such gentry about. Well, Miss Selden, I am at your service;" and, stepping to the front-door, he beckoned in a second officer, and the two accompanied the young lady up-stairs.

The seamstress looked surprised, as who would not, at the sudden and unannounced entry of two constables into the room, but instead of being in the least flustered, continued quietly with her work. "She's an old one at it," muttered one of the officers to himself; for his heart, naturally narrow and hard, had become seamed and stony by his daily contact with crime, and he judged every one guilty till he was proved innocent. The other, a man of warm impulses and a heart so big that he had charity for even the vilest, and moreover a man of keen discernment, said at once to himself, "She is sinless as an unborn child, and either the victim of unjust suspicion or wicked intrigue."

But he was too true to his profession to betray by either word or look his real emotion, and so spoke up at once, bluntly yet not austerely, "You are accused, miss, of stealing a valuable diamond ring, and it becomes my duty to search your room and trunk."

For an instant the girl's face turned ghastly white; for whose would not, when so suddenly accused of such a crime? But conscious innocence sustained her, and, with the return of color to her cheeks. and lips, she rose up and said, with a gentle dignity, "Who is my accuser? When and where is it said I stole it?" her voice quivered at that word stole; but whose would not have done

ing-room and the adjoining bed-chamber which she had tenanted for two nights. Also, while Mary's room was searched, and Miss Selden's also.

Then the tiro withdrew to a corner and conversed awhile in low tones, keeping an eye to her. Mrs. Selden who, to do her justice, was one of the kindesthearted women in the world, if she did have a way of "storming" about trifles, came in and whispered to her kindly, Keep up a good heart, child; I don't believe you're guilty." And she did not, though, as she said, "it was very strange where the ring could have gone."

The seamstress gave her a grateful look, but said nothing. Belle, sore from her loss, the more as she felt it was mostly in consequence of her own carelessness, drew her mother from the room, saying, as they stood in the hall, “I know she took it; it's all a sham, the airs she puts on. If they don't arrest her, I'll send for the chief. A great pity if a family like ours can be robbed with impunity by a girl of whom nobody knows anything."

Just then one of the officers came out and said he must see Mr. Selden. It was a grave charge, and nothing to substantiate it except very slight circumstantial evidence.

"But she must have taken it," persisted Belle, " and I don't see any need of going for father."

"But I must go," said he, and he started at once. Unfortunately, Mr. Selden had been a good deal worried that morning. Two heavy remittances which he had confidently expected by the first Southern mail had failed to arrive, and to meet his own notes he had been oblig ed to run around and borrow. The officer found him in a surly mood, disposed to believe ill of every one, and though he stated the case in the way best calculated to bear favorably on the accused, Mr. Selden at once made up his mind she was guilty. "I told my wife she'd be terribly taken in sometime," said he; "so careless as she is about references, always saying she could tell an honest person by the look of their eye; and to have this happening to-day, when I've so

much to do at the store!" and he fretted and fumed all the way home. The consequences were as might have been expected. The accusers were wealthy and influential, the accused poor and unknown. She was taken before a magistrate, and, notwithstanding her plea of "not guilty," in default of bail, she was committed to jail to await a trial.

What she suffered in her cell, innocent, yet without friends or means to engage counsel! Ah, "the heart knoweth its own bitterness." But, if her cell was gloomy, it was hardly less so than the house of Mr. Seiden, on that evening and through the week. Belle was in hysterics, except when under the influence of opiates. A little inclined by temperament to be superstitious, she was sure the loss of the ring betokened misfortune to her affianced husband, or a rupture of the engagement. He was absent, and his expected letter had not come, and something must have happened to him, and so she sobbed and slept. Her father went back and forth from store to house, as gloomy as the grave. Something in his heart told him he had been hasty in the arrest, and something smote him there, constantly, at his sullen refusal to the big-hearted officer's request that he would get somebody to go bail for her. As for Mrs. Selden, she was nearly distracted with conflicting emotions. Belle and her husband both blamed her for taking in a stranger, while she, without a doubt of the girl's entire innocence, shuddered every minute, as she thought of her in jail, so young and delicate. Unbeknown to either her husband or child, she went to the jailer and bade him treat her as kindly as possible, and furnish her with anything she requested which would not be in violation of prison rules.

"If Frank were only here," she said, as she returned; "he's so different from his father and sister; he'd take her side, -at least he'd see that she had a lawyer. I'd write to him; but I know he can't leave his uncle so sick, and it would only worry him to know it and have to stay there;" and she wrung her hands and wished "young people wouldn't be

such fools as to think they must have a diamond ring when they were engaged; better save the money to furnish their house."

But the saddest heart of all was poor Irish Mary's. She had been the first one to turn suspicion on the seamstress, and when she saw her come down-stairs so white and trembling, and take her seat in the carriage between the two officers, she was ready to die of remorse. She remembered how kindly the stranger had spoken to her while she had been in the house, and that once, when she had run into the sewing-room to beg a needle and thread to run up a rent in her gown, the seamstress had mended it for her so quickly that her mistress had not missed her, and so neatly that you could hardly see the place. What would she not have given had she never said those words to Miss Selden! Time and again she crept over Belle's chamber on her hands and knees to see if she could not find the ring, her eyes so blinded with tears that, had it been there, she could not have seen it. On the third day a happy thought came to her. She would send Mr. Frank a letter and tell him all about it, and "shure he'd know just what to do, he would." And she did so.

She could not write herself, but she had a brother who could, and between the two, after an evening of hard work, she dictating and he writing, the letter was got ready and mailed. She wanted much to tell the family what she had done, but wisely forbore; for fear, as she said, "she'd git anither bad job on her han's."

convalescent, was reclining on a lounge drawn close to the hearthstone. "I'll warrant there is a pretty girl Down East that wishes me and my fever at Jericho just now; no beau for the next ball,

no

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"There's no pretty girl in the case, Uncle John!" interrupted Frank, hotly. They all shun me. In fact, I'm a confirmed old bachelor, and believe I shall soon quit the city for good, and come and live out here with you. But hark! there are bells, yes, Jim's got back;" and he hastened from the room. He soon returned with his hands full of letters and papers. "He says he thought he never should get back again alive; the snow blows so and drifts so fast! Only that Polly knew the way, he thinks he should have been lost or frozen. Poor fellow! it was too bad to send him; but I did want to hear from home so much. Ha!" and his cheek turned white; "what's this? mail direct, — strange hand." And he tore the envelope from Mary's letter. "In jail for stealing your sister's diamond ring." Uncle John caught those words only, and then, to his surprise, his nephew ran from the room like one demented.

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What is up now?" said the old man; and, feeling that he had a right to know, he managed to sit up and reach over for the letter which had been tossed upon the stand.

"Bad business! bad business!" said he; but I don't see, after all, anything in it to make Frank act so;" and in his methodical way, he refolded the sheet. He was just slipping it in the envelope when the young man returned.

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"So you've read it, and know what mischief I've made," said he; "but ". You, Frank? what do you mean?" Why, I took it; the ring "You stole Belle's ring, Frank! what does the boy mean?" And the old man began to think Frank was crazy.

"No, no; I took it and hid it; " and he briefly explained. "I have never thought of it since. Don't reproach me, uncle, don't. If you do, I shall go mad. I'll undo the wrong as fast as possible. Jim is harnessing up Ned for me,

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and, storm or no storm, I'll be in Buffalo to-morrow morning in time for the express, and the next morning in Boston.” But you'll freeze before you ever get half-way there, boy. Hear the wind roar, and see the snow blow. Wait till daylight, do."

"Wait! and the girl may die in jail! No, uncle," and his eyes flashed; "if I knew I should be frozen stiff in every joint, I'd start to-night! But I sha'n't. I know every step of the whole twenty miles, and so does Ned. And you've plenty of buffaloes and blankets. Don't say another word, — I must go."

He had felt from the beginning that it would be almost useless to remonstrate, . and therefore gave in, only trying to think of everything he could to make hiin comfortable.

"If Ned's likely to give out, stop at Bushnell's and tell him I say he must let you have his Charlie. He wont often let him, for he thinks more of him than he does of his wife; but he'll take you through if anything four-legged can. And now, good-by, my boy; and mind you, Frank, if the girl's homeless, fetch her out here. There's always room in Uncle John's house for one more. God bless you!"

There was not one in that household but sent up an extra prayer that night for the hurried traveller, and every time the old house rocked in the blasts, they shuddered in their beds, thinking of poor Frank out in the storm.

As for him, he says if he lives to be an hundred years old he will never forget that journey. "It was all flounder, flounder, from beginning to end; upset and set-up and upset again; only for Bushnell's Charlie I should have died. Ned was completely knocked up when we got there. I had frozen my toes, ears, and fingers. Oh, but 'twas an awful night."

But the distance was accomplished in barely time for the train though. The three hundred miles between Buffalo and Albany! They seemed as many thousands to the young man, tortured in min 1 and body; for both ears, cheeks, nose, hands and feet were severely frozen.