Chapter 23 - Page 2

with a degree of sympathy.

A year Mr. Dexter waited for some sign from his wife. But if the grave had closed over her, the isolation from him could not have been more perfect. He then sold his house, removed to a hotel, and made preparations for an absence in Europe of indefinite continuance. He went, and was gone for over two years.--Returned, and almost immediately on his arrival, took legal steps for procuring a divorce. Mrs. Dexter received due notice of these proceedings, based simply on her abandonment of her husband, and refusal to live with him as a wife. But she remained entirely passive. The proceedings went on, and in due time Mr. Dexter obtained what he sought, a divorce. Within a month after the decree in his favor, he returned across the Atlantic.

The publication of this decree awakened a brief interest in Mrs. Dexter--or rather in plain Jessie Loring, as she was now in legal aspect. But the curious public were not able to acquire any satisfactory information in regard to her. The world in which she lived was a terra incognita to them.

The next exciting news which came in this connection, was the announcement of Dexter's marriage with an English heiress. He did not return with her to the United States; but remained in England, where he established a foreign branch of the mercantile house in which he was a partner, and took up his permanent residence beyond the sea.