The burgher cast a quick suspicious glance at Ludlow, and shook his head, to express his belief that the young man was true. “Go; desire Mr. Van Staats of Kinderhook to favor us with his company.” “Hold,” cried Ludlow, motioning to the valet to withdraw. “Mr. Beverout, an uncle should be tender of the errors of one so dear as this cruel, unreflecting girl. You cannot think of abandoning her to so frightful a fortune!” “I am not addicted to abandoning anything, sir, to which my title is just and legal. But you speak in enigmas. If you are acquainted with the place where my niece is secreted, avow it frankly, and permit me to take those measures which the case requires.” Ludlow reddened to his forehead, and he struggled powerfully with his pride and his regrets. “It is useless to attempt concealing the step which Alida Barbérie has been pleased to take,” he said, a smile so bitter passing over his features, as to lend them the expression of severe mockery; “she has chosen more worthily than either of us could have believed; she has found a companion more suited to her station, her character, and her sex, than Van Staats of Kinderhook, or a poor commander of a Queen’s ship!” “Cruisers and manors! What in the name of mysteries is thy meaning? The girl is not here; you declare she is not on board of the Coquette, and there remains only——” “The brigantine!” groaned the young sailor uttering the word by a violent effort of the will. “The brigantine!” repeated the Alderman, slowly. “My niece can have nothing to do aboard a dealer in contraband. That is to say, Alida Barbérie is not a trader.” “Alderman Van Beverout, if we wish to escape the contamination of vice, its society must be avoided. There was one in the pavilion, of a mien and assurance the past night, that might delude an angel. Ah! woman! woman! thy mind is composed of vanities, and thy imagination is thy bitterest foe!” “Women and vanities!” echoed the amazed burgher. “My niece, the heiress of old Etienne Marie de Barbérie, and the sought of so many of honorable names and respectable professions, to be a refugee with a rover!—always supposing your opinions of the character of the brigantine to be just. This is a conjecture too improbable to be true.” “The eye of a lover, sir, may be keener than that of a guardian—call it jealousy, if you will,—would to Heaven my suspicions were untrue!—but if she be not there, where is she?” The opinion of the Alderman seemed staggered. If la belle Barbérie had not yielded to the fascinations of that wayward, but seductive, eye and smile, to that singular beauty of face, and to the secret and often irresistible charm that encircles eminent personal attractions, when aided by mystery, to what had she yielded, and whither had she fled?