contemptible result of all his patience, self-command,
and success, was too heartbreaking. He
groaned aloud. "And you can come with a
smile and tell me that; you cruel woman." Then
he broke down altogether and burst out crying.

"You were born without a heart," he sobbed.

Mrs. Archbold quivered at that. " I wish I
had been," said she, in a strange, soft, moving
voice; then, casting an eloquent look of reproach
on him, she went away in visible agitation, and
left him sobbing. Once out of his sight she
rushed into another room, and there, taking no
more notice of a gentle madwoman its occupant
than of the bed or the table, she sank into
a chair, and, throwing her head back with
womanly abandon, laid her hand upon her bosom
that heaved tempestuously.

And soon the tears trickled out of her imperious
eyes, and ran unrestrained.

The mind of Edith Archbold corresponded
with her powerful frame, and bushy brows. Inside
this woman all was vigour; strong passions,
strong good sense to check or hide them; strong
will to carry them out. And between these mental
forces a powerful struggle was raging. She was
almost impenetrable to mere personal beauty, and
inclined to despise early youth in the other sex;
and six months spent with Alfred in a quiet
country house would probably have left her
reasonably indifferent to him. But the first day
she saw him in Silverton House he broke through
her guard, and pierced at once to her depths; first
he terrified her by darting through the window
to escape: and terror is a passion. So is pity;
and never in her life had she overflowed with it
as when she saw him drawn out of the tank and
laid on the grass. If, after all, he was as sane as
he looked, that brave high-spirited young creature,
who preferred death to the touch of coarse
confining hands!

No sooner had he filled her with dismay and
pity, than he bounded from the ground before
her eyes and fled: she screamed, and hoped he
would escape; she could not help it. Next she
saw him fighting alone against seven or eight,
and with unheard-of prowess almost beating
them. She sat at the window panting, with
clenched teeth and hands, and wished him to
beat, and admired him, wondered at him. He
yielded, but not to them: to her. All the
compliments she had ever received were tame
compared with this one. It thrilled her vanity. He
was like the men she had read of, and never seen;
the young knights of chivalry. She glowed all
over at him, and detecting herself in time was
frightened. Her strong good sense warned her
to beware of this youth, who was nine years her
junior yet had stirred her to all her depths in an
hour; and not to see him nor think of him too
much. Accordingly she kept clear of him
altogether at first. Pity soon put an end to that;
and she protected and advised him, but with a
cold and lofty demeanour put on express. What
with her kind acts and her cold manner he did
not know what to make of her; and often turned
puzzled earnest eyes upon her, as much as to say
are you really my friend or not? Once she forgot
herself and smiled so tenderly in answer to these
imploring eyes, that his hopes rose very high
indeed. He flattered himself she would let him
out of the asylum before long. That was all
Julia's true lover thought of.

A feeling hidden, and not suppressed, often
grows fast in a vigorous nature. Mrs. Archbold's
fancy for Alfred was subjected to this
dangerous treatment; and it smouldered, and
smouldered, till from a penchant it warmed to a fancy,
from a fancy to a passion. But penchant, fancy,
or passion, she hid it with such cunning and
resolution, that neither Alfred nor even those of
her own sex saw it; nor did a creature even
suspect it, except Nurse Hannah; but her eyes were
sharpened by jealousy, for that muscular young
virgin was beginning to sigh for him herself, with
a gentle timidity that contrasted prettily with her
biceps muscle and prowess against her own sex.

Mrs. Archbold had more passion than tenderness,
but what woman is not to be surprised and
softened? When her young favourite, the greatest
fighter she had ever seen, broke down at the end of
his gallant effort and began to cry like a girl, her
bowels of compassion yearned within her, and
she longed to cry with him. She only saved
herself from some imprudence by flight, and
had her cry alone. After a flow of tears such a
woman is invincible; she treated Alfred at
teatime with remarkable coldness and reserve. This
piece of acting led to unlooked-for consequences:
it emboldened Cooper, who was raging against
Alfred for telling the justices, but had forborne
from violence, for fear of getting the house into
a fresh scrape. He now went to the doctor, and
asked for a powerful drastic; Bailey gave him
two pills, or rather boluses, containing croton-
oil- inter alia; for Bailey was one of the
farraginous fools of the unscientific science. Armed
with this weapon of destruction, Cooper entered
Alfred's bedroom at night, and ordered him to
take them: he refused. Cooper whistled, and
four attendants came. Alfred knew he should
soon be powerless; he lost no time, sprang at
Cooper, and with his long arm landed a blow
that knocked him against the wall, and in this
position, where his body could not give, struck
him again with his whole soul, and cut his cheek
right open. The next minute he was pinned,
handcuffed, and in a strait-jacket, after crippling
one assailant with a kick on the knee.

Cooper, half stunned, and bleeding like a pig,
recovered himself now, and burned for revenge.
He uttered a frightful oath, and jumped on
Alfred as he lay bound and powerless, and gave
him a lesson he never forgot.

Every art has its secrets: the attendants in
such madhouses as this have been for years
possessed of one they are too modest to reveal to
justices, commissioners, or the public: the art of
breaking a man's ribs, or breast-bone, or both,
without bruising him externally. The convicts
at Toulon arrive at a similar result by another