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198 him till this day, but I could not keep it from you."

"You'd better stop now, John," said the old woman, "for the long walk, and the long story, have quite overdone Miss Jane; she has had the flushes this half hour." Jane was obliged to own she did not feel well; but after drinking some water, she made an effort to compose herself, and asked the old man, "What reason he had to think the Woodhulls and Erskine were intimate friends?"

"Why, did you never hear, Miss, that it was Erskine that got John Woodhull clear when Betsy Davis sued him for breach of promise? I was summoned to court as a witness. It was a terrible black business; but Erskine made it all smooth; and after the trial was past, I overheard these chaps flattering Erskine till they made him believe he was more than mortal. At any rate, they put such a mist before his eyes, that he could not see to choose good from evil, else he never would have chosen them for his companions; he never would have been led to spend night after night with them at the gambling club."

"At the gambling club, John!—where—what do you mean?" and poor Jane clasped her hands together, and looked at him with an expression of such wretchedness, that the old man turned his eyes from her to his wife and back again to Jane, as if he would, but dared not, inquire the reason of her emotion.