was christened HELENA RIVERS;--the '_Lena_ of our story.




CHAPTER II.

JOHN.

Ten years of sunlight and shadow have passed away, and the little
grave at the foot of the mountain is now grass-grown and sunken. Ten
times have the snows of winter fallen upon the hoary head of
Grandfather Nichols, bleaching his thin locks to their own whiteness
and bending his sturdy frame, until now, the old man lay dying--dying
in the same blue-curtained room, where years agone his only daughter
was born, and where ten years before she had died. Carefully did
Mrs. Nichols nurse him, watching, weeping, and praying that he might
live, while little 'Lena gladly shared her grandmother's vigils,
hovering ever by the bedside of her grandfather, who seemed more
quiet when her soft hand smoothed his tangled hair or wiped the cold
moisture from his brow. The villagers, too, remembering their
neglect, when once before death had brooded over the mountain
farmhouse, now daily came with offers of assistance.

But one thing still was wanting. John, their only remaining child,
was absent, and the sick man's heart grew sad and his eyes dim with
tears, as day by day went by, and still he did not come. Several
times had 'Lena written to her uncle, apprising him of his father's
danger, and once only had he answered. It was a brief, formal
letter, written, evidently, under some constraint, but it said that