ve to conceal it from all the world, including my wife, will
not lessen its sting.

"I have this evening married Maude Kirton. I might tell you of unfair
play brought to bear upon me, of a positive assurance, apparently well
grounded, that Anne had entered into an engagement to wed another,
could I admit that these facts were any excuse for me. They are no
excuse; not the slightest palliation. My own yielding folly alone is
to blame, and I shall take shame to myself for ever.

"I write this to you as I might have written it to my own mother, were
she living; not as an expiation; only to tell of my pain; that I am not
utterly hardened; that I would sue on my knees for pardon, were it not
shut out from me by my own act. There is no pardon for such as I. When
you have torn it in pieces, you will, I trust, forget the writer.

"God bless you, dear Mrs. Ashton! God bless and comfort another who is
dear to you!--and believe me with true undying remorse your once
attached friend,

"Hartledon."

It was a curious letter to write; but men of Lord Hartledon's sensitive
temperament in regard to others' feelings often do strange things; things
the world at large would stare at in their inability to understand them.
The remorse might not have come home to him quite so soon as this, his
wedding-day, but for the inopportune appearance of Dr. Ashton in the
chapel, speaking those words that told home so forcibly. Such reproach
on these vacillating men inflicts a torture that burns into the heart
like living fire.

He sealed the letter, addressing it to Cannes; called a waiter, late as
it was, and desired him to post it. And then he walked about the room,
reflecting on the curse of his life--his besetting sin--irresolution. It
seemed almost an anomaly for _him_ to make resolves; but he did make one
then; that he would, with the help of Heaven, be a MAN from henceforth,
however it might crucify his sensitive feelings. And for the future, the
obligation he had that day taken upon himself he determined to fulfil to
his uttermost in all honour and love; to cherish his wife as he would
have cherished Anne Ashton. For the past--but Lord Hartledon rose up now
with a start. There was one item of that past he dared not glance at,
which did not, however, relate to Miss Ashton: and it appeared inclined
to thrust itself prominently forward to-night.

Could Lord Hartledon have borrowed somewhat of the easy indiffe