After a moment's consideration, he dismounted, and walked quietly round to the spot where the negroes still kept up their lively dance. One of them, Bruno by name, stood a little apart, a smiling spectator of the merriment that he was too old to join. It was easy to touch him on the shoulder, without attracting the notice of the rest. The negro turned, and instantly recognized Bergan; but his exclamation of surprise was cut short by the young man's significant gesture, and he silently followed him to a spot equi-distant between the cottage and the dancers. "All well, Bruno?" was Bergan's first inquiry. "All bery well, Massa Arling. You's welcome back, sah. But I'se sorry you's too late for de weddin'." _The wedding_,--the word fell almost meaninglessly on Bergan's ear, so intent was he upon satisfying himself that his late anxieties had been groundless. "And Miss Carice," he went on, "is she quite well, too?" Bruno smiled. "Yes, massa, I 'spec so, tho' she do look mighty pale and peaked, dese yere last weeks. But dey mostly look so, at sich times, I s'pose. She'll be better when de weddin's ober, an' all de fuss and flurry." This second mention of "the wedding" penetrated to Bergan's understanding, and awakened a faint emotion of surprise. "The wedding!--whose wedding?" he asked. Bruno opened his eyes wide in astonishment. "Why, don' you know, sah? I thought you'd come on purpose. Miss Carice's weddin', to be sure." It was Bergan's turn to look more than astonished, confounded. "Miss Carice's wedding!" he repeated, as doubting the trustworthiness of his own ears. "Yes, sah, to Doctor Remy, sah. Dey had--" Bruno stopped short in alarm. Bergan's face had grown deadly pale, his blank stare was that of a man who neither saw nor heard. For a few merciful moments, he was simply stunned with the suddenness and severity of the shock. Too soon his benumbed senses began to revive, he put his hand to his head, where a dull, heavy pain was beginning to make itself felt; mechanically he sat down on the grass, and his breath came hard like that of a man stricken with apoplexy. With a delicacy not uncommon in his race, Bruno turned his eyes away. A trusted servant of the household, he had seen Bergan and Carice together enough to be able to divine something of the state of the case.