“As day after day rolled by without receiving any intelligence from her, I grew more and more uneasy, until, as the term of my absence drew toward a close, my sensations approached to agony. A few disappointments I had borne with fortitude, if not with calmness, for I knew that the mail was not always regular; but when days grew into weeks, and weeks had almost grown into months, without the arrival of a single line from Isabel, either directly from our residence, or indirectly by the way of P——, nay fears grew insupportable. I was like Prometheus chained to a rock, and subject to a torture from which there was no escape. At length I could endure it no longer, but hastily bringing my business to a close, even at a considerable sacrifice, I set out by rapid journeys toward my home, without even passing by P——, such was my eagerness to know what could have been the cause of Isabel’s silence. “It was on an evening in the latter part of the month of March, when my jaded horses drew up before the gate of my dwelling. Hastily alighting, I entered the little lawn, and was soon at my long-sought-for threshold. But I started back at the sight that met my eyes. The windows were dark and cheerless; the grass was covered with leaves and broken twigs; the knobs upon the door were soiled for want of burnishing; and everything around wore that appearance of loneliness and desolation which marks an uninhabited house. With a fainting heart I lifted the knocker. The sounds echoed with hollow distinctness through the house; but no one replied to the summons. Again and again I repeated it; and again and again I was unsuccessful. With a heart wild with the most terrible fears I passed to the back part of the house; but there, too, I found the same silence and desolation. It was like the house of the dead. Unable longer to contain myself I rushed back to my carriage, and with an air that made the coachman believe me insane, ordered him to drive to a neighboring farm-house. “‘Who’s there?’ asked a female voice from inside of the cottage, in answer to my impetuous knock. “‘I, madam, do you not know me? But where, in heaven’s name, is Isabel? where is my wife?’ I exclaimed, seeing by the astonished looks of the woman, that she, too, believed me out of my senses, ‘what is the matter at my house, that I find it closed?’ “‘Oh! la,’ answered the woman, curtseying as she held the candle to my face, ‘you are the gentleman that lived at the big house nigh to the stage-road, across the creek. Gracious me! how wild you look. But, sit down, sir; we ain’t very nice just now, for baby’s sick, and we can’t afford help—’ “‘Woman,’ I exclaimed, vehemently interrupting her, and seizing her fiercely by the arm, ‘in God’s name tell me all. Answer me at once—is my wife dead?’ and though my voice grew husky, it trembled not, as I put the fearful question.