by to-morrow's post that you are the woman who visited him in
Vauxhall Walk. Say the word! Shall I tear the envelopes up, or shall I
put them back in my pocket?"

There was a pause of dead silence. The murmur of the summer waves on the
shingle of the beach and the voices of the summer idlers on the Parade
floated through the open window, and filled the empty stillness of the
room.

She raised her head; she lifted her hand and pointed steadily to the
envelopes.

"Put them back," she said.

"Do you mean it?" he asked.

"I mean it."

As she gave that answer, there was a sound of wheels on the road
outside.

"You hear those wheels?" said Captain Wragge.

"I hear them."

"You see the chaise?" said the captain, pointing through the window as
the chaise which had been ordered from the inn made its appearance at
the garden gate.

"I see it."

"And, of your own free-will, you tell me to go?"

"Yes. Go!"

Without another word he left her. The servant was waiting at the door
with his traveling bag. "Miss Bygrave is not well," he said. "Tell your
mistress to go to her in the parlor."

He stepped into the chaise, and started on the first stage of the
journey to St. Crux.

CHAPTER XII.

TOWARD three o'clock in the afternoon Captain Wragge stopped at the
nearest station to Ossory which the railway passed in its course through
Essex. Inquiries made on the spot informed him that he might drive
to St. Crux, remain there for a quarter of an hour, and return to the
station in time for an evening train to London. In ten minutes more the
captain was on the road again, driving rapidly in the direction of the
coast.

After proceeding some miles on the highway, the carriage turned off, and
the coachman involved himself in an intricate network of cross-roads.

"Are we far from St. Crux?" asked the captain, growing impatient, after
mile on mile had been passed without a sign of reaching the journey's
end.

"You'll see the house, sir, at the next turn in the road," said the man.

The next turn in the road brought them within view of the open country
again. Ahead of the carriage, Captain Wragge saw a long dark line
against the sky--the line of the sea-wall which protects the low coast
of Essex from inundation. The flat intermediate country was intersected
by a labyrinth of tidal streams, winding up from the invisible sea in
strange fantastic curves--rivers at high water, and channels of mud at
low. On his right hand