I WAS stalking about, then, in the same dull half frenzy, when some one knocked at the door. Taking it for granted it was some of the servants, I answered in a voice of rage, “Begone!”—but the knock was repeated. I rushed to the door and opened it, (for it was both locked and barred within,) and there was Katharine!——She was dressed as if for going out, and her boy was in her hand.

“Come in, Katharine,” said I; “I did not dream that it was you.—Come in.”

She entered, still leading the child with her.—I gazed upon her with a sort of awe, and even dread; her cheek was so pale, so bloodless,—her lips so white and bleached,—her eyes so fixed in the gloomy stedfastness of utter desolation.

“Our meeting, Matthew,” she said, “has been a sore one; we must now part. I have come to bid you farewell—I, and my boy.”

“What! all leave me, Katharine?—Look there,—do you see what partings I have had already?—You too!—Alas! why?—whither?—Are you not still my sister? Is not our blood the same?”

“I must go, Matthew; my retreat has been discovered. I knew from the first moment it must be so. How could that be kept secret that was known to so many,—and under such circumstances, too?”

“Stop, Katharine, stop!” I cried; “let me bury my dead, and I will go with you wherever you will lead me.—Alas! what matters place to me now?—Do you not see that I am alone in this world?—No, no; not alone neither;—not quite alone, while I have you to weep with me.—Oh! would that I could weep!—While I have still an arm to defend you,—blood, floods and floods of blood, to flow for you!—Do you not see that Providence has given me to you for your protector?—What fear you from man?—Why fly?—from whom?—What is it that you fear?—Here, anywhere, ‘tis all one,—sit down here,—sit down beside this black casket of my jewels.—Here let us rest together: what need we care for this world now?”