|OLD Jacob Forest had made a well-grounded complaint when he cried out with such vehemence that that fellow Derrick had actually left the front door open, and the Guard-ship and his rheumatism more exposed to the rigour of the elements even than usual; but to do his visitor justice, this rudeness was not committed with intention; Ralph knew not what he was doing; he was out of his mind with fury and despair. “Damn her!” screamed he, plucking the little bunch of violets from where he had placed them so tenderly but an hour before; “so she was false, too, like the rest of them. She had no more heart in her than a woman of stone; and I have been worshipping her all my life, just as a savage worships his idol. No wonder I took to that young son of hers--how like! how like!--and like, too, in his selfish soul! Why, I was calling yonder Sea a while ago a cruel smiling traitress--because in her wrath I thought that she had swallowed this woman up. But the sea is honest enough compared to her. She puts up painted panes to my memory, does she, with the money of the very man she has married! Hypocrite! Wonton! Liar! She has held converse with me, knowing who I was, across that man's very grave, and let me pour my heart out before her, drop by drop, when she might have stanched it with a word. How _could_ she do it? How _dared_ she do it?--she that is a God-fearing woman, forsooth! But I suppose that all is fair against a castaway. Let her look to it now, though. Ralph Gavestone is not a man, as I told her then, to be crossed with impunity--far less to be cajoled, betrayed, insulted, Wronged! Richard Lisgard, too!--Sir Richard, as the bastard calls himself!--_your_ hour of bitterness is drawing nigh too, and I will not spare you. There is no memory now of the beloved Dead to stay my hand; there is the knowledge of the treacherous living to make the blow all the surer and the more fatal. Love--nay, even the impress of where I thought love had lain within me, but it was not so--is cancelled out, and Mercy with it. Friendship--bah, I have found out what that is worth! There is nothing left me, nothing in the world, now, except Revenge! Lord it, Sir Richard, for yet a few hours more, among your truckling neighbours, your fawning tenants, for your time is short indeed. They may be your humble and obedient servants still, but what will they think of you, what will they say of you, behind your back, when they come to learn who you are? If your mother has the right to rule at Mirk, then I will rule there too: and you shall serve; and if not--then she is my wife still, and leaves you for me. There will be a downfall for your pride! Lady Lisgard of Mirk Abbey to be claimed by a 'drunken brawler'--do you suppose that I forget such words as those--and forced to be once more plain Lucy Gavestone, for the wife of a vagabond like me has scarcely the right to be termed 'madam.' The law will give her to me: there is no doubt of that. The righteous Law, which is to be