the result? Could I have made my discovery a marketable commodity, even
for Laura's sake, after I had found out that robbery of the rights of
others was the essence of Sir Percival's crime? Could I have offered
the price of MY silence for HIS confession of the conspiracy, when the
effect of that silence must have been to keep the right heir from the
estates, and the right owner from the name? Impossible! If Sir Percival
had lived, the discovery, from which (In my ignorance of the true
nature of the Secret) I had hoped so much, could not have been mine to
suppress or to make public, as I thought best, for the vindication of
Laura's rights. In common honesty and common honour I must have gone
at once to the stranger whose birthright had been usurped--I must have
renounced the victory at the moment when it was mine by placing my
discovery unreservedly in that stranger's hands--and I must have faced
afresh all the difficulties which stood between me and the one object
of my life, exactly as I was resolved in my heart of hearts to face
them now!

I returned to Welmingham with my mind composed, feeling more sure of
myself and my resolution than I had felt yet.

On my way to the hotel I passed the end of the square in which Mrs.
Catherick lived. Should I go back to the house, and make another
attempt to see her. No. That news of Sir Percival's death, which was
the last news she ever expected to hear, must have reached her hours
since. All the proceedings at the inquest had been reported in the
local paper that morning--there was nothing I could tell her which she
did not know already. My interest in making her speak had slackened.
I remembered the furtive hatred in her face when she said, "There is no
news of Sir Percival that I don't expect--except the news of his
death." I remembered the stealthy interest in her eyes when they
settled on me at parting, after she had spoken those words. Some
instinct, deep in my heart, which I felt to be a true one, made the
prospect of again entering her presence repulsive to me--I turned away
from the square, and went straight back to the hotel.

Some hours later, while I was resting in the coffee-room, a letter was
placed in my hands by the waiter. It was addressed to me by name, and
I found on inquiry that it had been left at the bar by a woman just as
it was near dusk, and just before the gas was lighted. She had said
nothing, and she had gone away again before there was time