Forbes took me partly for that. 'Here is
a girl who will expect no devotion, no fondness,
no nonsense,' he thought, ' nothing, at least,
that I cannot give her.' Suppose he finds out
that I am not the woman he thought me, and
that when I married I did expect to love and to
be loved, will it not be misery to him to try
and fulfil his part of the compact?"

Alas! that was true, aud because it was
true I heaved a deep sigh. At that moment the
parlour door opened, and Arthur came in. At
once he crept up to his young step-mother. She
took him on her knee, and twining his arms
around her neck, he nestled on her bosom, and
thence looked at me with a pale pitiful little
face that made me forgive him all his sins.

"Jane," I said, and I am not ashamed to add
that my eyes were dim, "there is your hope and
your link with the father."

Jane shook her head rather sadly.

"No link," she replied, "but, if possible, a
cause of further division. When I came and
found this poor sickly thing, my heart yearned
towards it, perhaps because it suffered like
myself; perhaps," she added, with a faint blush,
"because it was his. I called it, and it came. I
caressed it, and it fell asleep in my arms. When
it was sick, I tended it; when it was peevish and
fretful through pain, I bore with it; and thus, I
suppose, it loved me. But, you see, it loves me
too much. One who ought to be first is second
now, and second far away. I am obeyed when
another is not heeded; I am sought when
another is left, and I am not his Annie that the
preference should not be resented; not against
me, indeed, not against the child, but resented
as a wrong. For if there be a being passionately
loved, it is this little pale creature. His mother
died when he was born, and his father almost
became a woman for his sake. He nursed him, he
tended him, and I reap the sweet fruit of love—
I, who had not the care of the tree. But I cannot
help it. This is my comfort, in sadness; this
little warm living creature clinging to me, and I
cannot give it up. When I talk to it and play
with it, when I dress it, as I like to do daily, I
feel almost happy. Arthur is not always cross
as you have seen him, cousin William; Arthur
does not always bite, for Arthur is not always in
pain, poor little fellow. He has days when he
is bright, and merry, and frolicsome, without
mischief, just like a young kid. Eh, Arthur?"

Arthur looked up; she stooped, and their lips
met in a long fond kiss. They were thus when
Mr. Forbes entered the room. I saw his colour
change as he perceived the child in his wife's
arms, but he soon recovered his composure, came
up to us cheerfully, and, bending over Jane's
shoulder, asked Arthur to kiss papa. Arthur
frowned, and gave papa a sulky push. Mr.
Forbes tried to smile as he walked away, but the
smile was forced, though a blush which followed
it was real. We are none of us perfect, and i
am bound to say that as Arthur pushed his father
away, a saucy little look of triumph passed
through Jane's brown eyes: a look that to me, at
least, said very plainly: "l am not Annie; but
some one can love me, Mr. Forbes." It was
this look which, whether he understood it or
not, made Mr. Forbes colour like a girl.

Nothing is easier than to solicit confidence
under pretence of giving advice; nothing more
troublesome, to a conscientious person, than to
give the proffered counsel when the confidence
has been made. So, at least, I now felt, and I
dreaded being alone with Jane again; but I
found, to my great comfort, though not without
some mortification, that Jane had spoken to get
relief, not to be advised. At least, she never
asked me to suggest what line of conduct she
should pursue towards her husband, and I believe
she even forgot that anything of the kind had
been mentioned between us. I pitied her from
my heart, but I saw no remedy to her sorrows. I
pitied Mr. Forbes too. You see, it is one thing
to marry a woman with the intention of giving
and receiving affectionate regard, and it is
another thing to marry a girl who takes the liberty of
falling in love with you, and who feels aggrieved if
you do not, or rather cannot, follow her example.
What should I have done, for instance, if, marrying
Jane for the sake of being comfortable with
her, I had suddenly discovered that my saucy
little cousin was enamoured of poor me? It has
occurred to me since then, that Jane would not
so have committed herself with me, but, at the
time, I did not think of that. I rejoiced that I
had not proposed to her, and I pitied her
husband; for if Jane's misfortune was to have read
the letter, his trouble was to read her heart
rather too truly. Poor little simple Jane! it was
like her to think that she could keep such a
secret from a husband, who had not love to
blind him.

I watched him without seeming to do so, and
I felt sure that Mr. Forbes's grief was to see his
wife's love and not be able to return it; his
grief was to have married, as he thought, a
sensible mercenary girl, and to find out that he
was wedded to a fond and tender-hearted woman.
I do not mean to say that he resented that
love, or that it bored him; but he could not
return it.

I was beginning to walk about with the help
of a stick, when I saw Mr. Forbes go off in
his chaise one morning with Arthur.

"Please to tell Jane that I am taking the
child —-" he said to me.

On hearing this, Arthur, who had sat quietly
till then, uttered a scream of dismay, and called
on his " mamma." I saw Mr. Forbes bite his
lip, but he drove away all the faster, and both
father and child were out of sight in a few
moments. Jane had heard the cry, and now came
down rather scared. On hearing the explanation
I gave her, she turned very pale.

"Oh, why does he take him to Harting?" she
cried, piteously; "my maid has just told me the
small-pox is there. Oh, if one could only
overtake him!"