alone those two from the house of Porthgenna
drive away. Not a word says the mistress
till they have got to the journey's end for the
first day, and are stopping at their inn
among strangers for the night. Then at last
she speaks out, ' Put you on. Sarah, the good
linen and the good gown to-morrow,' she
says, 'but keep the common bonnet and the
common shawl, till we get into the carriage
again. I shall put on the coarse linen and
the coarse gown, and keep the good bonnet
and shawl. We shall pass so the people at
the inn, on our way to the carriage, without
very much risk of surprising them by our
change of gowns. When we are out on the
road again, we can change bonnets and shawls
in the carriage—and then, it is all done.
You are the married lady, Mrs Trecverton,
and I am your maid who waits on you, Sarah
Leeson.' At that, the glimmering on Sarah's
mind breaks in at last: she shakes with the
fright it gives her, and all she can say is,
'Oh, mistress! for the love of Heaven, what
is it you mean to do? ' 'I mean,' the
mistress answers, ' to save you, my faithful
servant, from disgrace and ruin; to prevent every
penny that the captain has got from going
to that rascal-monster, his brother, who
slandered me; and, last and most, I mean to
keep my husband from going away to sea
again, by making him love me as he has
never loved me yet. Must I say more, you
poor, afflicted, frightened creature—or is it
enough so ? ' And all that Sarah can answer,
is to cry bitter tears, and to say faintly. ' No.'
' Do you doubt,' says the mistress, and grips
her by the arm, and looks her close in the
face with fierce eyes, 'Do you doubt which is best
best, to cast yourself into the world forsaken,
and disgraced, and ruined, or to save
yourself from shame, and make a friend of me for
the rest of your life? You weak, wavering,
baby-woman, if you cannot decide for
yourself, I shall for you. As I will, so shall it
be! To-morrow, and the day after, and the
day after that, we go on and on, up to the
north, where my good fool of a doctor says
the air is cheerful-keen—up to the north,
where nobody knows me or has heard my
name. I, the maid, shall spread the report
that you, the lady, are weak in your health.
No strangers shall you see, but the doctor
and the nurse, when the time to call them
comes. Who they may be, I know not; but
this I do know, that the one and the other
will serve our purpose without the least
suspicion of what it is; and that when we get ]
back to Cornwall again, the secret between
us two will to no third person have been
trusted, and will remain a Dead Secret to the
end of the world! ' With all the strength
of the strong will that is in her, at the hush
of night and in a house of strangers, she
speaks those words to the woman of all women
the most frightened, the most afflicted, the
most helpless, the most ashamed. What need
to say the end? Onthat night Sarah first
stooped her shoulders to the burden that
has weighed heavier and heavier on them
with every year, for all her after-life."

"How many days did they travel towards
the north?" asked Rosamund, eagerly.
"Where did the, journey end? In England
or in Scotland ? "

"In England," answered Uncle Joseph.
"But the name of the place escapes my
foreign tongue. It was a little town by the
side of the sea—the great sea that washes
between my country and yours. There they
stopped, and there they waited till the time
came to send for the doctor and the nurse.
And as Mistress Treverton had said it should
be, so, from the first to the last, it was. The
doctor and the nurse, and the people of the
house were all strangers; and to this day, if
they still live, they believe that Sarah was
the sea-captain's wife, and that Mistress
Treverton was the maid who waited on her.
Not till they were far back on their way
home with the child, did the two change
gowns again, and return each to her proper
place. The first friend at Porthgenna
that the mistress sends for to show the
child to, when she gets back, is the other
doctor who lives there. 'Did you think
what was the matter with me, when you sent
me away to change the air ? ' she says, and
laughs. And the doctor, he laughs too, and
says, ' Yes, surely! but I was too cunning
to say what I thought in those early days,
because, at such times, there is always fear
of a mistake. And you found the fine dry
air so good for you that you stopped? ' he
says. ' Well, that was right! right for
yourself and right also for the child.' And the
doctor laughs again and the mistress with
him, and Sarah who stands by and hears
them, feels as if her heart would burst within
her, with the horror, and the misery, and the
shame of that deceit. When the doctor's
back is turned, she goes down on her knees,
and begs and prays with all her soul that
the mistress will repent, and send her away
with her child, to be heard of at Porthgenna
no more. The mistress, with that
tyrant-will of hers, has but four words of answer
to give:—' It is too late! ' Five weeks after,
the sea-captain comes back, and the 'Too
late ' is a truth that no repentance can ever
alter more. The mistress's cunning hand
that has guided the deceit from the first,
guides it always to the last—guides it so that
the captain, for the love of her and of the
child, goes back to the sea no more—guides
it till the time when she lays her down on
the bed to die, and leaves all the burden of
the secret, and all the guilt of the confession,
to Sarah—to Sarah who, under the tyranny
of that tyrant-will, has lived in the house,
for five long years, a stranger to her own
child!"

"Five years! " murmured Rosamond, raising
the baby gently in her arms, till his face
touched hers. " Oh me! five long years a