vents in the past with a
certainty and a familiarity which no impostor could simulate, and so
the fact of her identity, which her own appearance had failed to
establish, might subsequently be proved, with time to help her, by the
surer test of her own words.

But the circumstances under which she had regained her freedom rendered
all recourse to such means as these simply impracticable. The pursuit
from the Asylum, diverted to Hampshire for the time only, would
infallibly next take the direction of Cumberland. The persons
appointed to seek the fugitive might arrive at Limmeridge House at a
few hours' notice, and in Mr. Fairlie's present temper of mind they
might count on the immediate exertion of his local influence and
authority to assist them. The commonest consideration for Lady Glyde's
safety forced on Miss Halcombe the necessity of resigning the struggle
to do her justice, and of removing her at once from the place of all
others that was now most dangerous to her--the neighbourhood of her own
home.

An immediate return to London was the first and wisest measure of
security which suggested itself. In the great city all traces of them
might be most speedily and most surely effaced. There were no
preparations to make--no farewell words of kindness to exchange with
any one. On the afternoon of that memorable day of the sixteenth Miss
Halcombe roused her sister to a last exertion of courage, and without a
living soul to wish them well at parting, the two took their way into
the world alone, and turned their backs for ever on Limmeridge House.

They had passed the hill above the churchyard, when Lady Glyde insisted
on turning back to look her last at her mother's grave. Miss Halcombe
tried to shake her resolution, but, in this one instance, tried in
vain. She was immovable. Her dim eyes lit with a sudden fire, and
flashed through the veil that hung over them--her wasted fingers
strengthened moment by moment round the friendly arm by which they had
held so listlessly till this time. I believe in my soul that the hand
of God was pointing their way back to them, and that the most innocent
and the most afflicted of His creatures was chosen in that dread moment
to see it.

They retraced their steps to the burial-ground, and by that act sealed
the future of our three lives.

III

This was the story of the past--the story so far as we knew it then.

Two obvious conclusions presented themselves to my mind a