f that night thinking of Eleanor,
and longing for the love of dear departed days.

"Perhaps when she comes back from Copthorne it will be different," he
thinks. "I have been away too much in that miserable City, she has
been dull, and thus fallen a prey to Mrs. Mounteagle's bad influence."
He will give her more companions, keep his house full of guests,
pleasant accommodating people who will not object to early breakfast,
and dinner that invariably waits half-an-hour later than it should on
account of his business.

He writes to Eleanor as the clock strikes two. His letter is full of
promises for the future.

He paints a picture of delightful plans. They will have the house full
until Easter, when he will take her abroad. She shall go wherever she
pleases, and he will be her trusting, adoring slave. He will make it
impossible for her not to love him.

For nearly an hour he pores over the sheet, telling Eleanor these good
resolves.

"Dearest," he says in conclusion, "can't we begin our lives over
again--love as we did in quiet Copthorne--before we drifted apart? I
will try and be a better husband. Do come back to me soon, for I find
I cannot get on without my little Eleanor. She is all the world to me."

Then he seals the envelope, and falls into a restless sleep, which is
broken by haunting dreams of dimly suspected terrors.

Early in the morning Philip wakes, unrefreshed and heartsick. Still
the question burns on his brain--Why has Eleanor not written?

He rises before the household is astir, and lets himself out into the
mild air.

Hailing a hansom, he tells the man to drive him as quickly as possible
to Richmond Terrace. Perhaps Erminie is right, and Eleanor has written
to Lyndhurst after all.

Sarah starts as she sees Mr. Roche on the doorstep.

"Good-morning," he says, "are there any letters for me?"

He does not wait for the answer, but walks straight in, and takes up a
pile of envelopes on the hall table.

A few circulars, a bill, and three letters addressed to Eleanor at
Copthorne in his own handwriting, and forwarded back by Mrs. Grebby to
Mrs. Roche at Lyndhurst.

He stares at them in mute amazement, as if in those white envelopes a
horrible mystery lies unrolled.

He tears them slowly open one by one, reading what he knows so well
already, the casual news, the fond farewells, penned only for Eleanor's
eyes.

How is it she has never received them? How is it they have been sent