The Queen of Hearts

he hills to one of Owen’s outlying farms. She was already too impatient to wait quietly for the eveni

e evening of which the first story was to be read, I began to calculate the chances of failure as well as the chances of success. What if my own esti

, I began, nevertheless, on this first of our days of suspense, to look for the name of his ship in the columns of telegraphic news. The mere mechanical act of loo

oduced but six of the necessary ten stories. As they were only, however, to be read, one by one, on six successive evenings, a

gether, in consequence of the perpetual intrusion of my brother’s eccentricities in every part of his narrative. The process of removing these quaint turns and frisks of Morgan’s humor — which, however amusing they might have been in an essay

hese contributions, he had undertaken to help us by some work of his own, and had been engaged for the last four days in molding certain events which had happened within his personal knowledge into the form of a story. His extrem

fternoon I completed my work of revision, numbered the manuscripts from one to six exactly as they happened to lie under my hand, and in

trings of the portfolio, and, womanlike, instantly asked leave to

sitting-room; and she was so enthusiastically desirous to do honor to the occasion, that she regretted not having brought with her from London the dress in which s

de) sat her three wrinkled, gray-headed, dingily-attired hosts, and just behind her, in still more inappropriate companionship, towered the spectral figure of the man in armor, which had so unaccountably attracted her on her arrival. This strange scene was lighted up by candles in high and heavy brass sconces. Before Jessie stood a mighty china punch-bowl of the olden time, containing the folded pieces of card, inside which were writ

to inaugurate the proceedings by requesting Jessie to take one of t

usiness;” and then entreated Morgan not to stare at her, or, in the present state of her nerves, she should upse

number, my de

king a magnificent courtesy, and b

posure was soon explained. Malicious fate had assigned to the most diffident individual in the company the trying re

dly, “that it has fallen to my turn to read first. I

ically. “Gentlemen of your cloth, Owen, seldom seem to distrust t

te. I became possessed of the letter which contains my narrative under these circumstances. At the time when I was a clergyman in London, my church was attended for some months by a lady who w

an shook his head and growled to h

versation. One of the guests present, who saw how she had interested me, and who spoke of her in the highest terms, surprised me by inquiring if I should ever have supposed that quiet, good-humored little woman to be capable of performing an act of courage which would have tried the nerves of the boldest man in England? I naturally enough begged for an explanation; but my neighbor at the table only smiled and said, ‘If you can find an opportunity, ask her what happened at The Black Cottage, and you will hear something that will astonish you.’ I acted on the hint as soon as I had an

a fortnight afterward I received from her

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