These questions were asked hurriedly, apprehensively, with a

look of vague terror, her cheoks whitening as she spoke, her eyes

darting wildly into mine, and her lips remaining parted after she

had spoken.

"Ah!" I exclaimed, keenly watching her. Her glance sank beneath

my gaze. I put my hand upon her own.

"What do I suspect I What should I suspect? Ha!"--Here I arrested

myself. My ardent anxiety to know the truth led me to forget my

caution; to exhibit a degree of eagerness, which might have proved

that I did suspect and seriously. To exhibit the possession of

jealousy was to place her upon her guard--such was the suggestion

of that miserable policy by which I had been governed--and defeat

the impression of that feeling of perfect security and indifference,

which I had been so long striving to awaken. I recovered myself,

with this thought, in season to re-assume this appearance.

"Your mind still wanders, Julia. What should I suspect? and whom?

You do not suppose me to be of a suspicious nature, do you?"

"Not altogether--not always--no! But, of course, there is nothing

to suspect. I do not know what I say. I believe I do wander."

This reply was also spoken hurriedly, but with an obvious effort

at composure. The eagerness with which she seized upon my words,

insisting upon the absence of any cause of suspicion, and ascribing to

her late delirium, the tacit admissions which her look and language

had made, I need not say, contributed to strengthen my suspicions,

and to confirm all the previous conjectures of my jealous spirit.

"Be quiet," I said with an air of sang froid. "Do not worry yourself

in this manner. You need sleep. Try for it, while I leave you."

"Do not leave me; sit beside me, dear Edward. I will sleep so much

better when you are beside me."

"Indeed!"

"Yes, believe me. Ah! that I could always keep you beside me!"

"What! you are for a new honeymoon?" I said this in a TONE of

merriment, which Heaven knows, I little felt.

"Do not speak of it so lightly, Edward. It is too serious a matter.

Ah! that you would always remain with me; that you would never

leave me."

"Pshaw! What sickly tenderness is this! Why, how could I earn my

bread or yours?"

"I do not mean that you should neglect your business, but that

when business is over, you should give me all your time as you

used to. Remember, how pleasantly we passed the evenings after

our marriage. Ah! how could you forget?"

"I do not, Julia."

"But you do not care for them. We spend no such evenings now!"

"No! but it is no fault of mine!" I said gloomily; then, interrupting

her answer, as if dreading that she might utter some simple but

true remark, which might refute the interpretation which my words

conveyed, that the fault was hers, I enjoined silence upon her.




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