The desolation and sadness of that scene I shall never forget—­the hearse, the dark, waving plumes, the sight of the two heavy laden coffins, the servants all in mourning.

A room next the great entrance hall had been prepared; it was all hung with black and lighted with wax tapers.  In the midst stood the two coffins covered with a black velvet pall.

On the coffin of Miles Trevelyan, the son and heir, I saw a wreath of flowers.  I asked several times who had brought it, but no one seemed to know.

I do not think that any one at Crown Anstey went to rest that night, unless it were mademoiselle.  There was something in the event to move the hardest heart.

Father and son had left Crown Anstey so short a time since, full of health, vigor, strength and plans for the future.  They lay there now, side by side, silent and dead; no more plans or hopes, wishes or fears.  The saddest day I ever remember was the one on which I helped to lay my two unknown kinsmen in the family vault of the Trevelyans.

CHAPTER IV.

It was all over.  The morning, with its sad office, had passed; the servants had gone back to their work; the blinds were drawn up, and light once more found its way into the darkened house.  The will was read in the library; the whole of the property, entailed and unentailed, was left to his only son, Miles, and after him to his heirs.  There was several legacies to his servants, but no mention was made of mademoiselle.  I thought it strange at the time, afterward I understood it.

Of course, as the poor young Miles was dead without heirs, I, as next of kin, took his place.  I faithfully carried out every wish expressed in the will.  That same evening I sent orders to London for a splendid memorial window to be placed in the church, and while I sat wondering whether I had remembered everything that required attention, there came a rap at the library door.  Mademoiselle would be glad if I could see her for five minutes.

I went at once to the drawing-room, knowing she would be there.  She was dressed in the deepest mourning, and her face was very pale.

“I knew you would spare me a short time,” she said.  “I want to ask you a question that I could not ask any one else.  Of course you were present when the will was read to-day?”

She raised her eyes to mine.  I knew not what magnetism, what spell lay in them; but no other eyes were like them.  They compelled attention; a man could no more release himself from their glance than he could fly.  I was not at all in love with her, yet those eyes held me spell-bound.

“I want you to tell me,” she said, “if there was any other will.  Did—­did Miles leave one?”

As she put the question to me I saw that her lips were parched and burning, her white fingers so tightly clenched that they left great red marks.

“No,” I replied; “there was only one will, and that was Sir Barnard’s.”