It was then that Isabella was revenged; and she no doubt looked smilingly down from her home in the spirit-land on the scene below.
On Gertrude's return from her shopping tour, she found Henry in a melancholy mood, and soon learned its cause.

As Gertrude had borne him no children, it was but natural, that he should now feel his love centering in Clotelle, and he now intimated to his wife his determination to remove his daughter from the hands of his mother-in-law.
When this news reached Mrs.Miller, through her daughter, she became furious with rage, and calling Clotelle into her room, stripped her shoulders bare and flogged her in the presence of Gertrude.
It was nearly a week after the poor girl had been so severely whipped and for no cause whatever, that her father learned on the circumstance through one of the servants.

With a degree of boldness unusual for him, he immediately went to his mother-in-law and demanded his child.

But it was too late,--she was gone.

To what place she had been sent no one could tell, and Mrs.Miller refused to give any information whatever relative to the girl.
It was then that Linwood felt deepest the evil of the institution under which he was living; for he knew that his daughter would be exposed to all the vices prevalent in that part of the country where marriage is not recognized in connection with that class..