"My lady!" muttered the old philosopher. "Pray go on, sir. Go on, Edgar, my boy; it is interesting!"

"This passionate appeal," said the barrister, "seems to have been the final one. Eugenie-or Mrs Wade, as she called herself in England-seems to have yielded to the entreaties of my father; for the next letter, dated a week later, is very explicit.

"My valet, Gustave, of whom I have spoken, will give you this. He is a Swiss, and speaks German, French, and English equally badly; but you can understand him, and, what is more, you can trust him. He will bring with him a young Boulognese girl, a fisher wife, and her baby, who is about the age of your own. This young woman will be a ready implement to all we want; and only requires to be paid well, to be fed well, and to dress well, and she will do anything, as most of the lower class women will.'"

"Dash his aristocratic impudence!" said Old Daylight. "Poor human nature !"

"Your child will come to Normandy, where so many children are brought up, where his rival is peacefully sucking his Norman milk; and then an accident, or a storm, or something of that sort-for fortune helps the bold-will make the two nurses take shelter in the same auberge-in the same room.

"There will be a quarrel among the people-there always is when people drink well, and Gustave shall manage that— and in that quarrel and fright the children will be changed.'" "A good plot! a very neat plot, my lord," said Forster, cracking his fingers.

Edgar continued-

"Gustave and the young woman, whose name is Estelle Martin, and who is the lawful wife, dear soul, of an intelligent animal who provides us with fish on this coast"".

"Ah! my faith that fellow Brownjohn has something in his clue," said Old Daylight to himself, with a feeling of chagrin. Then he comforted himself with the remembrance"No; it is broken, for Madame Martin was a widow."

These thoughts did not interrupt Edgar, who read on"Gustave and the nurse will furnish you with clothes exactly the same in material and pattern as those worn by Monsieur. They purchase these things at warehouses; and

every rag, every stitch will be the same, and marked the same, each alike with the coronet which, one day, your boy-our boy-will wear with such pride. That, my Eugenie, will be your reward for acting so nobly!'"

"Nobly!" thought Forster. "Well, there are two ways of looking at everything."

"And you will console yourself with the thought that your offspring-the dearest part of you-will be often in my arms, always in my heart, and covered with my kisses. As to the other, I know your truth and goodness. You will cherish him as your own. You will again and again, every day, my Eugenie, prove to me how you love me. Do not think of the guilt of this: it deceives no one, it can hurt no one.

The heir

to the estates and name I bear is my child, of my dearest and best blood-and your blood is better than the puddle of a shopkeeper, although he has enriched himself, as did my respected English father-in-law. The Autras were Knights of Aquitaine. The two nations so often at war will be joined in our issue, who shall, one day, sit in the English House of Peers. Heaven, if we succeed in so many difficult paths, and in such unforeseen circumstances, will smile on our endeavour and bless our deed.'"

"He knows how to plead with a woman, that fellow there," said Daylight, pointing to the letter. "By St Bridget, St Botolph, and the Bank of England, he is clever."

Then, with a revulsion of feeling, he said

"Unhappy man, he makes Heaven an accomplice of his crime."

Edgar shuddered, as if cold.

"You see," he continued, "the woman seems to have rejected the idea at first; and then, miserable creature, to have yielded."

"Softly, softly!" said Old Forster. "It appears to me that your father was much more to blame than your mother-beg pardon, than Madame Wade."

"Yes," said Edgar, with a violent gesture. "Yes; men are, in the incipient circumstances of crime, more guilty than It is for men to propose, for women to reject. He, the Earl of Chesterton ".

women.

"The Earl of Chesterton!" cried Forster. tip-top swell who holds his head so high?"

"What! that

"The very same," said the young man, with a certain pride. "The Earl of Chesterton has thought out and laid the lines of all this plot. But, then, he has something to excuse him; and it is curious that I feel no hatred towards him. He has his excuse-intense love for this woman, intense love for his child, a passion which he could not control. All the love that he felt he has shown; and, at least, he has not, like this miserable creature, deceived me for thirty years. Moreover, he has been cruelly punished."

"Punished! How so?" said Old Daylight. "I saw him at Ascot with the royal party; he looked at a distance as well as you-young and well-looking-with his son, Lord Wimpole."

"I am Lord Wimpole," said Edgar, proudly. "You, at least, should believe so."

"I do," returned Old Daylight, hastily. "But how has the Earl been punished?"

"I will tell you. Here are one or two more extracts:

"DEAREST EUGENIE,-All went well. The nurses met. There was a storm, or a threatened one; they took refuge in a cabaret. Your nurse's husband was there, and pretended to be-or, egad, I think the fellow was-jealous of Gustave. At any rate, there was a desperate quarrel, and in the row the babies were successfully changed. Our nurse went into hysterics, and knew nothing about the matter; neither knows the fisherman Martin anything, for he was very fairly drunk. The secret rests, then, with Gustave, Estelle Martin, and our two selves. Providence has aided us; let us thank God for His goodness. Now, dearest, I shall be happy-as happy as I can be without you. From time to time you shall have news of your-of our son.'

'Now, what do you say?" asked Edgar Wade, triumphantly. "Upon my soul, upon my affidavit," cried Old Daylight, in triumph, "you are NOT the son of Mrs Wade!"

Edgar grasped his hand warmly.

"Now," said he, "listen. Now comes the punishment. The letters continue for years, and from the Earl always as fondly.

There is much news of my rival, who is growing, we are told, a fine fellow. He hunts, he fishes, he shoots; while I am for ever at eternal books. But at last the letters are interrupted. Then come some of reproach.

"Alas! Eugenie, alas! at last I know all. I herewith send you a deed of settlement, which will make you rich: would that it would make you happy! A friend of your own nation-cruel as friends are--has told me all. You have been watched; the visits of the officer !'—underlined—' have been noted; and, alas! I have seen him enter your house. I have now no more doubts. You, for whom I have pawned my very soul-you, whose faith I could have sworn to-you, whom I loved above all-you have deceived me. I have been guilty for nothing. I am assured that you have deceived me for nothing. We part for ever. I will receive no letters from you. The grave has, as it were, closed over our love, leaving me with the poisoned arrow of this doubt-Is this child, for whom I have sacrificed so much, my own?'"

CHAPTER VII.

BROTHERS IN BLOOD, BUT WIDE-DIVORCED IN SOUL."

OLD FORSTER, called Daylight-who, being an inductive philosopher, understood complications as well as most men-laid his head upon his two hands, and rocked backwards and forwards, muttering to himself his favourite phrase, "Poor human nature," several times. Then he began to think that, considering all things, man was an unhappy animal; that when he meddled with he generally muddled matters; and that no more proper or more intense punishment to Philip Stanfield, the proud Earl of Chesterton, could have been found than that which, after all his plots and deceptions, left him uncertain of his son-nay, uncertain if, indeed, the ancestral blood that he so much talked of flowed in the veins of him who would wear the coronet of Chesterton.

"Oh," said Mr Tom Forster, as he thought over all this

But he was not making rhymes: he was merely quoting the literary baronet, Sir Walter Scott's poem of "Marmion," which was at the time very popular.

The more Old Daylight thought over the matter, the more sure he felt of his inductive process. Poor Edgar Wade, overcome with conflicting emotions, was silent. Old Forster put his hand kindly on his shoulder, and said to him

"Edgar, my boy, if every one else in the world should desert you, I never will. I have no doubt of your story. I will do all that patient research can do to prove it true. There are means to do so you little think of. But now we had better go to bed. I will wait on you to-morrow morning, and we will then consult how to proceed.

"I am not tired," said Edgar, yet saying the words most wearily. "I am at the end of my tether. What am I to do? Estelle Martin is dead-dead; and her secret is with her, and will be buried with her in the grave. Poor woman!-it was too heavy for her, and she would have confessed. It tormented her. But there!" cried the barrister, impatiently, "what can you do against luck? Some common, money-seeking ruffian, for the sake of a few pounds, breaks into the house and murders my chief witness. Fortune is against me."

Money-seeking scoundrel," repeated Forster, emphasising the word "money." "Are you sure of that, Edgar?"

The question made the barrister start. His eyes glared for a moment, with a meaning look, upon the old man.

دو

"Do you mean he cried. "But no, the suggestion is too horrible. No, that cannot be, as I well know. Perhaps," he said, suddenly, "I may yet have hopes. Estelle must have had some letters and papers perhaps some deeds even, We must search the house. well knew that the poor woman had

executed by my father. Alas! Old Forster too

not left a scrap of paper. All her writings had disappeared as entirely as those of Mr William Shakespeare, poet and drama