She bowed her head in uncontrollable emotion.

"And your son?" said her sister, half-smiling through her sympathetic tears.

"Will be yours also, Amy tells me," said Aunt Martha. "Thank God! thank God!"

"Martha, who gave him his name?" asked Mrs. Bennet.

Aunt Martha paused for a little while. Then she said:

"You never knew who my--my--husband was?"

"Never."

"I remember--he never came to the house. Well, I gave my child almost his father's name. I called him Wynne; his father's name was Wayne."

Mrs. Bennet clasped her hands in her lap.

"How wonderful! how wonderful!" was all she said.

Lawrence Newt knocked at the door, and Amy and he came in. There was so sweet and strange a light upon Amy's face that Mrs. Bennet looked at her in surprise. Then she looked at Lawrence Newt; and he cheerfully returned her glance with that smiling, musing expression in his eyes that was utterly bewildering to Mrs. Bennet. She could only look at each of the persons before her, and repeat her last words:

"How wonderful! how wonderful!"

Amy Waring, who had not heard the previous conversation between her two aunts, blushed as she heard these words, as if Mrs. Bennet had been alluding to something in which Amy was particularly interested.

"Amy," said Mrs. Bennet.

Amy could scarcely raise her eyes. There was an exquisite maidenly shyness overspreading her whole person. At length she looked the response she could not speak.

"How could you?" asked her aunt.

Poor Amy was utterly unable to reply.

"Coming and going in my house, my dearest niece, and yet hugging such a secret, and holding your tongue. Oh Amy, Amy!"

These were the words of reproach; but the tone, and look, and impression were of entire love and sympathy. Lawrence Newt looked calmly on.

"Aunt Lucia, what could I do?" was all that Amy could say.

"Well, well, I do not reproach you; I blame nobody. I am too glad and happy. It is too wonderful, wonderful!"

There was a fullness and intensity of emphasis in what she said that apparently made Amy suspect that she had not correctly understood her aunt's intention.

"Oh, you mean about Aunt Martha!" said Amy, with an air of relief and surprise.

Lawrence Newt smiled. Mrs. Bennet turned to Amy with a fresh look of inquiry.

"About Aunt Martha? Of course about Aunt Martha. Why, Amy, what on earth did you suppose it was about?"

Again the overwhelming impossibility to reply. Mrs. Bennet was very curious. She looked at her sister Martha, who was smiling intelligently.

Then at Lawrence Newt, who did not cease smiling, as if he were in no perplexity whatsoever. Then at Amy, who sat smiling at her through the tears that had gathered in the thoughtful womanly brown eyes.

"Let me speak," said Lawrence Newt, quietly. "Why should we not all be glad and happy with you? You have found a sister, Aunt Martha has found herself and a son, I have found a wife, and Amy a husband."

They returned to the room where they had left the guests, and the story was quietly told to Hope Wayne and the others.

Hope and Edward looked at each other.

"Little Malacca!" she said, in a low tone, putting out her hand.

"Sister Hope," said the young man, blushing, and his large eyes filling with tenderness.

"And my sister, too," whispered Ellen Bennet, as she took Hope's other hand.

CHAPTER LXXXIII.

MRS. DELILAH JONES.

Mr. Newt's political friends in New York were naturally anxious when he went to Washington. They had constant communication with the Honorable Mr. Ele in regard to his colleague; for although they were entirely sure of Mr. Ele, they could not quite confide in Mr. Newt, nor help feeling that, in some eccentric moment, even his interest might fail to control him.

"The truth is, I begin to be sick of it," said General Belch to the calm William Condor.

That placid gentleman replied that he saw no reason for apprehension.

"But he may let things out, you know," said Belch.

"Yes, but is not our word as good as his," was the assuring reply.

"Perhaps, perhaps," said General Belch, dolefully.

But Belch and Condor were forgotten by the representative they had sent to Congress when he once snuffed the air of Washington. There was something grateful to Abel Newt in the wide sphere and complicated relations of the political capital, of which the atmosphere was one of intrigue, and which was built over the mines and countermines of selfishness. He hoodwinked all Belch's spies, so that the Honorable Mr.

Ele could never ascertain any thing about his colleague, until once when he discovered that the report upon the Grant was to be brought in within a day or two by the Committee, and that it would be recommended, upon which he hastened to Abel's lodging. He found him smoking as usual, with a decanter at hand. It was past midnight, and the room was in the disorder of a bachelor's sanctum.

Mr. Ele seated himself carelessly, so carelessly that Abel saw at once that he had come for some very particular purpose. He offered his friend a tumbler and a cigar, and they talked nimbly of a thousand things. Who had come, who had gone, and how superb Mrs. Delilah Jones was, who had suddenly appeared upon the scene, invested with mystery, and bringing a note to each of the colleagues from General Belch.

"Mrs. Delilah Jones," said that gentleman, in a private note to Ele, "is our old friend, Kitty Dunham. She appears in Washington as the widow of a captain in the navy, who died a few years since upon the Brazil station.

She can be of the greatest service to us; and you must have no secrets from each other about our dear friend, who shall be nameless."

To Abel Newt, General Belch wrote: "My dear Newt, the lady to whom I have given a letter to you is daughter of an old friend of my family. She married Captain Jones of the navy, whom she lost some years since upon the Brazil station. She has seen the world; has money; and comes to Washington to taste life, to enjoy herself--to doff the sables, perhaps, who knows? Be kind to her, and take care of your heart. Don't forget the Grant in the arms of Delilah! Yours, Belch."

Abel Newt, when he received this letter, looked over his books of reports and statistics.

"Captain Jones--Brazil station," he said, skeptically, to himself. But he found no such name or event in the obituaries; and he was only the more amused by his friend Belch's futile efforts at circumvention and control.

"My dear Belch," he replied, after he had made his investigations, "I have your private note, but I have not yet encountered the superb Delilah; nor have I forgotten what you said to me about working 'em through their wives, and sisters, etc. I shall not begin to forget it now, and I hope to make the Delilah useful in the campaign; for there are goslings here, more than you would believe. Thank you for such an ally.