and were now representing Oswyn as his
friend's sole executor.

It contained a brief intimation that the grant of probate of the
late Mr. Rainham's will had been duly extracted, and ended with a
request that the executor would consider the inclosed bundle of
documents, which appeared to be of a private nature, and decide
whether they should be preserved or destroyed.

When he had removed the tape, Oswyn noticed that a great many of the
letters had the appearance of being in the same handwriting; these
were tied up separately with a piece of narrow faded silk riband,
and it was evident that they were arranged more or less in order of
date; the writing in the case of the earliest letter being that of a
child, while the most recent, dated less than a year ago, was a
short note, an invitation, with the signature "Eve Lightmark."

Oswyn contemplated the little bundle with an air of indecision,
falling at last into a long reverie, his thoughts wandering from the
letters to the child, the woman who had written them, the woman
whose name his friend so rarely breathed, whose face he had seen for
the first time, proud, and cold, and beautiful, that very afternoon.
Did she, too, care? Would she guard her secret as jealously?

Suddenly he frowned; the thought of Lightmark's effrontery recurred,
breaking his contemplative calm and disturbing his speculations. He
laid the papers aside without further investigation, and, after
gazing for a few minutes vacantly out of the uncurtained window,
rolled a fresh cigarette and went out into the night.

Next morning he made an expedition to Lincoln's Inn Fields to see
Messrs. Furnival and Co., taking the packet with him. The partner
who had the matter in hand was engaged, and he was kept waiting for
nearly half an hour, in a dusty room with an elaborately moulded
ceiling, and a carved wooden chimney-piece and scrolled panelling of
some beauty, both disfigured with thick layers of dingy brown paint.
A fire had just been lighted, in deference to the unseasonable
coldness of the June day, and the room was full of pungent smoke.

As he waited his irritation increased. Lightmark's impertinent
intrusion (such it appeared to him) and the scene which had ensued,
had entirely aroused him from the state of indifference into which,
when the incident occurred, he was beginning to relapse. The man was
dangerous; a malign passion, a craving for vengeance, slept in him,
born of his southern blood, an