"The lady to whom I am attached," continued the Earl, "is, as I ere now informed you, in every way worthy of an alliance with me; and she is moreover deeply attached to me. She has never loved another, and declares that she never can. No apparent circumstances interfere with our union; and she has done me the honour to assure me that she should be alike proud and happy to own me as her husband. She is entirely her own mistress; and, even if she were not, her friends would present no barrier to our marriage. Yet she refuses me—and for some mysterious cause which she will not explain. I have just left her,—left her in a state of anguish such as I never before witnessed—such as I hope never to behold again!" [Illustration] "Perhaps she has been guilty of some weakness which she is afraid you would discover?" suggested Dr. Lascelles. "Oh! no—no," exclaimed Arthur, enthusiastically: "in an unguarded moment—carried away by a hasty suspicion of the kind—I hinted at that possibility,—and I soon repented of my rashness! The lady's countenance flushed with a glow of honest indignation; and, instantly veiling her blushes with her hand, she burst into tears. I could pledge my existence, doctor, that she is purity itself." "But wherefore do you consult me in the matter?" asked Lascelles. "You must admit, doctor," answered Ellingham, "that my position is a singular one in reference to the lady of whom I speak. What am I to conjecture? Suspense is terrible; and yet, not for worlds would I again attempt to extort her secret from her." "The motive may be a physical one," said the doctor. "That was the idea which ere now struck me, and which has brought me hither to consult you!" exclaimed the Earl. "She may be the prey to some insidious disease which impairs not her exterior aspect at present," continued Doctor Lascelles; "say, for instance, a cancer in the breast. Or again, her motive may be a moral one; inasmuch as she may be aware, from some secret warnings, that she is in danger of suffering an aberration of reason." "And if the lady were a patient of your own, doctor," asked the Earl, "should you be enabled to judge whether she were menaced by that dreadful mental malady to which you have alluded?" "Decidedly so," replied the physician. The Earl rose from his seat, and walked two or three times up and down the apartment. Dr. Lascelles followed him with his eyes; and as he surveyed the strong, well-knit, but slender and graceful form of the young nobleman, the votary of science could not help thinking what a splendid skeleton he would make. At length the Earl stopped abruptly opposite the doctor, and said in an impressive tone, "You will never reveal the particulars of this interview?" "It is scarcely probable," returned Lascelles, with a smile. "But you promise me—you pledge your word never to breathe a syllable which may betray the motive of my present visit or the topic of our conversation?" persisted the Earl.