The doctor, the while, led Alfred through the hall, assisted him into his (the doctor's) carriage, which stood at the door, and begged to know whither he desired to be driven. The question had to be repeated more than once before a murmur, from which something like the address was at length collected, could be drawn from Alfred. CHAPTER XVIII. The movement of the carriage, and the necessity of descending from it, having aroused Alfred from the first paralysing effects of his grief, he now paced his apartment rapidly, and continued to do so almost the whole of the night; too much absorbed by his miserable reflections, to be conscious of the bodily fatigue he was thus incurring. Yet it was impossible to be still! Was she indeed dead?--was the question, he again and again, asked himself. Then, with indescribable agony, he recalled the bewildered terror of those dear eyes during the single moment they had met his. How short was the period which had since elapsed; she was then in life--was it possible! could she be already gone for ever? A lingering feeling, in some sort allied to hope, though altogether irrational, still struggled with his despair. It is after waiting in vain, as it were, for a reprieve from fate, that sorrow for the dead seems gradually to reach its climax. It is not in the first hour of bereavement that we can comprehend our wretchedness; so difficult is it to believe, that in a few short moments, the great, the awful change, has taken place and eternity for a fellow-mortal, who trod the path of earth with us but now, commenced. Then would he view, with stern despair, the mysterious union, by which his own fate, the fate of poor Willoughby, and that of Caroline, seemed linked together in misery. "But she is now at rest," he would add, and after dwelling for a time on this idea, gentler emotions would arise; and he would strain his mental vision to behold the shadowy regions of that "bourn whence no traveller returns," as though tenderness thus sought for some locality in which to picture to itself the cherished image of the being beloved. Night passed away, and morning came, but its light brought with it the unsufferable thought, that even now the busy preparations of the living, to rid themselves of the dead, were in all probability being commenced!--Once more--yes, once more, he must behold her! And then he would think of his poor mother, and patiently await his own release. As he formed this resolve, he was crossing his apartment, to descend into the street and hasten back to the villa, when the door flew open and Lady Arden entered. "Alfred! my son," she exclaimed, "you are justified!" unable to articulate further, she wept passionately, but her tears flowed over a countenance radiant with joy.