hotel-keeper," he replied; "it will be ready in a few moments. Your own horses are not hurt, luckily."

"I don't know what Mr. Mellen will say!" she exclaimed. "He warned me not to keep the horses."

The stranger turned quickly toward her, with a sudden flush on his face.

"May I know whom I have had the pleasure of assisting?" he asked.

"I am Mrs. Harrington," she replied, "of —— street. I am so—"

"And your friends?"

"Miss Mellen, the sister of Grantley Mellen; and the other lady is his betrothed wife."

"She! That—"

"Yes, yes! Dear me, if any accident had occurred, how terrible it would have been! They are to be married next week," continued the widow, hurriedly. "Mr. Mellen is out of town, and will not be back till just before his wedding. Oh, I shudder to think! Dear, dear sir, how can I thank you!"

The servant came up that moment to say that a carriage was ready to take the ladies back to the city, and the gentleman escaped from her flood of meaningless gratitude.

Mrs. Harrington ran back to call her friends, and found Elizabeth quite composed and strong again.

"He's the most magnificent creature!" exclaimed the widow. "And you don't know him, Elizabeth?"

"Have I not said so? Come, Elsie."

As she passed into the hall, Elizabeth hurried on, leaving Mrs. Harrington to repeat her thanks, and Elsie to utter a few low, and apparently thankful words, to which he listened with more interest than he had done to all the widow's raptures.

They were in the carriage: the door closed; the stranger gave his parting bow, Elizabeth leaned further back in her seat, and they drove on, leaving him standing in the road.

"His name is North," said Mrs. Harrington. "Such an adventure! What will Mr. Mellen say?"

"We won't tell him yet," Elsie replied; "it would only frighten him. Be sure and not mention it, dear Mrs. Harrington."

"Oh, of course not,—just as you like. But what a handsome man that was! North—North? Who can he be? I have never met him!"

"Whoever he is, he has saved our lives," said Elsie.

"Yes, yes! But, dear Miss Fuller, how oddly you acted!"

"Do put up your veil, Bessie," added Elsie.

Elizabeth obeyed, showing her face, pale and tremulous still.

"I was very much frightened," she said; "I think my side was hurt a little—that was why I fainted."

She made no other answer to their wondering questions, and they drove rapidly back to Mrs. Harrington's house.

The stranger stood upon the porch of the hotel, looking after the carriage so long as it was in sight, with a strange, inexplicable expression upon his handsome face.

After a time, he roused himself, mounted his horse, and rode slowly back to the city.

CHAPTER IV.

HIGH FESTIVAL AT PINEY COVE.

On the shores of Long Island, where the ocean heaves in its wildest and most crystalline surf, a small cove had broken itself into the slopes of an irregular hill, after generations of beating storms and crumbling earth, taking a crescent shape, and forming one of the most picturesque bits of landscape to be found along the coast. The two points or promontories that stretched their green arms to the ocean, were clothed with thickly growing white pines, scattered with chestnuts, and a few grand old oaks. The country sloped beautifully down to this bright sheet of water, and swept around it in rocky points and broken groves, giving glimpses of rich grass-land, more luxuriantly cultivated than is usual to that portion of the island. As you looked on the scene from the water, a house was visible on the hillside, and came in full view as the shore was approached. It was a noble stone mansion, old as the hills, people were used to say, and solid as their foundations. The house had been a stately residence before the Revolution, and, without an earthquake or a ton of powder, would remain such for a century to come.

Whatever the body of the house had been in the good old times, when ornament was little thought of, it was now rendered picturesque by lofty towers, and additional wings with oriel windows and carved balconies in one direction; while the other wing clasped in a conservatory, of which nothing could be seen from the distance but wave upon wave of rolling crystal emerald, tinted like the ocean by the wealth of green plants they covered.

This was the residence Grantley Mellen had inherited from a maternal uncle just after his first struggle in life commenced. It was backed by many a fruitful field and broad stretch of timber-land, which altogether went under the title of Piney Cove.

Grantley Mellen, since he became possessed of the estate, had completed the work his uncle commenced when he built the two grand towers, and a more picturesque building could not well be imagined, with its broad lawn, its clumps of forest trees, and that magnificent ocean view, which was broken only by the pine groves on the two points.

This was by no means the only house visible from the cove. As you turned the southern point, a village was seen down the coast; and about half way between that and the pines was a wooden house, brown and weather-beaten, standing unsheltered on the bleak shore. Back of this house, shutting out all prospect but that of the ocean, was a tall cliff, covered with ragged yellow pines and stunted cedars, from which on stormy nights many a quivering flame had shot upward, luring ships to their ruin. Still, with this grim protest against the name looming behind it, the lonely old house was called "The Sailor's Safe Anchor," and was known all along the coast as a fishing-lodge and small tavern.

But once within the cove, you saw no sign of habitation save the mansion house and its appurtenances.

Grantley Mellen had been some weeks at the cove, renovating and preparing the house for the reception of his bride; for it was understood that he intended henceforth to make it his permanent residence. But the wedding-day was near, and he had gone up to the city, leaving the last preparations to the care of a singular class of household servants, one of his uncle's philanthropic importations from the South, where he had owned a plantation, and emancipated all its slaves except a half dozen, that would only accept liberty on condition that they might follow the old man to his northern home.

Grantley had accepted this sable household with the general inheritance; for, spoiled and pampered as family negroes are apt to be, they had proved generally faithful and obedient.

Though a very reverential and submissive person when her master was present, Clorinda, who had appointed herself housekeeper of the establishment, was apt to get on to a very high horse indeed when there was no superior authority to hold her in check; and, on this particular occasion, she was absolutely what she declared herself—"chief cook and bottle-washer."

This sable functionary was very busy two or three mornings before the time set for her master's wedding, not only in the general preparations for that event, but with a grand idea of her own, which she was earnestly carrying into effect. If the house was going into the hands of a new mistress, the colored persons of the establishment had resolved to commemorate the event in advance with a grand entertainment.

To this end, Clorinda, who appointed herself lady patroness in general, had betaken herself to Mr. Mellen's library with Caleb Benson, the high-shouldered, bald-headed occupant of "The Sailor's Safe Anchor," and the person whose prerogative it had been to supply fresh fish to the family at Piney Cove. Besides this, he performed a good deal of work in the grounds, and made himself generally useful.

This morning Benson had come up to the house at Miss Clorinda's special request, in order to assist in the literary department of the coming entertainment. Neither Clorinda nor any of her dark compeers could read or write, but invitations