“At the theatre?” said he, with some sudden recalling of his own surmise.

“You did not regard her, perhaps, towards the end of her part, on Saturday night?” said Estelle.  “I thought once she would fall on the stage.  On the way home I think she was crying—­I did not look.  Then she is in this room—­oh, so silent and miserable—­as one in despair, until I persuade her to go to sleep until the morning, when she would tell me her sorrow.  Then I was reading; I heard something; I went to the door there—­it was Nina crying, oh, so bitterly; and when I ran to her, she was wild with her grief.  ’My life is broken, Estelle, my life is broken!’ she said—­”

But here Estelle herself began to sob, and could not get on with her story at all; she rose from her chair and began to pace up and down.

“I cannot tell you—­it was terrible—­”

And terrible it was for him, too, to have this revelation made to him.  Now he knew it was no little quarrel that had sent Nina away; it was something far more tragic than that; it was the sudden blighting of a life’s hopes.

“Estelle,” said he, quite forgetting, “you spoke of a letter she had left for you; will you show it to me?”

She took it from her pocket and handed it to him.  There was no sign of haste or agitation in these pages; Nina’s small and accurate handwriting was as neat and precise as ever; she even seemed to have been careful of her English, as she was leaving this her last message, in the dead watches of the night: 

“DEAR ESTELLE” [Nina wrote],—­“Forgive me for the trouble I cause you; but I know you will do what I ask, for the sake of our friendship of past days.  I leave a letter for Mr. Lehmann, and one for Miss Constance, and a packet for Mr. Moore; will you please have them all sent as soon as possible?  I hope Mr. Lehmann will forgive me for any embarrassment, but Miss Constance is quite perfect in the part, and if she gets the letter to-day it will be the longer notice.  I enclose a ring for you, Estelle; if you wear it, you will sometimes think of Nina.  For it is true what I said to you when you came into my room to-night—­I go away in the morning.  I have made a terrible mistake, an illusion, a folly, and, now that my eyes are opened, I will try to bear the consequences as I can; but I could not go on the stage as well; it would be too bad a punishment; I could not, Estelle.  I must go, and forget—­it is so easy to say forget!  I go away without feeling injured towards any one; it was my own fault, no one was in fault but me.  And if I have done wrong to any one, or appear ungrateful, I am sorry; I did not wish it.  Again I ask you to say to Mr. Lehmann, who has been so kind to me in the theatre, that I hope he will forgive me the trouble I cause; but I could not go on with my part just now.

“Shall I ever see you again, Estelle?  It is sad, but I think not; it is not so easy to forget as to write it.  Perhaps