yet--a mortal fear seized on him: not for me, not for
himself; a fear for his own child. The same day (without a word to me)
he sent for the doctor. I was mean, wicked, what you please--I listened
at the door. I heard him say: _I have something to tell my son, when
my son grows old enough to understand me. Shall I live to tell it_? The
doctor would say nothing certain. The same night (still without a word
to me) he locked himself into his room. What would any woman, treated
as I was, have done in my place? She would have done as I did--she would
have listened again. I heard him say to himself: _I shall not live to
tell it: I must; write it before I die_. I heard his pen scrape, scrape,
scrape over the paper; I heard him groaning and sobbing as he wrote;
I implored him for God's sake to let me in. The cruel pen went scrape,
scrape, scrape; the cruel pen was all the answer he gave me. I waited
at the door--hours--I don't know how long. On a sudden, the pen stopped;
and I heard no more. I whispered through the keyhole softly; I said I
was cold and weary with waiting; I said, Oh, my love, let me in! Not
even the cruel pen answered me now: silence answered me. With all the
strength of my miserable hands I beat at the door. The servants came up
and broke it in. We were too late; the harm was done. Over that fatal
letter, the stroke had struck him--over that fatal letter, we found him
paralyzed as you see him now. Those words which he wants you to write
are the words he would have written himself if the stroke had spared him
till the morning. From that time to this there has been a blank place
left in the letter; and it is that blank place which he has just asked
you to fill up.'--In those words Mrs. Armadale spoke to me; in those
words you have the sum and substance of all the information I can give.
Say, if you please, sir, have I kept the thread at last? Have I
shown you the necessity which brings me here from your countryman's
death-bed?"

"Thus far," said Mr. Neal, "you merely show me that you are exciting
yourself. This is too serious a matter to be treated as you are treating
it now. You have involved Me in the business, and I insist on seeing my
way plainly. Don't raise your hands; your hands are not a part of the
question. If I am to be concerned in the completion of this mysterious
letter, it is only an act of justifiable prudence on my part to inquire
what the letter is about. Mrs. Armadale appears to have favored y