"Mrs. Wilson."

"Gone out, too!"

"Indeed!

But as I wish to see Mrs. Wilson, I shall come in." And so saying, he pushed open the door, admitting Père Plantat and six of his men, whom he disposed in the yard and under the gateway, five others being left outside. One, we have seen, was in attendance on Mr. James Wilson.

"Now, in the name of Laurentia, be courageous!" M. Lecoq said to Père Plantat, as they ascended the staircase together.

There was no mistake about it. The daughter of the Mayor of Orcival was not dead. It was the unfortunate Laurentia, who step by step had been led from one act of imprudence to another, had fallen, and, when no longer able to conceal her shame, had at last taken refuge in this hotel under the name of Mrs. James Wilson. It is the old, old lesson, that one false step leads irrevocably to others, and ultimately to ruin. The day that Laurentia had allowed the count to press her hand without her mother's knowledge she was lost. That first secret exchange of sympathy had led to her ultimately pretending suicide in order to abscond with her lover.

When M. Lecoq and Père Plantat abruptly entered the room after a preliminary knock for form sake, Laurentia was bathed in tears. All that had happened still seemed to her as a hideous nightmare. She wept for her youth gone by, her hopes wrecked, her own self-respect, the respect of the world lost for ever, her home broken up, and she barely twenty years of age! But roused from her agony by the appearance of strangers, she haughtily inquired:

"Who are you, who have thus intruded without even announcing yourselves?"

M. Lecoq bowed obsequiously, and replied by pushing forward Père Plantat.

"You!" murmured the poor girl-"you here!" And she seemed on the point of fainting.

The justice went up to her assistance. But M. Lecoq had promised him to do the conversational part.

"It is not you, madame," he said, "whom we are seeking, but Monsieur Count Hector de Trémorel."

"Hector! What do you want him for?"

"M. de Trémorel," persisted the detective, "has committed a great crime."

"He commit a crime! Sir, you calumniate him!"

M. Lecoq shook his head in sadness.

"What I say is, alas! too true. M. de Trémorel assassinated his wife on the night of Wednesday and Thursday last. I am an agent of police, and hold a warrant for his arrest."

"Well! then be it so," ejaculated Laurentia, in the sublimity of a woman's love. "Take me, too. I am his accomplice."

"No, madame," quietly replied M. Lecoq, "you are not M. de Trémorel's accomplice. Besides, the murder of his wife is only one of his crimes. Do you know why he did not marry you? It was because with Bertha, his mistress, together they poisoned their best friend, M. Sauvresy."

Laurentia's energy now totally failed her. She saw with the lightninglike instinct of an injured woman the whole history of Hector's conduct, previously so inexplicable to her. But affection still took the upper hand, and she attempted some shadowy excuses, which only deepened the despair of the worthy justice of peace.

"Ah!" he exclaimed, in his agony, "how you loved that wretch to hold by him even still!"

But the implication caused a revulsion of feeling in the young woman's bosom.

"I love him! I!" she exclaimed. "To you, my only friend, I can explain my conduct. Yes, I did love him, even to the sacrifice of myself for his sake. I knew not of his crimes, but when he told me that his life and honour were in the hands of Bertha I despised him. It was then too late. I had to follow him for the sake of the child I bore in my bosom. By his dictation I had to write an odious falsehood to my parents."

At this moment the preconcerted signal was given that M. de Trémorel had come back. M. Lecoq was about leaving the room, as he said, to arrest him, when Laurentia prayed to be allowed five minutes conversation with her seducer. The detective at once granted it, and Père Plantat and himself withdrew into an adjoining room. Hector came in

pale and staggering.

"We are lost," he said; "they are on our traces. The letter which I received was a feint. Let us away from this hotel."

Laurentia looked at him with a glance of mingled hatred and contempt. "It is too late," she said.

"What is the matter?" exclaimed Hector, utterly taken aback at Laurentia's manner.

"It is known that you have assassinated your wife."

"It is false! And if I did it was for love of you."

"Really! and was it for the love of me that you poisoned Sauvresy?" Hector de Trémorel was for a moment horror-struck. Everything was out. "What was he to do?” was all that he could mutter. Laurentia stepped forward and took the trembling criminal by the hand.

"What remains for you to do," she said, emphatically, "is to save the name of De Trémorel. There are arms here."

"No," murmured the count, who was as cowardly as he was perfidious. "I may still escape."

"You cannot escape, the house is surrounded-not an issue is left."

So saying, she went to a drawer and took out two pistols. One she handed to Hector, the other she reserved for herself. But, as had happened in the Garden of Plants, in the Hôtel de Luxemborg, on the banks of the Seine, and the room of the dying Sauvresy, he had not the courage to pull the trigger.

"Laurentia, my beloved, what will become of you?" he murmured. "I! I have sworn to follow you wherever you go-now do you

understand ?"

At that moment Lecoq and Père Plantat rushed in to prevent a double suicide; but Laurentia, seeing that Hector had not the courage to act himself, and determined that he should not perish on the scaffold, levelled her pistol at him.

The wretch made no movement. The pistol went off, and he fell dead at her feet. Seizing his pistol, she was about to turn it towards herself, when M. Lecoq rushed up and tore the weapon from her hands.

Why do you do that?" she exclaimed. "I am lost, for ever ruined, why not let me die ?"

"No," ejaculated Lecoq, with energy, "you are not lost. You have been the victim of a wretch. Great griefs like yours must live to expiate their sorrows in a life of charity and devotion. You must live, were it only for your child's sake!"

"My child!" exclaimed Laurentia, he thoughts suddenly thrown into another channel. "My child has no father!"

"Laurentia!" muttered Père Plantat, who was bathed in tears. "If you only will it, I will be a father to your child."

The unfortunate girl was overcome by the kindly voice of her old friend; she also wept, and, as she did so, she moved mechanically towards him. M. Lecoq threw a shawl over her shoulders, and said,

"Now be off together to Orcival. Think of what her father and mother are suffering!" Then placing himself before the body of Count Hector de Trémorel, "There is a wretch whom I have killed," he said, meditatively, "instead of delivering him over to the hands of justice. Had I a right to do so? No! but my conscience does not reproach me, so I have done well."

The day after the death of Count Hector, La Ripaille and Guespin were set at liberty, and money was given to the former to purchase a new fishing-boat and nets, and to the latter to return to his own country. A fortnight later, to the great surprise of the scandal-mongers of Orcival, Père Plantat married Mademoiselle Laurentia Courtois, and the newly-married couple at once took their departure for Italy. Shortly afterwards, M. Lecoq received a bundle of papers, chiefly parchments, duly signed and sealed. Upon looking them over, he found they were the deeds of Père Plantat's little property at Orcival—house, furniture, stables, conservatory, garden, and meadows adjoining.

"Prodigious!" exclaimed the detective. "For once in my life I have done a service for those who can be grateful. Well! I will become a proprietor, if it is only for the novelty of the thing."

638

IN DIXIE.

BY A CONFEDERATE STAFF OFFICER.

I.

I LEFT Bermuda in the autumn of 1864, and went to Nassau, New Providence, to obtain a passage on a blockade runner into Charleston, S.C. I had been a long time at Bermuda, and, owing to the yellow fever which raged there during the summer months, there was no blockade running, and, consequently, no chance of my getting into Dixie from that island.

When I arrived at Nassau, the tropical heat of the summer had abated, and nothing could be more charming than the appearance of the island, with its luxuriance of tropical fruits and flowers, bright, pleasant-looking houses with their cool verandahs, the pillars of which were covered with various creepers in full blossom. The inhabitants of Nassau are principally negroes, or mulattoes; it is rare to see a man free from African blood. The postmaster and many of the Custom-house officials are quite black; and the regiment stationed there was a West Indian one, recruited from the west coast of Africa. The Nassau negroes are very impertinent and ignorant, lazy and dirty; they are, indeed, of the very worst type of their

race.

There is a magnificent hotel here, called the Victoria, built by the trustees of her Majesty's private fortune a great many years ago; it was full of Americans requiring a mild climate during the winter months. At this hotel everything was conducted on the American principle. It is beautifully situated on the highest point of ground on the island, and commands a view of the sea in every direction. From the circular verandah of this hotel some hundred persons witnessed Wilkes, of the Trent affair, chase a blockade runner within half a mile of the shore, and actually fire on it, in defiance of all international law. Previous to the American war, Nassau was a very quiet, insignificant place, the inhabitants living principally upon fish, large quantities of which are caught there; and occasionally doing a little business in wrecking. (It is said that long ago they used to decoy vessels on to the reefs, and murder the crews and plunder them.) After the blockade running commenced, Nassau wore quite a different appearance; King Cotton having made his way there, was of course attended by all his worshippers-the harbour became full of vessels of all nations, huge steamers and three-mast ships astonished the bewildered "darkey." Mountains of cotton appeared on every wharf, thousands of strangers thronged the island. If a gold mine had been discovered there, it could not have worked so great a change, or brought such wealth into the hands of the lucky Conks, as the Nassau people are nicknamed, from their partiality to that shell-fish.

There were a considerable number of Southern men in business at Nassau at this time; they were runaways, or, as the Yankees would elegantly style them, Skedadlers, who, fearing the conscription in the South, and hearing of the rich harvest to be reaped from the blockade-running business, preferred money to patriotism, honour, and glory. As the event proved, they were wise; but had the South been successful, they would

have been for ever considered as alien enemies-the Confederate congress passed a law to that effect.

There were anchored in the harbour of Nassau at this time several blockade runners, some of them old and successful ones, bearing the marks of Federal shot, and others quite new, and lately arrived from England. They were all built for the purpose, and had engines suitable for vessels four times their size and burden, speed being all that was sought for in building them. I was at many entertainments on board these vessels, given by the owners and passengers on their safe arrival with good cargoes of cotton.

Having waited for upwards of a month at Nassau for a chance to run the blockade into the land of Dixie, I found myself at last on board of the Owl, 350 tons burden, and 250 horse power, steaming out of the harbour. As we passed the other vessels, they saluted us, by hoisting all their flags and cheering lustily. We had on board two pilots, one from Charleston, S.C., and the other from Wilmington, N.C., so that if we were headed off from one port we might try the other; we had also seven days' coal on board. Our steamer had only once run the blockade, but was considered the fastest in the trade, and was quite new; the crew were all old hands at blockade running, and the Wilmington pilot had made fourteen successful trips, and realised twenty thousand pounds.

The pilots received as much as two thousand pounds a round tripthat is, to the blockaded port and back. This was owing to the scarcity of competent pilots and the great risk they ran, for if captured by the Federals they would be retained in prison until the end of the war. The blockade runners could only ply their trade on the dark nights, the moon being their greatest enemy. Our cargo consisted of army medicines, clothing, and machinery, and was very valuable.

There were but two passengers besides myself on board: one a naval officer, who was returning to the confederacy after the rams, which were intended for the Confederate navy, were seized, one of which he was to have commanded; the other, an officer in a Western cavalry regiment, who had escaped from prison in the North, and who, after undergoing many great hardships, succeeded in reaching Bermuda, where I first made his acquaintance, and nursed him through the yellow fever, as we lodged in the same house. He was, indeed, a fine fellow, and I may as well here mention all I know of his after movements. After reaching Richmond, he proceeded to join his command, then under Hood, and was present at the mad and disastrous attempt upon Nashville. Subsequently he, with Vaughan's cavalry brigade, entered Athens, Tennessee, then held by the Federals, and was shot on the steps of his own house. A short time before we started upon our perilous adventure, some three or four vessels returned, having failed to run in, owing, as the captains of them said, to the blockading force having been very considerably increased. Notwithstanding all this, I felt very confident of the successful issue of our attempt.

We headed for Charleston. At this time the harbour of Charleston was closely blockaded by the Federal navy, and inside it was filled with obstructions, such as sunken vessels, and sown all over with torpedoes by our own people, so that if we escaped the blockading force we had a still greater danger to run in the torpedoes and obstructions.