"A favor! a right, my beloved! There is nothing that you can ask of me that is not your right to receive!"

"No, no; a favor. I like to ask and receive favors from you, dear Lyon."

"Call my service what you will, dear love! a right or a favor, it is always yours! What, then, is this favor, sweet Sybil?"

"That you will give me a perfect _carte blanche_ in my manner of dealing with this poor little lady, even though my manner should seem foolish or extravagant."

At these words from his ardent, generous, romantic wife, Lyon Berners looked very grave. What, indeed might Sybil, with her magnanimity and munificence _not_ think proper to do for this utter stranger--this possible adventuress? Lyon looked very solemn over this proposal from his wife. He hesitated for a moment; but her large, clear, honest eyes were fixed full upon him, waiting for his reply. Could he refuse her request? Did _he_ not owe everything to her, and to that very high-flown spirit of generosity which was not only a fault (if it were a fault) of Sybil, but a trait common to all her race.

"As you will, my darling wife! I should be a cur, and worse than a cur--a thankless wretch--to wish to restrain you in anything!" he answered, sealing his agreement on her velvet lips.

In another minute the landlord re-entered the room.

"Mrs. Blondelle's thanks and compliments, and she will be very grateful for Mrs. Berners' visit, as soon as Mrs. Berners pleases to come," was the message that Mr. Judson brought.

Sybil arose with a smile, kissed her hand playfully to her husband, and pa.s.sed out of the room.

The landlord went before her, rapped at the opposite door, then opened it, announced the visitor, and closed it behind her.

Sybil advanced a step into the stranger's apartment, and then paused in involuntary admiration.

She had heard and read of celebrated beauties, whose charms had conquered the wisest statesmen and the bravest warriors, who had governed monarchs and ministers, and raised or ruined kingdoms and empires. And often in poetic fancy she had tried to figure to herself one of these fairy forms and faces. But never, in her most romantic moods, had she imagined a creature so perfectly beautiful as this one that she saw before her.

The stranger had a form of the just medium size, and of the most perfect proportions; a head of stately grace; features small, delicate, and clearly cut; a complexion at once fair and rosy, like the inside of an apple blossom; lips like opening rose-buds; eyes of dark azure blue, fringed with long dark eye-lashes, and over-arched by slender, dark eyebrows; and hair of a pale, glistening, golden hue that fell in soft, bright ringlets, like a halo around her angelic face. She wore a robe of soft, pale, blue silk, that opened over a white silk skirt.

She arose with an exquisite grace to welcome her visitor.

"It is very good of you, madam, to come to see me in my misery," she murmured, in a sweet, pathetic tone that went to her visitor's heart, as she sat a chair, and, by a graceful gesture invited her to be seated.

Sybil was herself impulsive and confiding, as well as romantic and generous. She immediately drew her chair up to the side of the strange lady, took her hand affectionately, and tried to look up in her eyes, as she said:

"We are personal strangers to each other; but we are the children of one Father, and sisters who should care for each other."

"Ah! who would care to claim sisterhood with such a wretch as I am?"

sighed the unhappy young creature.

"_I_ would; but you must not call yourself ill-names. Misfortunes are not sins. I came here to comfort and help you--to comfort and help you not in words merely, but in deeds; and I have both the power and the will to do it, if you will please to let me try," said Sybil, gently.

The young creature looked up, her lovely, tearful, blue eyes expanded with astonishment.

"You offer to comfort and help me! _Me_--a perfect stranger, with a cloud of dishonor hanging over me! Oh, madam, if you knew _all_, you would certainly withdraw your kind offer," she said.

"I will not withdraw it in any event. I _do_ know all that your landlord could tell me, and that awakens my deepest sympathy for you. But I do not know all that _you_ could tell me. Now, dear, I want you to confide in me as you could not confide either in your landlord, or even in his mother."

"Oh, no, no! I could not tell either of them. They were kind; but--oh, so hard!"

"Now, dear, then, look in my face, look well, and tell me whether you can confide in me," said Sybil, gently.

"If I had never seen your heavenly countenance--if I had only heard your heavenly voice, I could confide in you, as in the holy mother of Christ," said the stranger fervently.

"Tell me then, dear; tell me all you wish to tell; relieve your heart; lay all your burdens on my bosom; and then you shall feel how well I can comfort and help you," said Sybil, putting her hand around the fair neck and drawing the little golden-haired head upon her breast.

Then and there the friendless young stranger--friendless now, no more--told her piteous story.

CHAPTER VI.

ROSA BLONDELLE.

Her form had all the softness of her s.e.x, Her face had all the sweetness of the devil When he put on the cherub to perplex Eve, and to pave, Heaven knows how, the road to evil.--BYRON.

She had been the penniless orphan daughter of a n.o.ble, but impoverished Scotch family. She had been left, by the death of her parents, dependent upon harsh and cruel relatives. She had been given in marriage, at the age of fifteen, to a wealthy old gentleman, whose years quadrupled hers.

But he had used her very kindly, and she had performed her simple duty of love and obedience as well as she knew how to do it. After two years of tranquil domestic happiness, the old man died, leaving her a young widow seventeen years of age, sole guardian to their infant son, between whom and herself he had divided his whole estate.

After the death of her old husband, the youthful widow lived in strict seclusion for nearly two years, devoting herself exclusively to the care of her child.

But in the third year the health of the little Cromartie required a change, and his mother, by her physician's advice, took the boy to Scarborough. That fashionable watering place was then at the height of its season, and filled with visitors.

Thus it was impossible but that the wealthy young widow should attract much attention. She was inevitably drawn into the maelstrom of society, into which she rushed with all the impetuosity of a novice or an inexperienced recluse, to which all the scenes of the gay world were as delightful as they were novel.

She had many suitors for her hand; but none found favor in her eyes but Mr. Horace Blondelle, a very handsome and attractive young gentleman, whose princ.i.p.al pa.s.sport into good society seemed to be his distant relationship to the Duke of Marchmonte. _How_ he lived no one knew.

_Where_ he lived everyone might see, for he always occupied the best suits of apartments in the best hotel of any town or city in which he might be for the time sojourning.

We, every one of us know, or know _of_, Mr. Horace Blondelle. There are scores of him scattered about the great hotels of all the large cities in Europe and America. But the simplest maiden or the silliest widow in society, is seldom taken in by him.

There, however, at Scarborough, was an inexperienced poor little creature from the Highlands, who had never in her life seen any one more attractive than the red-headed heroes of her native hills, and who, having aurific tresses of her own, was particularly prejudiced against that splendid hue, and fatally ensnared by the raven ringlets and dark eyes of this professional lady-killer.

And thus it followed of course, that this beast of prey devoured the pretty little widow and all her substance with less hesitation or remorse than a cobra might have felt in swallowing a canary bird.

So complete was her hallucination, so perfect her trust in him, that she took no precaution of having any part of her property settled upon herself; and, in marrying this man she gave him an absolute control over her own fortune, and a dangerous, if limited, influence over that of her infant son.

This very imprudent marriage was followed by a few months of delusive happiness on the part of the bride; for the little fair beauty adored her dark-haired Apollo, who graciously accepted her adoration.

But then came satiety and weariness and inconstancy on the part of the husband, who soon commenced the pleasing pastime of breaking the wife's heart.

Yet still, for some little time longer, she, with a deplorable fatuity, believed in and loved him. After he had squandered her own fortune on gaming-tables and race-courses, he wished to get possession of the fortune of her son. To do this he persuaded her to sell out certain stock and entrust him with the proceeds, to be invested, as he convinced her, in railway shares in America, that would pay at least two hundred per cent. dividends, and in a few months double that money.

Acting as her son's guardian and trustee, acting also, as she thought, in his best interests, the deluded mother did as her husband directed.

She sold out the stocks, and confided the proceeds to him.

Then it was that they made the voyage to America, ostensibly to purchase the railway shares in question. His real motive in bringing her to this country was, doubtless, to take her as far as possible from her native place and her old acquaintances, so as to prosecute the more safely and effectually his fraudulent designs.

How they had arrived at Norfolk and taken rooms at the Anchor, and how he had robbed and deserted her there, has already been told.

Sybil Berners listened to this sad and revolting story of woman's weakness and man's criminality with mingled emotions of pity and indignation.