"Farewell--why did not he say good-bye--or good-night, Joseph? Farewell! that is a very solemn word. I wish he had not said farewell!" CHAPTER XXII. THE WALK AND THE WILL. Now do I drop my heavy load of woe, As some wet mantle saturate with rain, And rise as a soft spirit that doth glow In rays of light beyond the realm of pain. W. W. FORDICK. The Mayor walked home very slowly, for remorse, while softening into penitence, had sapped the foundations of his life; and he had grown a feeble old man in so short a time, that those who look upon God as an avenger, rather than a chastiser, might have supposed that old age had fallen as a judgment upon him. But the All-wise one knows best how to redeem the souls he has created, and that weary man as he walked home in the darkness, was a thousand times more worthy of respect, than he had ever been in his whole lifetime before. There was a private room in the lower story of his house, in which Mr. Farnham had usually received his constituents and persons who came to his residence on private business. It had been little used of late, for the routine of his old life was broken up, and when he went to this apartment, it was usually to be secure of the solitude which daily became more necessary to his habits of self-communion. That night he found company in the drawing-room. Mrs. Farnham had guests from the South; other friends were invited to meet them, and the lower portion of the house was in a blaze of magnificence. This scene was so at variance with his state of feelings, that the Mayor recoiled from its glitter, as the sick man shrinks from a noonday sun. His wife, who was standing in the centre of a group near the door, resplendent with jewels and brocade, saw him pass through the hall, and playfully shaking her fan called after him. Either he did not hear, or he did not heed her, and with the usual obstinacy of a silly woman, she called to her son and bade him go bring his father back. Frederick went and found Mr. Farnham in his private room, looking cold and weary. The greatest retribution that had fallen upon this man for his evil act had been the effect it had produced upon his own son. Frederick had known and loved Chester. With his energy and quickness of character, it was impossible that he should not have gathered all the facts regarding his trial and death. The very silence which he maintained on the subject was a proof of this. His manner too had changed so completely that it was a constant reproach to the suffering man. There had always existed a certain reserve between the father and son, but now it amounted almost to coldness. Perhaps this repulsion had driven the unhappy man to seek sympathy in the child of another, for it became a weary trial to seek his home day after day, and find all affection chilled there.