“What became of him, after that, for a long time, I don’t know. He may have been in the city all the time, or he may have been in Cincinnati. At any rate, one day, as I was going from my boardinghouse to the store, I found him walking along by my side. Nora was nigh a year old then. He commenced talking to me on the street, asking me again to marry him; and then, to frighten me, he said what a pretty baby Nora had got to be; and that he should have to find a wife to take care of his child. She was his, and he was going to have her, right away; and if I had any interest in her, I could show it by becoming her stepmother. He said he had plenty of money, and pulled out a handful of gold and showed me. But this only made me think the worse of him. He followed me home, and into my room, against my will, and there I turned upon him and told him that if he ever dared to force himself into my presence again, I would summon the police, and he should be turned over to the Blankville authorities for the crime that had driven him out of the village.
“After he was gone, I sunk into a chair, trembling with weakness, though I had been so bold in his presence. He looked like an evil spirit, when he smiled at me as he shut the door. His smile was more threatening than any scowl would have been. I was frightened for Nora. Every day I expected to hear that the little creature had been taken from her nurse; I trembled night and day; but nothing happened to the child, and from that day to this I have not seen George Thorley. If he is in California, I am glad of it; for that is a good ways off, and perhaps he’ll never get track of his daughter. I’d far rather she’d die and be buried with her mother and myself, than to live to ever know that she had such a father.
“It seems a strange lot has been mine,” concluded the sewing-girl, her dark eyes musing with a faraway look, “to have been followed by such a man as that, to have set my heart so high above me, and then to have fallen, by means of that love, into such a dreadful pit of circumstances—not only to be heartbroken, but so driven and hunted about the world, with my poor little lambkin here.”
The pathetic look and tone with which she said this touched me deeply. For the first time, I felt fully the exceeding cruelty I had been guilty of toward her, if she were as innocent as her words averred of that nameless and awful crime which I had written down against her. At that moment, I did believe her innocent; I did pity her for her own melancholy sufferings, which had wasted the fountains of her life; and I did respect her for that humble and perfect devotion, giving all and asking nothing, with which she lavished her soul upon him whose memory called upon his friends for sleepless vigilance in behalf of justice. I did not wonder that she shrunk from me as from one ready to wound her. But this was only when in her presence; as soon as I was away I felt doubtful again.
“Have you any likeness of George Thorley?” asked Mr. Burton.
“No. Poor Nora had his ambrotype, but after her death I threw it into the fire.”
“Will you describe him to us?”
Miss Sullivan gave a description corresponding in all particulars with that given by Mr. Burton, after reading the dead-letter; he asked her about the third finger of the right hand, and she said—“Yes, it had been injured by himself, in some of his surgical experiments.”
We now proposed to take leave, the detective again assuring Leesy that he should rather protect her against Thorley than allow him any chance to annoy her; he assured her she should be cared for in his absence, and, what was more, that if little Nora should be left friendless, he would keep an eye on the child and see that it was suitably brought up. This last assurance brightened the face of the consumptive with smiles and tears; but when he gave her his hand at parting, she burst into sobs.
“It is our last meeting, sir.”
“Try to keep as well as you are now until I come back,” he said, cheerfully. “I may want you very much then. And, by the way, Leesy—one question more. You once told me that you did not recognize the person you saw upon the lawn, at Mr. Argyll’s, that night—have you a suspicion who it might be?”
“None. I believe the man was a stranger to me. I only saw him by a flash of lightning at the instant he was descending from the tree; if he had been an acquaintance I do not know that I should have known him.”
“That is all. Goodbye, little Nora. Don’t forget Burton.”
We heard the girl’s sobs after the door was shut.
“I’m her only friend,” said my companion, as he walked
