"I could say no more, for my ignorance of the cause of her distress put it out of my power to offer consolation, more particularly as it was her expressed wish that I should remain in ignorance. I staid an hour with her, during which time I learned that her husband had been suddenly called to New York on business. It was one of the unhappiest hours I ever spent in my life. On going away, I could not help recalling the conversation I had once held with Sarah Corbin about Mr. Eaverson, nor help feeling that there might be too much truth in her declarations that she believed him to be a man without honour or virtue. There was no doubt in my mind that Harriet's distress was in some way connected with her husband's absence, and it occurred to me that the letter I had seen upon the floor, and which she concealed so eagerly, might not have been intended for her eyes, and might contain things which for her to know would be fatal to her peace through life. In this, my conjectures were of course true. "I called in to see Mrs. Eaverson on the next day, reluctantly, but from a sense of duty. I found her calm, but pale, and with a look of distress. She said but little. No allusion whatever was made to the condition in which I had found her on the previous afternoon. I sat only half an hour, and then went away. I could not stay longer, for my presence seemed oppressive to her, and hers was equally so to me. "On the third day succeeding that on which Mr. Eaverson went to New York, I saw a newspaper paragraph headed, 'Melancholy Circumstances.' It related, briefly, that the daughter of respectable and wealthy parents in New York had been deeply wronged about a year previous by an unprincipled cousin, whom she passionately loved. The consequence was, that the young man had to leave the city, under the promise of never returning to it, unless he consented to marry his cousin. This penalty was imposed by the father of the girl, who declared his intention to shoot him if he ever saw him in New York. The result of this baseness on the part of the young man was the utter estrangement of his family. They threw him off entirely. But, as he had a handsome fortune in his own right, and the cause of his removal from New York did not become generally known, he soon found his way into the best society in a neighbouring city. Some months afterwards he married a lovely girl, who was all unconscious of the base retch into whose keeping she had given the inestimable jewel of her love. A few days since, the narration proceeded, the cousin, by some means or other, obtained a knowledge of this fact. She wrote to him demanding an interview, and threatening that if she did not obtain one in twenty-four hours, she would immediately come to him and ascertain for herself, if what she had heard were true. Alarmed for the peace of his bride, the young man hurried on to New York, and, at the risk of his life, gained an interview with the lovely girl he had so deeply injured.