Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/46

Rh and the fire will consume it in a few hours, besides I am certain that the fire has broke out near my room. Oh, no! all the things will be destroyed.” The loss seemed as nothing to Octavia. She was much more uneasy on account of the distress which her husband and her mother would feel if they should hear of the circumstance before she wrote.

In the meantime, as hour after hour went on, and we received no tidings either from Betsy or from St. Charles's, Octavia determined to go to one of her friends, who dwelt not far from the great hotel, that she might there gain some information, or even still go to the place itself.

When she had been gone about an hour, there was a hasty ring at the gate which leads from the garden into the street. I recognised Betsy, and rushed down to speak to her.

“How is it, Betsy?” cried I.

“All safe! " said she, so out of breath that she could hardly speak, but with a beaming countenance. “I have all the money with me!” and she laid her hand upon her breast. “Where is my missis?”

“I believe that she is gone to St. Charles's,” said I.

“There is no longer a St. Charles's,” said Betsy. “It is burned to the ground!”

And so it was. In less than three hours time that splendid building was a heap of ashes, and its population of nearly four hundred persons were houseless.

I went out with Betsy to seek for Mrs. Le V.

On our way, that faithful creature told me how the rumour of the fire had reached her, how she had hastened to the hotel, how one of the gentlemen there, a friend of Mrs. Le V., had broken open the door of her room, and how he and Betsy had saved all Octavia' s property. Not an article was lost. Betsy told me still more as we went along, of how much she loved her mistress; of how she might have been married, more than once, and how there