ave a wonderful way of turning up to claim fortunes,
and you see the result. Here is the letter, Sir Leonard."

Leonard took the document and looked at it, while strange feelings
crowded into his mind. This was the first letter that he had ever
received from Jane Beach; also it was the last that he ever could
receive.

"Before I open this, Mr. Turner," he said, "for my own satisfaction
I may as well ask you to compare the handwriting of the address with
another specimen of it that chances to be in my possession"; and
producing the worn prayer-book from his pocket--Jane's parting gift--he
opened it at the fly-leaf, and pointed out the inscription to the
lawyer, placing the envelope beside it.

Mr. Turner took a reading-glass and examined first one writing and then
the other.

"These words appear to have been written by the same hand," he said
presently. "Lady Cohen's writing was peculiar, and it is difficult to
be mistaken on the point, though I am no expert. To free you from
responsibility, with your consent I myself will open this letter," and
he slit the envelope at the top with an ivory paper-knife, and, drawing
out its contents, he handed them to Leonard. They ran thus:

"My dearest Leonard,--For so I, who am no longer a wife, may call you
without shame, seeing that you are in truth the dearest to my heart,
whether you be still living, or dead like my husband and my child.

"The will which I am to sign to-morrow will prove to you if you are yet
alive, as I believe to be the case, how deep is my anxiety that that you
should re-enter into possession of the ancestral home of which fortune
has deprived you. It is with the greatest pleasure that I make you this
bequest, and I can do so with a clear conscience, for my late husband
has left everything at my absolute disposal--being himself without near
relations--in the sad event which has occurred, of the death of his
daughter, our only child.

"May you live long enough to enjoy the lands and fortune which I am
enabled thus to return to your family, and may your children and their
descendants sit at Outram for many a generation to come!

"And now I will talk no more of this matter, for I have an explanation
to make and a pardon to ask.

"It may well be, Leonard, that when your eyes fall upon these lines, you
will have forgotten me--most deservedly--and have found some other woman
to love you. No, as I set this down I feel that it is not true; you will
never f