$2 FAR annum, y 'On we move indissolubl,y firm; Go "Vol. 1 ORANGEBURG, SOUTH CAROLINA nature bid tub same," j -( in advance, E?NESDAY, AUGUST 14, 1872* No, &7 THE OllANGEnUllG TIMES Is published every WEDNESDAY, AT ORANGEBURG, C. II., SOUTH CAROLINA by FRANK P. BEARD. mubscriition bates: $2 a year, in advance?$1 for six months. JOB PRINTING in uA nil dcpaUmcnt? neatly executed. Give us a call. IZLAB ,n't ask me any more questions.1' "Pardon me, love," whispered the young man, soothing down the gold tres ses with a tender touch. "Hereafter my love shall atone for all that of the dear one you have lost." As she looked up, smiling through her tears, Agnes Ordway came into the room. "Excuse ine for interrupting you, Mr. Delaval, but there is a man below with a note that he will deliver into no hands but those of Miss Ward." Marian slipped away, glad of an ex cuse to hide her flushed cheeks from Miss Ordwny's searching black eyes. She was gone scarcely ten minutes, yet when she returned, those same checks were whiter than monumental marble. ''Marian," exclaimed her lover, "what is the matter ? Are you ill ?" "111? No," she returned, in an absent mechanical sort of way. "Why do you ask ?" "Because you look so strange and pale." "Am I pale? I am quite well. But, May, I cannot go out with you this after noon." "Not go out with me, Marian? But you promised, love." "I know it, but?but I have changed my mind." "Nay, dearest, you surely do not be long to the enprioious coquettes whose minds vary with every hour in flic day? I must have you this afternoon, love I lirtYC^roinised to take you to ray mo ther's house; fiho '.All think it more than strnnge if you shrink from tho appoint ment." "To-morrow, May; indeed I cannot go to-day.'r MrtY^ulnvnl's brow darkened a little. "You say you are well, Marian ?" "Yes.'but?oh, May, don't speak so coldly fT> me l" She lairst into tears, and the very sight oiUhoso bright drops dispelled the gathering clouds of Mr. Del aval's dis pleasure at once. "Lefc^t he as you please, darling; to morrow.wiil do equally well for our ride. And hdw, seal my forgiveness with a km." *j? Long after her lover had taken his re luctant^ departure, Marian Ward sat niothmfrss in the same attitude?one hand tkooping at her side, and the large witful eyes gazing into space. At length she started up with an effort. 'T must not sit nerel" she moaned. "Oh, I was so happy?so happy?and now?" Sheifomt up stairs into her own room, and opening the well-worn desk, counted out forty-five dollar*?nil "that remained oi'thorast "quarterly instalment of her sa'.ary. "It i*not enough," she pojidered, with a despairing pang at her heart. "I must have ten dollars more." Th?rV was little enough in the scanty jewelry he had inherited fromjhermother ?two or three rings of no great value, and an old fashioned pin containing hair, whose rjrh was studded with a circlet of rice pearls. "Moiherl" she murmured, pressing the antique trinket to her lips, "I thought ns^Xi^>l^v*-parted with this, yet I think even you would bid me sell it now V" She folded the pin in a hit of paper, and placed it carefully in her purse. Then wrapping her grny shawl about her and tying the faded strings of her brown silk bonnet, she stole softly down stairs. "Going out, Miss Ward?" ejaculated airs. Ordway, smoothly, as she met her little governess in the hall; "won't you take the earrage ?" "Thank you?I prefer to walk," said Marian, feeling the hot blood surging up to tho very roots of her hair. "Or perhaps you would like Aggie to accompany you ? I'll speak to her in one iustant." But Marian's gloved hand checked Mrs. Ordway's oily movements. "No; I would rather be alone , I shall soon return." .She hurried down the street with a heat ing heart, feeling like a guilty creature and never paused until she had reached a second rate littlo jewelry store, where, a dozen clocks were all ticking discord antly together, aud an old man sat in tho window, peering through a double magnifying glass at the works of some valetudinarian watch. "What can I do for you, Miss?" ho asked leaving his perch, and slowly com ing forward to the counter. 'T want to sell this pin?that is the setting of it," said Marian, in a low, stilled voice. "How much will you give me for it?" "Pearls, eh !" said the old man, again taking up his magnifying glass, the bet ter to scrutinize the gems. "And I guess the} must ha' been valuable in their time. Pretty well kept, too, Well, young wo man, whnt'll you take for 'em?" "Arc they worth ten dollars, sir?" The old man looked at her keenly. There was a momentary struggle between honesty and self-interest in his breast ending in a compromise. "They are worth that and more Miss; I'll give you fifteen for 'em. Will you wait for the hair to be taken out now?" "Not now?1 will call again." faltered Marian, holding out her hand for the fifteen dollars, which the old man slowly counted out. Down the snowy streets, through nar row thoroughfares and noisome alley-ways now threading a precarious passage aomng contending carts and hacks and (trays, and now stealing along in shadow of mouldering, runiuous walls, went Marian Ward, her heart fluttering like a a caged bird, until she reached a shabby thrce-sjory house, whose door, creaking on its hinges, gave an ample view of the carpetless hall and bare stairways. A fat, bald-headed man started from the angle of the entry as she came in, as if he had been some old spider lying in wait for unwary prey. "Miles Keepler?" she asked, in a scarce audible voice. ?'Keepler ? Miles Keepler? repeated the man,Jitaring insolently into her face. 'Yea, he's at home. Did you want to see him, pretty one?" "If you please, sir* faltered Marian, shrinking yet closer to the wall. "Well, then j?st go up to the third Hooi and knock at the second door on the left, and you'll be sure to find him." I only wish I had such a pretty looking visitor 1" he chuckled. But Marian had not observed, ueither lad Mr. Noah Meeker, an eager auditor to their brief colloquy, in che person of a tall man, in a surtout lined with costly sables, who had paused- at tho foot of the steps, apparently stricken motionless by the voice of the young girl. "I cannot be mistaken," muttered May Delaval to himself, "and yet?my Ma rian in a foul den like this?impossible! Still it was her voice, her figure: Can it be possiblo that any human being could so closely resemble her ? As surely as I live and beathe, I will not leave this houso until the matter is decided." He boldly ascended tho steps, and pushed'for ward into the doorway. Mr. Meeker interposed his portly length and breadth before hint. "Hold on a minute, sir. Did you wish to see me?" "Let . me pass man! ' said Delaval an grily turning on him, "or it may be tho worse for you." Meeker Shrank back?he recognized the voice and eye. It was scarcely a week since there bad been an awkward investigation of his means of gaining a livelihood at the instigation of Mr. Dela vil, one of whose clerks had been guided to his ruin by the artful villain; and he still retained a very lively remembrance of the same. "Certainly, sir," he said, in a subdued voice. "'Can I give you and informa tion ?" "I want to find Miles Kepler," said Delaval, shortly. "Miles Kepler!" repeated Meeker, with a low whistle. "Well, for a gent as didn't want to sec company, he docs have many visitors. Third floor, second door on the left, sir." It was rapidly growing dusk in the dark entries of the dirty house, and Mr. Delaval could just grope his way up. The "second door on the left" was half way open, and by the dim light that streamed through one dingy window, he could see Marian Ward's pulo face up lifted to a dark, swarthy visage, whose mustache almost touched her forehead. This, then, was Miles Kepler; and Miles Kepler's arm was round her slender waist, and the light hand lay on his shoulder? May Delaval could feel tho blood curdling into ice around his heart, as he looked upon this strange group for one instant?then turned away. "I am satisfied," wri$ his mental com ment. "No further evidence is needed. And I?I have been a blinded, befooled dune!" Noah Meeker looked after him, as he strode away into the brooding twilight, muttering to himself: "It wasn't a very long call you made on Mr. Miles Kepler, anyhow." The gas was lighted in Mrs. Ordway's hall when Marian Ward returned, and the servant who admitted her pointed to a note on the Gothic table. "It just this minute came, Miss Ward. I was going to take it up to your room." Marian broke tho seal with a deep flush on her cheek?she had already learned to recognize her affianced lover's hand writing ; but the flush faded into why parlor as she rend the few brief words on the crested paper: "When 1 asked Miss Ward to become my wife, I did not know I had a rival in Mr. Miles Kepler. Miss Ward was obliged to break her appointment with me in order to pay Mr. Kepler a Irish. Hereafter I relinquish to him ell my claims upon her heart or hand, M. B7\ Marian stood an Instant as if c thun derbolt had paralyzed her whole being, then murmuring, "It must not be?no, it cannot bei" she ran upstairs to her room, heedless of Mrs. Ordways eager inquiries. Kneeling on the floor beside the table, with her bonnet still unrcmoved, she hurriedly wrote a few brief lines, indis tinct and blotted with tears: "Come to me, May I I can,... cxpln in it all, if you will but give me an opportu nity. Only come to me! Your lovo was all X had in the world?I cannot loso it thus. Maria?." "Joseph," she said to the servant, "will you carry this note to Mr. Delaval for me." ? Directly, Miss Ward." ?'This instant" "Yes, ma'am." Joseph went on his errand with prompt itude and departed; yet to poor Marian every second seemed an hour, as sho there sat counting the pulses of her own miserable heart. Presently Joseph open ed the door. "Mr. Delaval, Miss!" And as she looked up, with her eyes dimmed by thick-coming tears, May De laval was standing before her, cold, pale and haughty. "I have obeyed your summons. Mis* Ward ; you will oblige me by being as brief as possible 1" "Oh, May I don't speak so to met" she sobbed. "How else can I speak V he asked, in a tone that was somewhat softened, "after -=?fter.your interview of. this .nftorjioon. Marian, had an angel of light warned me of this, I could scarce have believed him." "Listen to me, May," she said, pas sionately. "For the sake of retaining my place in your good opinion, I will re veal what should be a secret to all the world, save yourself. I *will put into your hands the life I would fain shield with my own." "I am listening," he said, coldly. "May," pursued Marian Ward, "Miles Kepler is my brother," "Your brother V* "I said I had lost him,'" she went on, with burning cheeks and set lips. "I shosld have said he had lost himself?to duty, honor, and his native land. He was in the army?he deserted, thereby rendering himself liable to tho awful penulty of death. Now you have my se cret. May, for the sake of the mother who prayed above us both, do you think I did wrong in trying to shield him from disgrace and death ? in giving him money to flee the country under an assumed name ? Henceforward he is as dead to me and all who once knew and respected him as if the grave had closed over his head. And now, if you choose to breaa our en gagement, May Delaval, you are at lib erty to do so. I have done what I deem ed to be my duty- not- even for your precious love could I do otherwise." May Delaval's face had glowed into sudden brightness: he folded her in his arms with a tender pride too deep for outward expression. "Marian! my own love! I have been a villian ever to doubt you. But it i the last shadow that shall ever rise be tween us. Henceforward I will strive constantly to bo worthy of your love." And, months afterwards, when poor Harvey Ward, safe under the fictitious appellation of "Miles Kepler," was dom iciled beneath the broad sky of another climate, and the great dread off from Marian's heart, she never could think of that dreary winter's afternoon without mi involuntary shudder. "J had so nearly lost you, May," she said, clinging nervously to her husband's hand. ''And I had so nearly sacrificed my life's happiness to a blind phantasm of jealousy," said May, caressingly. "Tell ? me, little wife, are you happy nowf And Mrs. Dclaval's brown eyes, swim ming in liquid light, made a sweet reply*.