Sedgewick had refreshed his intellectual powers with copious
draughts of strong tea, he began to talk of Marian's childhood, and the
circumstances which had thrown her into his hand.

"I don't suppose my little girl ever showed you her mother's jewel-case,
did she, Gilbert?" he asked.

"Never."

"I thought as much. It contains that old-fashioned jewelry I spoke
of--family relics, which I have sometimes fancied might be of use to her,
if ever her birthright were worth claiming. But I doubt if that will ever
happen now that so many years have gone by, and there has been no
endeavour to trace her. Run and fetch the case, Marian. There are some of
its contents which Gilbert ought to see before he leaves England--papers
which I intended to show him when I first told him your mother's story."

Marian left them, and came back in a few minutes carrying an
old-fashioned ebony jewel-case, inlaid with brass. She unlocked it with a
little key hanging to her watch-chain, and exhibited its contents to
Gilbert Fenton. There were some curious old rings, of no great value; a
seal-ring with a crest cut on a bloodstone--a crest of that common kind
of device which does not imply noble or ancient lineage on the part of
the bearer thereof; a necklace and earrings of amethyst; a gold bracelet
with a miniature of a young man, whose handsome face had a hard
disagreeable expression; a locket containing grey hair, and having a
date and the initials "M.G." engraved on the massive plain gold case.

These were all the trinkets. In a secret drawer there was a certificate
of marriage between Percival Nowell, bachelor, gentleman, and Lucy
Geoffry, spinster, at St. Pancras Church, London. The most interesting
contents of the jewel-case consisted of a small packet of letters written
by Percival Nowell to Lucy Geoffry before their marriage.

"I have read them carefully ever so many times, with the notion that they
might throw some light upon Mr. and Mrs. Nowell's antecedents," said the
Captain, as Gilbert held these in his hands, disinclined to look at
documents of so private and sacred a character; "but they tell very
little. I fancy that Miss Geoffry was a governess in some family in
London--the envelopes are missing, you see, so there is no evidence as to
where she was living, except that it _was_ in London--and that she left
her employment to marry this Percival Nowell. You'd like to read the
letters yourself, I daresay, Gilbert. Put them in you