else has nothing to do with it. You must obey. I am
lost if you refuse. Do then what I ask, and save

"ONE WHO LOVES YOU."

It was addressed to Mrs. Belden; there was no signature or date,
only the postmark New York; but I knew the handwriting. It was Mary
Leavenworth's.

"A damning letter!" came in the dry tones which Q seemed to think fit to
adopt on this occasion. "And a damning bit of evidence against the one
who wrote it, and the woman who received it!"

"A terrible piece of evidence, indeed," said I, "if I did not happen to
know that this letter refers to the destruction of something radically
different from what you suspect. It alludes to some papers in Mrs.
Belden's charge; nothing else."

"Are you sure, sir?"

"Quite; but we will talk of this hereafter. It is time you sent your
telegram, and went for the coroner."

"Very well, sir." And with this we parted; he to perform his role and I
mine.

I found Mrs. Belden walking the floor below, bewailing her situation,
and uttering wild sentences as to what the neighbors would say of her;
what the minister would think; what Clara, whoever that was, would do,
and how she wished she had died before ever she had meddled with the
affair.

Succeeding in calming her after a while, I induced her to sit down and
listen to what I had to say. "You will only injure yourself by this
display of feeling," I remarked, "besides unfitting yourself for what
you will presently be called upon to go through." And, laying myself out
to comfort the unhappy woman, I first explained the necessities of the
case, and next inquired if she had no friend upon whom she could call in
this emergency.

To my great surprise she replied no; that while she had kind neighbors
and good friends, there was no one upon whom she could call in a case
like this, either for assistance or sympathy, and that, unless I would
take pity on her, she would have to meet it alone--"As I have met
everything," she said, "from Mr. Belden's death to the loss of most of
my little savings in a town fire last year."

I was touched by this,--that she who, in spite of her weakness and
inconsistencies of character, possessed at least the one virtue of
sympathy with her kind, should feel any lack of friends. Unhesitatingly,
I offered to do what I could for her, providing she would treat me with
the perfect frankness which the case demanded. To my great relief, she
expressed not only her willingness, but her str