“My poor Rose, I knew what your decision would be; I told the wretched man so. But, my dearest, it is proper that I should set the matter before you in its true light. Should you fail to expose the forged mortgage, you will not only lose the sum of forty thousand dollars, which was raised on your plantation, but, by the foreclosure of the mortgage, and the peremptory sale of the plantation, the property will be sacrificed at about a fourth of its real value, and you will lose all, my poor Rosalie.” “I do suppose so. Well, well; let all go—all, but peace of mind; for, my dearest Mark, could you or I enjoy peace of mind—could we take pleasure in our morning ramble, or our evening fireside—could we take comfort in anything, dearest Mark, if a deliberate deed of ours had consigned a fellow-creature—an old, gray-headed man—to a prison? Oh, never let it be dreamed of, Mark.” “That is a woman’s thought! Men would deem it a stern duty to prosecute the criminal.” “And do you?” “I should so deem it, but for the thought that this is the old man’s first offence, under great temptation; that it surely will be his last; that punishment, in his case, would not be reformatory, but ruinous; that no one can be tempted by the impunity of his crime, since no one but ourselves know it.” This was all that was said then. Mr. Bolling’s entrance interrupted the conversation; and Billy soon appeared and summoned the party to tea. And though Rosalie presided at her supper-table that evening with a graver face than usual, yet by the next morning she had recovered her self-possession and cheerfulness, and met them all at breakfast with a smile. CHAPTER XXXII. RESTITUTION. “Rouse to some high and holy work of love, And thou an angel’s happiness shalt know; Shalt bless the earth while in the world above; The work, begun by thee, shall onward go In many a branching stream and wider flow.”—_Carlos Wilcox._ A week after this, Mark Sutherland once more left home for a visit to Mississippi, on business. He went to make a final settlement with Clement Sutherland. The miserable old man had fallen, almost into a state of idiotcy. He gave up all the title deeds and various documents relating to Rosalie’s estate, but could give little or no information concerning them. The plantation was sold under the mortgage, and when all was done, and the final accounts cast up, Mark Sutherland found that of all his wife’s splendid fortune, but a paltry two thousand dollars was left. With this, Mark Sutherland prepared to leave the neighbourhood of Cashmere. But the day that he had fixed for his departure was signalized by a catastrophe that delayed his journey for weeks. It was the dreadful death of St. Gerald Ashley, who, during a fit of mania-a-potu, threw himself from a second story window, and, striking his head upon the iron trellis below, was instantly killed.