day; his full pouting lips relaxing into smiles of
content as he lay along the old settle, and the
firelight playing upon his bleached face, which
but a few weeks since had borne such a brave
look of coming manhood. My hoard, which I
had been saving against my wedding, had been
spent upon his defence, and I had not enough
money to take us both together to America; he
could not stay behind, so he should go on before
me, and I would continue my embroidering until
I could earn sufficient to join him. I know now
that there was in my inmost thoughts a secret
subtle hope that when he was fairly gone George
would seek me again, and that there might still
be something of the happiness we had so long
looked forward to in the future. Willie agreed
to my plan eagerly, and pressed forward the few
preparations we had to make; so that in another
week I went with him to Liverpool, and engaged
a berth in an emigrant ship for him, with no fear
of his being arrested and brought back now. But
of that one awful subject we never spoke to one
another; though the boy's manhood seemed
crushed into the helplessness and indecision of
a child; appealing and clinging to me until the
last moment, as if he could not part with me. I
stood upon the landing-stage watching the vessel
as it was towed down the river, till the fog into
which it was sailing covered it from my eyes;
and then I opened a scrap of paper which Willie
had pressed into my hand at parting.

"What can I do?" was written upon it;
"sister, I am heart-broken for you; but I could die
thankfully if I knew you would be happy. George
Denning knows I am as innocent of this crime
as an unborn babe. If he would only tell you I
am not guilty I would be satisfied. Sister, you
do not believe it yet, but only hear what he can
say. He knows that I am innocent."

I read these sentences over until the one idea
they expressed took full possession of my mind.
George could prove at least to me that my Willie
was innocent, and I must obtain this proof from
him by any means. All the time I was travelling
down to the town I was pondering over this
secret. It was in George Denning's heart; but
was not I there too? and had he not a thousand
times declared he could not, if he would, conceal
a thought from me? True, it must be full of
anguish and shame, or even, maybe, some
partnership in guilty knowledge, or George would
have come forward at once to free my brother.
Yet both of them had kept silence; and Willie
had risked his life upon the secret. But whatever
this mystery was between my young brother and
my betrothed husband, I had a right to know it,
and decide upon it for myself— I, no longer a
child, but a woman, who had battled with the
world. Endless speculations crossed my mind,
always strengthening my resolution to spend my
life, if that were necessary, in clearing Willie
from the false accusation which had sent him
forth a stranger among strangers.

I knew the way to the pretty cottage in the
suburbs of the town, for I had been there once,
not long since, with George and Willie, to see
the preparations they were both making for me
after their work- hours. Something of the old
hope and confidence awoke, as from a long and
miserable trance, when I swung back the garden
wicket, and walked slowly down the path to the
porch, where he and I had sat together, talking
in interrupted whispers, that one and only time
I ever crossed his threshold. I needed only a
few words from his lips, and though Willie and
I might have something to forgive, how easy it
would be to forgive him! I was not thinking of
the murdered man at all, and scarcely of crime in
connexion with George; only that there was a
painful secret between us, and he must disclose
it to me. As I lingered in the porch, before the
door which was to have opened to me as a
cherished wife, the latch was lifted from within,
and George Denning stood face to face with me.
It was only a few weeks since we had met, but
they had wrought the changes of a lifetime in
him. When I had known him in that far distant
past, he was a strong, powerful man, with the
energy of a warm spirit in every feature of his
handsome face; now he stood before me gaunt
and pale and shattered, with a drooping head
and languid eyes that hardly kindled into life as
they rested suddenly upon me. He stretched
out his trembling hand to the door-post for
support, but it seemed to me like a barrier to
prevent my entrance.

"I am not coming in," I said; but the strong
man reeled giddily, and would have stumbled
over his own threshold if I had not extended my
arms to his help. He sank down upon the porch
seat, and, leaning his head upon my shoulder, he
groaned bitterly.

"Oh, Rachel!" he cried, in a weak, querulous
voice, like an ailing child, " how I have suffered.
I have been ill almost to death, and longing all
the time for one sight of you. But you have
come back to me. God bless you, my Rachel!
You have sought me out, and not cast me off.
You are a true Christian, Rachel."

"Willie is gone," I answered, with a keen
thrill of joy at his words of welcome; "it was
we who thought you had forsaken us, never
coming to see us; and I counting myself a
murderer's sister. But Willie says you know he is
innocent. Tell me, George; trust me with the
secret. What is it? What can it be that could
hinder you coming forward to clear Willie?"

My voice fell into a whisper as I uttered the
last words; and in the silence that followed we
could hear the far-away mournful under tone from
the life in the city, that always sounds to me like
a ceaseless wailing over the sorrow and crime of
the crowded homesteads. But in the gardens
round us the birds were singing their last and
gayest songs in the spring twilight; and the
children, in their new freedom from the pinching
cold of winter, were filling the quiet places with
noisy laughter.

"Rachel," said George, raising himself up
from leaning against me, and looking away from