The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1884-07-11
M DCAP;
OR
THE STORY OF A SIN.
By HELEN b. MATHERs.

ed through those awful hours; but
when day broke, she crept away home
ward, and after walking an incredible
distance, enduring all sorts of hard
ships, she reached her foster sister,
who, running to her with putstretched
arms to seize the child, was met with
the one single word-dead!
For alasl the mothers heart, to all
appearance so Indifferent, had Weakened
in her during the servants absence, and
only when she knew that her baby was
way home, did she fully realize the hap
piness that might have been hers had
she kept him beside her. When the
servant conducted her to a SUPPOSE
tious grave, she fell down beside it in
sensible, and for days and weeks was
incapable Of movement or thought; but
when she came to herself, q fixed mono
mania possessed her-to discover in
the ranks of the living such child as
her own might have been, had he lived.
But nowhere could she find such one,
though she sought him far and wide.
Think of the horror of the situation
of the servant knowing herself to be
in deed If not in heart, a murderess-
think of these two lonely women dwell
ing with that awful secret between
them for years and years, till one morn
ing, in the corner of country news
paper, the servant read how by the dry
ing up of the Shifting Pool in the vii
young child had been discovered; prov
ed by medical evidence to have lain
there upward of five years.
IAN awful fear seized her lest the
mother should hear of the discovery,
and drawn by dreadful fascination to
the spot, she gathered little money
together, and without word to her
mistress, walked every step OF the way
to Lowell.
"When she reached the fatal pool,
the place was deserted, but as she sat
there in state of stupor, born of in
anition and despair, laborer passed,
and she recognized his face at once, as
he recognized hers. He had spoken to
her five years before, when she had sat
by the pool with the baby on her knee
''As he stared at her, open-mouthed,
Mr.. Eyre rode up, and, hearing. the
mans stammering EXPLANATIONS, drew
the truth from him, and, without mo-
ment's hesitation, as magistrate COM
mitted the woman to prison. She did
not known him, either by sight or
name, nor did she bear him any malice
might be prevented from knowing the
truth, and so she gave false name, and
pleaded guilty, only anxious that she
might die before Hester Clarke, by,
chance, should hear Of the trial, and,
suspecting who the prisoner might be,
come in search of her. 81.
''She was found guilty in due course;
but the description or her person in the
papers, coupled with the fact of her
sudden disappearance, excited her mis-
tress's suspicious. and she set out at
once, reaching the prison the day after
sentence had been passed upon her fos-
ter-sister.
''Of that terrible meeting between the
two women, when the mother knew
herself to have been robbed of all that
had made life dear, by the hand Of the
only creature on earth who had love for
her, will not speak. Let us rather study
the conduct Of the accused afterward,
full, cruel disposition, which could alone
account for the murder she was after
ward supposed to commit.
dose she thrust her unhappy SER
want from her-does she leave her alone,
face to face with the horrors of the fate
to which she is sentenced? Does she
tell into the many eager ears around
her, the truth about the man who lives
honored and respected with her rival,
up at the house yonder?
mo! she remains with this poor
wretch-she soothes her in those last
days, so rapidly approaching their
frightful end-she cOnfesses that she is
the mother, thereby hoping to divert
to her own head some of her servants
guilt-she moves heaven and earth to
obtain reprieve, and, failing that, a
remission of the sentence to one of
penal servitude for life; and when at
length the respite comes-a respite de-
layed to the last moment, because the
efforts of Mr.. Eyre against it have we'll
nigh succeeded--she receives the merci-
full intelligence with her arms clasped
about the unhappy woman who has
consummated her misery.
"Then, when the poor felon had de-
parted to expiate her sin in q living
death more awful than utter extinction,
bereft of her last, her only hope, what
shall this poor stranger do? She has
but to open her lips, to blare aloud a
few pregnant words, and all will shrink
away from the man whom now they
delight to honor, the young wife's hap
piness will be withered, the young
children's opening lives overshadowed,
his peace as utterly broken as her nap
piness was by him half dozen years
ago. BY accident she finds herself in
the presence of the wife, but does not
speak, though Lord Lovel (who has
long known the truth), believing her
about to do so, interposes, and takes
upon himself the guilt belonging to her
husband, and in this transparent fiction
the woman before you quietly acquiesc-
ed, and stood dumbly by to see her rival
honored, left in the possession of hus-
band, home, and children; while she,
poor outcast, despised by man, il not
by God, stood at his gates hungering
for the crumbs of bread that fell from
the rich mans table.
'How much native goodness, how
much nobility of soul, did she not dis
play in thus permitting the happiness
to continue that she could wither at a
word! She fingers, and fingers yet;
and why? A beautiful little child, such
a child as hers might have been had he
lived-the child Of the man she loved
crosses her path; she trembles, and is
subjugated; she clasps him to her
bosom, and loves him as we'll as bet
ter woman might have done, as passion
ately as IL he had been her own little
living lad; and one by one parts with
her cherished jewels, gifts of the man
,.,t,< ~, m 1nvod har that nv copoilio M