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VIVIAN GREY.
209

fascination, I fly to confess my crimes at your feet, even, while the last minutes have witnessed my most heinous one. Oh! Madam, I have stood over the bier of the departed; I have mingled my tears with those of the sorrowing widower,—his young, and tender, child was on my knee; and, as I kissed his innocent lips, methought it was but my duty to the departed, to save the father from his mother's rival—" He stopped.

"Yes,—yes,—yes," said Mrs. Felix Lorraine, in a low whisper.

"It was then, even then, in the hour of his desolation, that I mentioned your name, that it might the more disgust him; and, while he wept over his virtuous and sainted wife, I dwelt on the vices of his rejected Mistress."

Mrs. Lorraine clasped her hands, and moved restlessly on her seat.

"Nay! do not stop me;—let me tell all. 'Cleveland,' said I, 'if ever you become the