By the time that Sir William Berkley and his party arrived, the Recluse had disappeared; every one was so much absorbed by the instant and pressing calls for assistance and sympathy from the suffering females, that the time of his departure was entirely unnoticed. The Governor had no sooner recovered from his first shock and surprise, than he made his way to one of the young Harrisons to learn the cause of the present appearance of the parties, so different from what he had been taught to expect. Although he did not believe that there was one word of truth in the cause assigned for the interruption of the ceremony, he was well enough satisfied that the parties themselves, and Mrs. Fairfax should believe it. No matter to him what horrors they suffered, he considered it all but a just punishment for their attempted mesalliance. As for Bacon, and his horror-stricken feelings, Sir William did not deign to bestow a thought or word upon them, after the first hasty exclamation with which he had entered the door. By his orders, the female sufferers were placed in a carriage, and removed to his own house. Bacon resigned his charge with a listless apathy, bordering on stupefaction, and to a superficial observer, such would doubtless have been the impression; but his was the deadly deceitful calm which precedes the coming storm. The most horrible of all human sufferings is that where no tear is or can be shed--where no enemy presents himself for vengeance--no hope for the future, all having been perilled and lost upon a single throw. Bacon felt himself thus situated--the cherished hopes of a lifetime were blasted in an instant, not only for the present, but under such circumstances as to cut off all hope for the future. The object of his passion could not henceforth be enshrined in a holy secret worship of the soul, such as is sometimes kept up through a long life of celibacy for the lost one.