CHAPTER XXXI.

ONE OF THE INSTITUTIONS.

"Small service is true service while it lasts;

Of friends, however humble, scorn not one." - - Wordsworth.

ON being bought at the auction-block by Ratcliff, and intro

duced into his household, Josephine Volney, the quadroon, had devoted herself to the health of his wife from purely selfish motives. But in natures not radically perverse, beneficence cannot long be divorced from benevolence. Josephine believed her interests lay in preventing as long as possible a second marriage: hence, at first, her sedulous care of the invalid wife.

Those who know anything of society in the Slave States are well aware that concubinage (one of the institutions of the institution) is there, in many conspicuous instances, as patiently acquiesced in by wives as polygamy is in Utah. Mrs. Ratcliff had, at first, almost adored her husband. Very unattractive, personally, she had yet an affectionate nature, and one of her most marked traits was gratitude for kindness. Soon Ratcliff dropped the mask by which he had won her; and she, instead of lamenting over her mistake, accepted as a necessary evil the fact of his relations to the handsome slave. The latter attempted no deception, but conducted herself as discreetly as any woman, so educated, could have done, under such compulsory circumstances.

Mrs. Ratcliff was soon touched by Josephine's obvious solicitude to minister to her happiness and health. The slave-girl's childlike frankness begot frankness on the part of the wife. Seeing that their interests were identical, each was gradually drawn to the other, till a sincere and tender- attachment was the result. The wife was made aware of her husband's calculations in regard to a second marriage; and Josephine found in that wife a faithful and crafty ally, too deep, with all her shallowness, to be fathomed by the husband.

No sooner had Ratcliff quitted the house, on the morning of the breakfast described, than Josephine hurried to the invalid's room. A poor diminutive Creole lady, with wrinkled skin, darker even than the quadroon's, and with one shoulder higher than the other, she sat, with a white crape-shawl wrapped round her, in a large arm-chair. Her face, as Josephine entered, lighted up with a smile of welcome that for a moment seemed to transfigure even those withered and pain-stricken features. In half an hour Josephine had put her in possession of all the developments of the last two days, and of her own plans for controlling the movements of Ratcliff in regard to the young white woman supposed to be his slave.

With absorbed interest the invalid listened to the details, and approved warmly of what Josephine had planned. Her feminine curiosity was pleased with the idea of having, in her own house and under her own eye, this young person whom Ratcliff had presumed to think of as a second wife; while the thought of baffling him in his selfish schemes sent a shock of pleasure to her heart. Furthermore, the excitement seemed to brace up her frame anew, and to ruffle into breezy action the torpid tide of her monotonous existence.

Esha was announced and introduced. A new and refreshing incident for the invalid! And now, if Esha had needed any further confirmation of the quadroon's story, it was amply afforded. Josephine's project for the present security of Ratcliff's white slave was discussed and approved.

The carriage was waiting at the door. "Go now," said Mrs. Ratcliff, "and be sure you bring the girl right up to see me."

In less than twenty minutes afterwards, as Clara, lonely and anxious, sat in Tremaine's drawing-room, a servant entered and told her that a colored woman was in Number 13, waiting to see her. Supposing it could be no other than Esha, she followed the servant to the room, and, on entering, recoiled at sight of a stranger. For a moment the quadroon was so absorbed in scanning the girl's whole personal outline, that there was silence on both sides.

"What's wanting?" asked Clara, half dreading some trick. "Please close the door, and I'll tell you," was the reply. Clara did as she was requested. "Have you any objections to locking the door?" continued the quadroon.

"None whatever," replied Clara, and she locked it. "You fear I may be here as an agent of Mr. Ratcliff," said Josephine.

"Ah! am I betrayed?" cried Clara, instinctively carrying her hand to her bosom, where lay the weapon she had bought. The quadroon noticed the gesture, and smiled. "Sit down," she said, "and do not consider me an enemy until I have proved myself such. Listen to what I have to propose." Clara took a seat where she could be within reach of the door, and then pointed to the sofa.

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"Yes, I will sit here," said the quadroon, complying with the tacit invitation. Now, listen, dear young lady, to a proposition I am authorized to make. Mr. Ratcliff will very soon be a widower. His wife cannot survive three months. He has seen you, and likes you. He is willing to lift you from slavery to freedom, from poverty to wealth, from obscurity to grandeur, on one very easy condition; this, namely: that, as soon after his wife's death as propriety will allow, you will yourself become Mrs. Ratcliff."

-

"Never!" exclaimed Clara, the blood flaming up like red auroras over neck, face, and brow.

"But consider, my dear. You will, in the first place, be forthwith treated with all the respect and consideration due to Mr. Ratcliff's future bride. As soon as he has you secure as his wife, he will emancipate you, make you a free woman. Think of that! Mr. Ratcliff is supposed to be worth at least five millions. You will at once have such a purse as no other young woman in the city can boast. Now why not be reasonable? Why not say yes to the proposition?"

"Never! never!” cried Clara, carrying her hand again to her breast with a gesture she thought significant only to herself. Josephine rose and felt of the bosom of Clara's dress till she distinguished the weapon of which Esha had spoken. Then a smile, so sincere as to forbid suspicion, broke over the quadroon's face, and she exclaimed: "Let me kiss you! Let me hug you!" And having given vent to her satisfaction in an embrace, she unlocked the door, and there stood Esha.

“What does it all mean, Esha?" asked Clara, bewildered. “It mean, darlin', dat Massa Ratcliff hab tracked you to dis

yere place, an' we two women mean to pull de wool ober his eyes, so he can't do yer no harm no how. You jes do what we want yer to, and we 'll bodder him so he sha'n't know his head's his own."

Josephine then communicated all the facts that had come to her knowledge in regard to Ratcliff's pursuit of Clara, together with her own conversation with him that morning, and the plan she had contrived for his discomfiture. "As soon," she said, "as such an opportunity offers that I can be sure you can be put beyond his reach, I will supply you with money, and help you to escape."

Truth beamed from her looks, and made itself musical in her tones, and Clara gratefully pressed her hand.

"And shall I have Esha with me?" she asked.

"Yes; and Mrs. Ratcliff, though an invalid, will also befriend you. 'T will be strange indeed if we four women can't defeat one man.'

"But I shall have all the slave-hunters in the Confederacy after me if I try to get away."

"Do not fear. We have golden keys that open many doors of escape."

Clara did not hesitate. She had faith in Esha's quickness, as well as in her own, to detect insincerity. And so she was persuaded that her safest present course would be to go boldly into the house of the very man she had most cause to dread!

It was agreed that the three should leave together at once. Clara went to her sleeping-room, and there, encountering the chambermaid, made her a present of two dollars, and sent her off. Laura was absent at the dressmaker's.

"Here are

"I would like," said Clara, "to find out at the bar what charge has been made for my stay here, and pay it." "Let me do it for you," suggested the quadroon. "If you would be so kind!" replied Clara. fifteen dollars. I don't think it can come to more than that." Without taking the money, Josephine left the room. minutes she returned with a receipted bill, made out against "Miss Tremaine's friend." This receipt Clara enclosed, together with a five-dollar gold-piece, in a letter to Laura, containing these words:

In five

"I thank you for all the hospitality I have received at your hands. Enclosed you will find my hotel bill receipted, also five dollars for the use of such dresses as I have worn. With best wishes for your mother's restoration to health and for your own welfare, I bid you good by. P. B."

The three women now passed through a side entrance to the street where the carriage was in waiting; and before half an hour had elapsed, Clara was established in the blue room of the house in Lafayette Square, the invalid lady had seen her and approved, and Esha, like a faithful hound, was following her steps, keeping watch, as Ratcliff had directed, though for other reasons than he had imagined.

Hardly had Clara left the hotel, before Vance called. He had come, fully resolved to wring from her, if possible, the secret of her trouble. Much to his disappointment, he learned she had gone and would not return. He called a second time, and saw Miss Tremaine. That young lady, warned and threatened by her father, now displayed such a ready and facile gift for lying, as would have highly distinguished her in diplomacy.

"Only think of it, Mr. Vance," said the intrepid Laura, "it turns out that Miss Brown has been having a love affair with one of her father's clerks, a low-born Yankee. He followed her to New Orleans, managed to send a letter to her at Mrs. Gentry's, Clara went forth to find him, but, failing in her search, came to claim hospitality of me. This morning her father a very decent man he seems to be - arrived from Mobile and took her, fortunately before she had been able to meet her lover."

It

The story was plausible. Vance, however, looked the narrator sharply and searchingly in the face. She met his glance with an expression beaming with innocence and candor. was irresistible. The strong man surrendered all suspicion, and gave in "beat."