarming form, he said, and Mr. Howland’s hand rested pityingly on the bowed head of the young girl who was soon to be an orphan. The morning came, and then, as it was necessary for him to go home for a time, he left both father and child to the care of Mr. Huntington, promising to send down one of his domestics, and to return himself ere long. CHAPTER X. REVELATIONS. The morning train from Albany had thundered through the town, and Mr. Howland was about returning to the hollow, when hasty footsteps were heard in the hall, and in a moment his sister stood before him. She had traveled night and day since leaving Milwaukee, she said, but she didn’t mind it at all, she was so impatient to be at home and tell him what she had heard, and, without so much as untying her bonnet, Miss Elinor continued: