contempt of anonymous doings. Still it was
possible, and the bare possibility doubled my reluctance to break the
seal.

For one minute longer I stood in doubt, and then honor and candor and
truth prevailed. If any other life had been in peril but my own, duty to
another might have overridden all. But duty to one's self, if overpushed
in such a case, would hold some taint of cowardice. So I threw the
letter, with a sense of loathing, on a chair. Whatever it might contain,
it should pass, at least for me, inviolate.

Now when Mrs. Busk came to see what I had done, or rather left undone,
she flew into a towering passion, until she had no time to go on with
it. The rattle of the rickety old mail-cart, on its way to Winchester
that night, was heard, and the horn of the driver as he passed the
church.

"Give it me. 'A mercy! A young natural, that you are!" the good woman
cried, as she flung out of the room to dash her office stamp upon that
hateful missive, and to seal the leathern bag. "Seal, indeed! Inviolate!
How many seals have I got to make every day of my life?"

I heard a great thump from the corner of the shop where the business of
the mails was conducted; and she told me afterward that she was so put
out, that broken that seal should be--one way or another. Accordingly
she smashed it with the office stamp, which was rather like a
woman's act, methought; and then, having broken it, she never looked
inside--which, perhaps, was even more so.

When she recovered her leisure and serenity, and came in, to forgive
me and be forgiven, we resolved to dismiss the moral aspect of the
question, as we never should agree about it, although Mrs. Busk was not
so certain as she had been, when she found that the initials were the
initials of a lord. And then I asked her how she came to fix upon that
letter among so many others, and to feel so sure that it came from my
treacherous enemy.

"In the first place, I know every letter from Nepheton," she answered,
very sensibly. "There are only fourteen people that write letters in the
place, and twelve of those fourteen buy their paper in my shop--there is
no shop at all at Nepheton. In the next place, none of them could write
a hand like that, except the parson and the doctor, who are far above
disguise. And two other things made me certain as could be. That letter
was written at the 'Green Man' ale-house; not on their paper, nor yet
with their ink; but being in great hurry, it was