hts of her among scenes which kept her in his memory--he had been
false to the very principles to which he had appealed at their farewell
interview. She had set him the right example, the example which he was
determined to follow, in leaving the place. Before he could falter in
his resolution, he gave notice of his departure. The one hope for him
now was to find a refuge from himself in acts of mercy. Consolation was
perhaps waiting for him in his Home.

His unopened correspondence offered a harmless occupation to his
thoughts, in the meanwhile. One after another he read the letters, with
an attention constantly wandering and constantly recalled, until he
opened the last of them that remained. In a moment more his interest was
absorbed. The first sentences in the letter told him that the deserted
creature whom he had met in the garden--the stranger to whom he had
offered help and consolation in the present and in the future--was no
other than the lost girl of whom he had been so long in search; the
daughter of Roderick Westerfield, once his dearest and oldest friend.

In the pages that followed, the writer confided to him her sad story;
leaving it to her father's friend to decide whether she was worthy of
the sympathy which he had offered to her, when he thought she was a
stranger.

This part of her letter was necessarily a repetition of what Bennydeck
had read, in the confession which Catherine had addressed to him. That
generous woman had been guilty of one, and but one, concealment of the
truth. In relating the circumstances under which the elopement from
Mount Morven had taken place, she had abstained, in justice to the
sincerity of Sydney's repentance, from mentioning Sydney's name.
"Another instance," the Captain thought bitterly, as he closed the
letter, "of the virtues which might have made the happiness of my life!"

But he was bound to remember--and he did remember--that there was now a
new interest, tenderly associating itself with his life to come. The
one best way of telling Sydney how dear she was to him already, for
her father's sake, would be to answer her in person. He hurried away to
London by the first train, and drove at once to Randal's place of abode
to ask for Sydney's address.

Wondering what had become of the postscript to his letter, which had
given Bennydeck the information of which he was now in search, Randal
complied with his friend's request, and then ventured to allude to the
report