nursing, and Mr. Lisle will be with her if there is serious cause for uneasiness."

There was then serious cause for uneasiness, for Kathleen ascertained by her next missive that Edward had not gone to the office. She had never passed so miserable a day; she would not go out, and she could not remain quiet in the house, so she roamed restlessly from place to place, rejecting all occupation, listening feverishly to the carriages rolling by, and to the rings at the door-bell. Late in the afternoon, Lord De Cressy proposed that they should go to Lowndessquare, to see Lady Harriet and Adelaide Wilmot, who were to arrive in town that day; but Kathleen impatiently declined the suggestion, and he went out alone.

On his return, he found Kathleen with her head buried in her hands, trying to stifle her sobs; and the slip of paper which lay beside her explained the cause of her emotion: "No amendment. Brown asked for further advice, and we sent for Dr. A-. He says he may do if the rash comes out, but of that there is no appearance, and the fever is frightfully high."

"Poor boy!" said Lord De Cressy. Kathleen shuddered at the words, and hid her face in the pillows of the sofa on which she sat, when he attempted, with gentle force, to make her look up.

"My dear Kathleen, do be calm."

"I cannot help it," said Kathleen, making, however,

another and more successful effort at self-control.

"It

is too dreadful. Lionel, you must feel, as I do, that it is our doing. We might have saved him, and now

it is too late."

De Cressy.

18

"Our doing!" Lord De Cressy repeated, impatiently; "it is at least generous of you to share the responsibility. There can be little doubt that Walter took the infection at the time his brother sickened, and that he has not strength to throw it out; though I am not yet without hopes of the disorder taking a favourable turn. But you have been convinced from the first that the issue of the matter rested with me."

"I cannot help thinking so, since we have done nothing to avert the calamity. And now he is dying. Oh, Lionel, you will not refuse to let me see him once more!"

"Impossible," said Lord De Cressy, hastily. "The scene would be so very trying in the nervous, excited state you are in. And you would be only in the way in those little rooms, where space and air are so much needed."

"Still I might be of use in keeping the children quiet. Then I should be well, and fit for anything; but what I cannot bear is to sit and think."

"Be reasonable, Kathleen; there is no use urging the point."

Kathleen looked up in imploring earnestness. "Oh, Lionel! Call me unreasonable, wilful

only let me have my way this once. be happy again more."

what you will I shall never

never if I may not see him once

There was no reply. Kathleen spoke again, with increasing vehemence. "Lionel, do you hear me? may I go?"

"I have already expressed my wishes," said Lord De Cressy; "and it is quite time to dress for dinner." And he took up his candle and left the room, in order to avoid further importunity.

"Heartless - unfeeling!" murmured Kathleen; and an indignant sense of injustice restored outward calmness, even while the storm of passion within had almost overcome the reason to which her husband so uniformly appealed. She rose, checking her sobs, and smoothing her hair over her heated temples. For a moment she stood irresolute, and then the decision was made. She must see Walter once more, and be with Agnes in her hour of trial: duty should not constrain, love should not move her. Had not her sister truer and more just claims to her affection?

She went to her room, and put on her cloak and bonnet, resolved to go forth alone and unattended. The servants, who were standing in the hall, looked astonished by her appearance, for it was dark and raining heavily; and though there was something in Kathleen's manner which would not brook question or opposition, one ventured to say, "My lord is in his room, my lady."

"I know it," said Kathleen, haughtily, as she passed on.

The house door closed behind her, and it crossed her mind that on her it might have closed for ever, in consequence of this defiance of her husband's authority. It mattered not: she only hurried on the faster.

She walked till she was wet and weary, and when she reached the stand behind Buckingham Palace, she got into a cab, finding that her trembling knees refused to carry her farther. The fever of her spirits began to

subside when she was no longer distracted by the necessity of attending to the turnings of the streets. There was time for thought, - a misgiving as to the propriety of the course she had taken, a momentary impulse to return, which was promptly checked. It was too late now.

Kathleen's heart sank when the rattling wheels of the cab were muffled by the straw laid down before the Lisles' house, and she scarcely dared to inquire after Walter from the person who opened the door. The answer was sullen and indifferent, for the landlady felt personally aggrieved by an event which was likely to interfere with the letting of her lodgings: she hardly knew, but she did not suppose that there was any change. Kathleen went up stairs to the sitting-room, where she found the two little boys Frank lying asleep on Walter's couch, while Cecil sat idly on a stool beside the fire, looking listless and scared, as children do when they have an indefinite consciousness of impending sorrow. But as soon as he perceived Kathleen, he sprang up with an exclamation of joy, and threw his arms round her neck.

"Where is papa? how is Walter?" said Kathleen, as soon as she could disengage herself.

"Walter is very ill with the fever; much worse than I was, papa says. Papa is with him, and so is mamma; and the nurse has gone for some physic, because the landlady says that her maid has been running our errands all day. So there is no one to put us to bed, and it has been such a long, tiresome day. Mary said that we must stay here, while she tried to get baby to sleep."

"I will come and put you to bed presently," said Kathleen, kissing the wan, tired little face, which looked so wobegone when all these griefs were told. "But first I must see Walter."

Cecil would not let her go until he had repeated the caution so carefully impressed upon his mind "You must not make a noise, for he is very ill," and then, with noiseless steps, Kathleen entered the

room.

All the accessories of severe and dangerous sickness struck with a chill upon her heart - the hushed voices, the shaded lamp, the different appliances and alleviations, so often, alas! tried in vain and cast aside. Her entrance was unnoticed, and it was some moments before her eyes were sufficiently accustomed to the dim and sickly light to discern the various objects with any distinctness. Walter lay in a sort of stupor, his eyes half closed and fixed in vacancy; but the restless motion of his hands, and the sharp, ringing moan by which his laboured breathing was continually interrupted, betrayed that, although unconscious, the sense of pain was fully alive. His fair, silken hair was cut away from his temples; and Edward Lisle busied himself about some cooling applications. Agnes, prevented by her blindness from bearing any part in the offices of love which are peculiarly a mother's privilege, might only sit and listen to the sounds of suffering that thrilled through her own heart with a pang of acute agony. Her quick ear first discovered Kathleen's presence, and she asked who was there.

"Kathleen!" said Edward, looking up, as she came