be put to when the day of reckoning comes will be the trial
of preserving my false character in his presence. I shall be safe in his
loathing and contempt for me, after that. On the day when I have denied
him to his face, I shall have seen the last of him forever.

"Shall I be able to deny him to his face? Shall I be able to look at him
and speak to him as if he had never been more to me than a friend? How
do I know till the time comes? Was there ever such an infatuated fool
as I am, to be writing of him at all, when writing only encourages me
to think of him? I will make a new resolution. From this time forth, his
name shall appear no more in these pages."

"Monday, December 1st.--The last month of the worn-out old year 1851! If
I allowed myself to look back, what a miserable year I should see added
to all the other miserable years that are gone! But I have made my
resolution to look forward only, and I mean to keep it.

"I have nothing to record of the last two days, except that on the
twenty-ninth I remembered Bashwood, and wrote to tell him of my new
address. This morning the lawyers heard again from Mr. Darch. He
acknowledges the receipt of the Declaration, but postpones stating the
decision at which he has arrived until he has communicated with the
trustees under the late Mr. Blanchard's will, and has received his
final instructions from his client, Miss Blanchard. The doctor's lawyers
declare that this last letter is a mere device for gaining time--with
what object they are, of course, not in a position to guess. The doctor
himself says, facetiously, it is the usual lawyer's object of making a
long bill. My own idea is that Mr. Darch has his suspicions of something
wrong, and that his purpose in trying to gain time--"

* * * * *

"Ten, at night.--I had written as far as that last unfinished sentence
(toward four in the afternoon) when I was startled by hearing a cab
drive up to the door. I went to the window, and got there just in time
to see old Bashwood getting out with an activity of which I should never
have supposed him capable. So little did I anticipate the tremendous
discovery that was going to burst on me in another minute, that I turned
to the glass, and wondered what the susceptible old gentleman would say
to me in my widow's cap.

"The instant he entered the room, I saw that some serious disaster had
happened. His eyes were wild, his wig was awry. He approached me with a
strange mixture of eag