Chapter 11 - Page 2

one the real cause of his sudden movement. After an anxious journey of nearly two weeks, he arrived in New Orleans, and called immediately upon Mr. Paralette, and stated the rumor he had heard. That gentleman seemed greatly surprised, and even startled at the earnestness of the young man, and more particularly so when he learned precisely the relation in which he stood to the daughter of Mr. Ballantine.

"I remember the fact," was his reply. "But then, the young woman was, of course, a mere pretender."

"But how do you know?" urged Mr. Perkins. "Did you take any steps to ascertain the truth of her story?"

"Of course not. Why should I? An old friend of her father's called upon them at the hotel, and saw the man that was attempted to be put off by an artful girl as Mr. Ballantine. But he said the man bore no kind of resemblance to that person. He was old and white-headed. He was in his dotage--a simple old fool--passive in the hands of a designing woman."

"Did you see him?"

"No."

"Strange that you should not!" Perkins replied, looking the man steadily in the face. "Bearing the relation that you did to Mr. Ballantine, it might be supposed that you would have been the first to see the man, and the most active to ascertain the truth or falsity of the story."

"I do not permit any one to question me in regard to my conduct," Mr. Paralette said, in an offended tone, turning from the excited young man.

Perkins saw that he had gone too far, and endeavored to modify and apologize: but the merchant repulsed him, and refused to answer any more questions, or to hold any further conversation with him on the subject.

The next step taken by the young man was to seek out his friend, and learn from him all the particular rumors on the subject, and who would be most likely to put him in the way of tracing the individuals he was in search of. But he found, when he got fairly started on the business for which he had come to New Orleans, that he met with but little encouragement. Some shrugged their shoulders, some smiled in his face, and nearly every one treated the matter with a degree of indifference. Many had heard that a person claiming to be Miss Ballantine had sent notes to a few of Mr. Ballantine's old friends about two years previous; but no one seemed to have the least doubt of her being an impostor. A week passed in fruitless efforts to awaken any interest, or to create the slightest disposition to inquiry among Mr. B.'s old friends. The story told by the young woman they considered as too improbable to bear upon its face the least appearance of truth.

"Why," was the unanswerable argument of many, "has nothing been heard of the matter since? If that girl had really been Miss Ballantine, and that simple old man her father, do you think we