to tell.  I hope in a few days to be able to write and give you better news.  Things may not be as they fear.”

Mrs. Conway sat for a long time with this letter before her.  She had not read it straight through, but after glancing at the first few lines that told of the death of Herbert Penfold she had laid it aside, and it was a long time before she took it up again.  He had been the love of her youth; and although he had seemingly gone for so many years out of her life, she knew that when she had found how he had all this time watched over her and so delicately aided her, and that for her sake he was going to make Ralph his heir, her old feeling had been revived.  Not that she had any thought that the past would ever return.  His letters indeed had shown that he regarded his life as approaching its end; but since the receipt of that letter she had always thought of him with a tender affection as one who might have been her husband had not either evil fate or malice stepped in to prevent it.

The fortnight they had spent in London had brought them very close together.  He had assumed the footing of a brother, but she had felt that pleasant and kind as he was to all the rest of the party it was for her sake alone that this festivity had been arranged.  They had had but one talk together alone, and she had then said that she hoped the expressions he had used in his letter to her with reference to his health were not altogether justified, for he seemed so bright and well.  He had shaken his head quietly and said: 

“It is just as well that you should know, Mary.  I have seen my physician since I came up to town, and I don’t think it will last much longer.  A little time ago I did not wish it to last, now I should be glad to go on until I can see my little scheme realized; but I am quite sure that it is not to be.  Anyhow I am ready to go when I am summoned, and am happy in the thought that the few people I care for are all in a fair way to be happy.  Don’t cry, dear.  I don’t want a single cloud to hang over our memories of this time.  I am happier than I have ever been in my life, and I want you and all of them to be very happy too.  I have set my mind upon that, and if I see a cloud on your face it will spoil it all.”

Still in spite of this she had hoped the doctor might have taken too gloomy a view of the case, and that Herbert Penfold’s death might yet be a distant event.

And now it was all over.  Herbert Penfold was dead.  The heart that had beat so kindly for her was silenced forever.  It was then a long time before Mrs. Conway recovered sufficiently from her emotion to take up the letter again.  She did so with an air almost of indifference.  She had learned the news, and doubtless all this long epistle contained many details of comparatively little interest.  But as she read her air of languid grief gave way to an expression of keen interest, and she skimmed through the last page or two with anxious haste.  Then she reread it more slowly and carefully, and then throwing it on the table stood up and walked up and down the little room.