"Yes, yes," he said, in a strange tone of voice. "I remember now. Who is upstairs?"

"Mrs Revitts--Mary."

"Let us go up," he said; "I'll step up quietly."

I was the more confused and muddled for having just awakened from a deep sleep, and somehow, all this seemed to be part of the dream connected with the great black ma.s.s that had threatened to fall upon me. I should not have been the least surprised if I had suddenly awakened and found myself alone, when, after closing the door, I led Hallett upstairs to the little front room where Mary was standing with dilated eyes, staring hard at the door.

"You, Mr Hallett?" she exclaimed, as he half staggered in, and then, staring round, seemed to reel, and caught my hand as I helped him to a seat.

"Tell me," gasped Mary, catching at his hand; "is it very bad?"

He nodded.

"Give me--water," he panted. "I am--exhausted."

Mary rushed to the little cupboard for a gla.s.s, and the brandy that had been kept on Revitts behalf, and hastily pouring some into a gla.s.s with water, she held it to him, and he drained it at a draught.

"Now, tell me," she exclaimed. "Where is he--what is it--have you seen him?"

"No," he cried hoa.r.s.ely, as he clenched his fist and held it before him!

"no, or I should have struck him dead."

"Mr Hallett!" she cried, starting. Then, in a piteous voice, "Oh, tell me, please--what has he done? He is my husband, my own dear boy! Pray, pray, tell me--he was half-mad. Oh, what have--what have I done!"

"Is she mad?" cried Hallett angrily. "Where is her husband--where is Revitts?"

"We don't know," I said hastily. "We are waiting for him."

"I want him directly," he said hoa.r.s.ely. "I could not go to a stranger."

"What is the matter, Hallett?" I cried. "Pray, speak out. What can I do?"

"Nothing," he said hoa.r.s.ely. "Yes; tell him to come--no, bring him to me. Do you hear?"

"Yes," I faltered.

"At any hour--whenever he comes," said Hallett, speaking now angrily, as he recovered under the stimulus of the brandy.

"Then there is something terribly wrong," I said.

"Wrong? Yes. My G.o.d!" he muttered, "that I should have to tell it-- Linny has gone?"

CHAPTER FORTY ONE.

THE BRIDEGROOM'S RETURN.

"Oh, Hallett!" I cried, catching his hand, as the poor fellow sat blankly gazing before him in his mute despair. "It is a mistake; she could not be so wicked."

"Wicked!" he said with a curious laugh. "Was it wicked, after all her promises--my forgiveness--my gentle, loving words? I was a fool. I believed that she was weaning herself from it all, and trying to forget.

A woman would have read her at a glance; but I, a poor, mad dreamer, always away, or buried in that attic, saw nothing, only that she was very quiet, and thin, and sad."

"Did she tell you that she would go, Hallett?" I asked, hardly knowing what I said.

"No, Antony," I replied, in a dreary tone.

"Did you have any quarrel?"

"No; not lately. She was most affectionate--poor child! and her heart must have been sore with the thought or what she was about to do. Only this evening, before I went up into the attic to dream over my invention, she crept to my side, put her little arms round my neck, and kissed me, as she used when she was a tiny child, and said how sorry she was that she had given me so much pain. Antony, lad," he cried pa.s.sionately, "I went up to my task to-night a happy man, thinking that one heavy load was taken off my shoulders, and that the future was going to be brighter for us both. For, Antony, in my cold, dreamy way, I love her very dearly, and so I have ever since she was a little wilful child."

He sat gazing at me with such a piteous expression in his face that his words went to my heart, and I heard Mary give quite a gulp.

"But, Hallett," I said, "you are not sure; she may have gone to some friend's. She may have come back by this time."

"Come back?" he said fiercely. "No; she has not come back. Not yet.

Some day she will return, poor strayed lamb!" he added, gazing straight before him, his voice softening and his arms extending, as if he pictured the whole scene and was about to take her to his heart.

"But are you sure that she has really gone?" I cried.

"Sure? Read that."

I took the crumpled paper with trembling fingers, and saw at a glance that he was right. In ill-written, hardly decipherable words, the poor girl told her brother that she could bear it no longer, but that she had fled with the man who possessed her heart.

I stared blankly at poor Hallett, as he took the note from my hand, read it once more through, crushed it in his hand with a fierce look, and thrust it back in his pocket.

"Is it--is it your poor dear sister who has gone?" said Mary excitedly.

"Yes," he cried, with his pa.s.sion mastering him once more; and his hands opened and shut, as if eager to seize some one by the throat--"yes; some villain has led her away. But let me stand face to face with him, and then--"

He paused in his low, painful utterance, gazing from me to Mary, who stood with her hand upon his arm.

"And I thought my trouble the biggest in the world," she sobbed; "but you've done right, sir, to come for my William. He'll find them if they're anywhere on the face of this earth, and they shall be found.

Poor dear! and her with her pretty girlish gentle face as I was so jealous of. I'm only a silly foolish woman, sir," she cried, with the tears falling fast, "but I may be of some good. If I'm along with my William when he finds 'em, she may listen to me and come back, when she wouldn't mind him, and I'll follow it out to the end."

"You're--you're a good woman," said Hallett hoa.r.s.ely, "and may G.o.d bless you. But your husband--where is your husband? We must lose no time."

"Master Antony?" cried Mary, and then, as if awakening once more to her position, and speaking in tones of bitterness--"Oh, what has come to my William? He must be found!"

"Send him on to me," said Hallett. "I'll go back now. Antony, will you come?"

"Why, there's your poor mother, too," cried Mary, "and all alone! I can help her, at all events!"

As Mary spoke, she hurried to get her work-a-day bonnet and shawl, while Hallett stood gazing at her in a dazed and helpless way.

"Your pore sister did come and help my pore boy when he was bad, and-- Oh!"

Mary uttered a fierce, angry cry. Bonnet and shawl fell from her hands, her jaw dropped, her ruddy face grew mottled with patches of white, and her eyes dilated. Her whole aspect was that of one about to have a fit, and I took a step towards her.