"But what of the unfortunate daughter?" inquired Leah faintly.

"Well, as I was about remarking, they went away to Cuby, and some months ago, perhaps a year or so, they caught the scamp out there, and smuggled him to this country, to be punished for a murder he committed some years ago, long before he was married."

Leah's heart throbbed wildly in her bosom, and every limb trembled like an aspen; but the old man did not detect her emotion, and continued:

"He will soon be tried here. I hear the friends of the dead man and the Mordecais are pushing up the trial. When the trial comes off, I guess the banker's family will come back."

"Is the unfortunate man confined in the old city prison here?"

inquired Leah, with a faltering voice.

"Yes, madam. At one time a shell struck the old prison, and some of the inmates came nigh escaping, but they have had it repaired, and now it's pretty full, sure. If a bomb could strike it, and finish all the inmates at once, I guess that would suit them. I don't know why else they keep that jail full of thieves and murderers. I am too busy with my wayside house, giving cheer and comfort to my unfortunate countrymen, to bother much about the jail-birds. Yes, Michael Moran is too busy for that."

"What is my bill, sir?" said Leah faintly, oblivious of the wordy Michael's harangue, and thinking only of the prison-the dim, dark prison, where her husband was languishing. "I have no money but gold," she continued; "how much do I owe you for my food and lodging?"

"Gold!" repeated Michael with eager emphasis; and then, as if fearing to betray his characteristic love of the shining ore, he added with an air of indifference, "well, I guess, as you have nothing else, gold will do. you owe me--" and he named a certain sum.

"Remarkable low price. Michael Moran hasn't the heart to be hard on a woman; and I know you'll be sorry, to your dyin' day, that you had to quit the Good Cheer House so soon."

Leah made no reply and evinced no regret, as she handed out, from her low supply of money, the amount demanded. Hurrying away from the inn, with the child in her arms, she hastened forward toward the dismal jail that, as she well remembered, was many streets away.

On the same bright October morning that opened the eyes of Leah in the Queen City, Emile Le Grande was pacing to and fro in his prison cell at an early hour. The confinement of so many long, weary months had left its impress on every feature; and pale and emaciated he scarcely resembled his former self. Before him, on a tin platter, was the coarse prison breakfast, as yet untasted. Restless and miserable, he trod backward and forward within the narrow limits of his cell, now glancing up at the sunlight that streamed through the narrow window so far above his head, then turning his ready ear to catch the sound of every human footstep that trod the corridors, or moved in the adjoining cells of this wretched place.

Despair had settled upon him, and death was a coveted visitor. "Is it myself," he muttered, as he convulsively ran his fingers through his hair, grown long from neglect, "or is it some other unfortunate wretch? Have I a wife and child on a far-off foreign shore, or is this thought a horrid, hideous nightmare, that comes to harrow my brain? O birds of the air, I envy you! O breezes that wander, I envy you! O sunlight, that streams through my window, give me my freedom, my freedom, I pray!"

Overpowered by these thoughts, the wretched man, enfeebled in mind as well as body, sank down upon the hard pallet, when the sound of footsteps was again heard along the corridor, coming nearer, nearer, nearer to his cell door. Startled, Emile heard the bolt draw back once more and the door open, and the jailer stood before him.

"Le Grande," he said, "there's a woman below says she must see you-a beggar; shall I bring her up?"

"Yes, man, in the name of mercy, bring her up. I'd see a dog that would come to me in this lonely place. Bring her up, beggar or not, though I have nothing to give her."

The jailer withdrew, and Emile's heart beat wildly from the strange announcement that even a beggar wished to see him in his wretchedness now.

Again the footsteps resounded in the corridor, coming nearer, nearer, nearer, to the cell.

Emile had risen from his pallet, and searching in his pocket said, "I haven't even so much as a fourpence for the poor old soul."

The cell door opened. Emile saw the jailer, and a woman with a child. His eye flashed bright, his heart leaped to his throat. The woman's face grew paler, and tottering forward she fell upon the prisoner's bosom, and gasped, "My husband!"

He said, "Thank God. My wife! my wife! my child!"

CHAPTER XXXIX.

IT were impossible to chronicle the half that transpired in the eventful days of those eventful years. Days seemed months, and months seemed years, in their sad, slow progress. When the heart is happy, Time's wing is light, but as every soul was sorrowful in those dark days, so the progress of the years was slow and dreary.

To none was the time so dark, and hopeless, as to Emile while he languished in prison, and to Leah, as she waited for an uncertain reunion. But the hopeless days had passed, and in unutterable joy the husband and wife clasped each other again. Now, she was never to leave him till the stern fiat of the law should decide his guilt or innocence. In an obscure abode, within the very shadow of the jail, Leah obtained a temporary home. The inadequacy of her means would have forbidden her more comfortable accommodations. But she desired only to dwell in obscurity, and be near, and with her husband, in his loneliness and misfortune. Without comment or observation, she passed in and out of the jail as frequently as the stern prison-law would allow. The jailer was a man who had occupied a higher position in life, and had sought this place to evade the merciless grasp of conscription. Often had he wondered at the pale, lovely face of this unhappy wife, and marked her tenderness toward the child that never seemed to weary the faithful arms that bore it so constantly about.

"That woman has a history," the jailer often said to himself.

But the days passed, and ere Leah had been a month within the Queen City, the trial was at hand. Pressing measures in these awfully chaotic times, Mr. Mordecai was about to bring his culprit to justice, from fear that delay would prove dangerous, if not disastrous, to his purposes.

"My darling," said Emile to his wife, the day before the proposed trial, "I desire that you shall not be present during the investigation of to-morrow. I fear you may be subjected to insult and indignity which I cannot resent, being in bonds. Besides, dear, you can do me no good."

"Will my father be there, Emile?"

"I suppose that he will."

"Then I cannot be present. I feel that I could never meet my father's eye, unless I knew I had his forgiveness and his love still. But how can I leave you?"

"Remain quietly, dear, at your boarding-place, and await, hopefully, the end. I trust it will all be right. I know I am innocent," said Emile, with a forced effort at cheerfulness.

"Heaven grant they may find you guiltless! But oh! Emile, I fear, I fear, I fear something-I cannot tell you how it is, but from the day you were taken from our happy Cuban home, not a ray of hope has illuminated my heart."

"You must be brave, Leah, your sadness will weigh me down, and I cannot, must not go into the presence of my accusers with aught but a look of defiant innocence. Be brave, be cheerful, for my sake, and the sake of our innocent child."

"Can I see you during the trial?"

"I suppose not; but as it will consume but a few days at most, you can remain quietly at your lodgings till the end."

"The twilight is gathering in your window, Emile," said Leah, after a thoughtful silence. "I should have gone an hour ago; your supper will be late to-night, dear; but oh! I fear to leave you! It seems as though you were going to your burial, to-morrow. What will become of me? What will become of our helpless darling?"

Distracted by the plaintive words and agonized look of his wife, Emile said:

"Would you madden me, Leah? Have I not asked you to be brave, even unto the end? If you falter now, I am lost. My health and my strength are already gone. Only the consciousness of innocence sustains me. Leave me now. Sheer me with the hope of acquittal, and be brave as only a woman can be."

"Forgive me, Emile; forgive my weakness; and when we meet again, may the sunshine of a brighter, happier day, dawn over us. Good-by, my own Emile, my own beloved husband," and the wretched wife laid her head upon the true, innocent heart of Emile, and wept her last burning tears of sorrow.

CHAPTER XL.

FROM the day that Leah first found her husband in the prison, and observed the coarse, uninviting fare that was served to the prisoners, she had daily prepared his food herself, and supplied it, too, from her scanty purse. By the permission of the jailer, this food was received twice a day from the hands of a trusty negro woman, known to many of the prison inmates as Aunt Dinah.

On this same evening when Leah parted so sadly from her husband, she went at once to her lodging place, and quickly prepared the tempting evening meal. After she had gone, Emile, once more alone, crouched down in a corner of his shadowy cell, and was lost in sorrowful revery, till the jailer, unheeded, opened the cell-door and handed in a basket, saying: