with which she did so, told plainly what it contained, and the
young man hurried to his room as soon as he fancied he could do so
without remark or comment. The continued rain precluded all idea of
leaving the house any more that day. He unfolded the packet; there were
a couple of sheets, written closely in a woman's fair hand, and
something wrapped carefully in a paper, which he knew to be the ring. It
was the fellow to that which he had given the day before to Emily, only
Ferdinand's name was engraved inside instead of hers. Such were the
contents of the papers:

"Secrecy would be misplaced with the friend of the dead. Therefore will
I speak to you of things which I have never uttered to a human being
until now. Jules D'Effernay is nearly related to me. We knew each other
in the Netherlands, where our estates joined. The boy loved me already
with a love that amounted to passion; this love was my father's greatest
joy, for there was an old and crying injustice which the ancestors of
D'Effernay had suffered from ours, that could alone, he thought, be made
up by the marriage of the only children of the two branches. So we were
destined for each other almost from our cradles; and I was content it
should be so, for Jules's handsome face and decided preference for me
were agreeable to me, although I felt no great affection for him. We
were separated: Jules traveled in France, England, and America, and made
money as a merchant, which profession he had taken up suddenly. My
father, who had a place under government, left his country in
consequence of political troubles, and came into this part of the world,
where some distant relations of my mother's lived. He liked the
neighborhood; he bought land; we lived very happily; I was quite
contented in Jules's absence; I had no yearning of the heart toward him,
yet I thought kindly of him, and troubled myself little about my future.
Then--then I learned to know your friend. Oh, then! I felt, when I
looked upon him, when I listened to him, when we conversed together, I
felt, I acknowledged, that there might be happiness on earth of which I
had hitherto never dreamed. Then I loved for the first time, ardently,
passionately, and was beloved in return. Acquainted with the family
engagements; he did not dare openly to proclaim his love, and I knew I
ought not to foster the feeling; but, alas! how seldom does passion
listen to the voice of reason and of duty. Your friend and I met in
sec