"Your name is,--is,"--he hesitated.
"Don't _you_ know me?" said the MAN.
"I,--I,--why,--I,--let me see."
Herman shaded his eyes with his hand, and steadily perused the face of
the STRANGER, as though, in the effort, to recognize him.
He was a young man of a muscular frame, clad in a single-breasted blue
coat, which was buttoned over a broad chest. He was of the medium
height. His forehead was broad; his eyes clear gray; his lips wide and
firm; his nose inclining to the aquiline; his chin round and solid.
The general expression of his features was that of straightforwardness
and energy of character. There was the freshness and the warmth of
youth upon his face, and his forehead was stamped with the ideality of
genius. As he wore his brown hair in short, thick curls, it marked the
outline of his head, and threw his forehead distinctly into view.
"You are,--you are,--where did I see you?" hesitated Herman.
"I am Arthur Dermoyne," was the reply, in an even, but emphatic voice.
Then there was an embarrassing pause.
"Where have I met you?" said Herman, as if in the painful effort to
recollect.
"At the house of Mr. Burney, in the city of Philadelphia," was the
answer.
"Ah! now I remember!" ejaculated Herman; "Poor, poor Mr. Burney! You
have heard of the sad accident which took place last night, ah--ah--?"
Herman buried his face in his hands, and seemed profoundly affected.
"I saw his mangled body at the house half way between New York and
Philadelphia, only a few hours ago," the young man's voice was cold and
stern, "and now I am in New York, endeavoring to find the scoundrel who
abducted his only daughter."
Herman looked at cupid in the ceiling and pretended to brush a hair
from his nose--
"Ah, I remember, poor Mr. Burney told me last night, that his child had
been abducted. Yes,--" Herman looked at the hair, and held it between
his eyes and the light, "he told me about it just before the accident
occurred. Poor girl! Poor girl! Oh, by-the-bye," turning suddenly in
his arm-chair, but without looking into the face of Dermoyne, "you take
an interest in the Burney family. Are you a relative?"
"I have visited the house of Mr. Burney, from time to time, and have
seen Alice, his only daughter. You may think me romantic, but to see
that girl, so pure, so innocent, so beautiful, was to love her. I
will confess that had it not been for a disparity of fortune, and a
difference in regard to religious views, between her father and myself,
I would have been most happy to have made her my wife."
The tone of the young man was somewhat agitated; he was endeavoring to
suppress his emotions.
"Courage! He does not _know_," muttered Herman to himself, and then
assuming a calm look, he continued, aloud: "And she would have made you
a noble wife. By-the-bye, you spoke of your profession. A merchant, I
suppose?"
"No, sir."
"A lawyer?"
"No, sir."
"A medical gentleman?"
"No, sir."
"You are then--"
"A shoemaker."