phed or written to me.

"'When I was strong enough to write,' she said, 'I was strong enough
to bear the sea-voyage to England. The expenses so nearly exhausted my
small savings that I had no money to spare for the telegraph.'

"On her arrival in London, only a few days since, she had called on me
at the time when I had left home on the business which I have already
mentioned. She had not heard of Lady Howel's death, and had written
ignorantly to prepare that good friend for seeing her. The messenger
sent with the letter had found the house in the occupation of strangers,
and had been referred to the agent employed in letting it. She went
herself to this person, and so heard that Lord Howel Beaucourt had lost
his wife, and was reported to be dying in one of the London hospitals.

"'If he had been in his usual state of health,' she said, 'it would
have been indelicate on my part--I mean it would have seemed like taking
a selfish advantage of the poor lady's death--to have let him know that
my life had been saved, in any other way than by writing to him. But
when I heard he was dying, I forgot all customary considerations.
His name was so well-known in London that I easily discovered at what
hospital he had been received. There I heard that the report was false
and that he was out of danger. I ought to hav e been satisfied with
that--but oh, how could I be so near him and not long to see him? The
old doctor with whom I had been speaking discovered, I suppose, that
I was in trouble about something. He was so kind and fatherly, and he
seemed to take such interest in me, that I confessed everything to him.
After he had made me promise to be careful, he told the night-nurse to
let me take her place for a little while, when the dim light in the room
would not permit his patient to see me too plainly. He waited at the
door when we tried the experiment. Neither he nor I foresaw that Lord
Howel would put such a strange interpretation on my presence. The nurse
doesn't approve of my coming back--even for a little while only--and
taking her place again to-night. She is right. I have had my little
glimpse of happiness, and with that little I must be content.'

"What I said in answer to this, and what I did as time advanced, it is
surely needless to tell you. You have read the newspapers which announce
their marriage, and their departure for Italy. What else is there left
for me to say?

"There is, perhaps, a word more still wanti