. You know that a little illness would not have kept me
from coming to say good-bye to you.

"So you went away, all alone with Gray. I remained in bed that
day with the room darkened. Mother and Cecile were troubled but
could not bring themselves to believe that my collapse was due to
your going. It was not logical, you know, as we all expected to
see you in a week or two in New York.

"So they had Dr. Vernam, and I took what he prescribed, and
nobody attached any undue importance to the matter. So I was left
to myself, and I lay and thought out what I had to do.

"Dear--I knew there was only one thing to do; I knew whither my
love--our love--was carrying me--faster and faster--spite of all
I'd said. _Said_! What are words beside such love as ours? What
would be my affection for dad and mother beside my love for you?
Would your loyalty and your dear self-denial continue to help me
when they only make me love you more intensely?

"There is only one thing clear in all this pitiful confusion;
I--whom they took and made their child--cannot sacrifice them!
And yet I _would_!--oh, Garry!--I would for you. There was no
safety for me at all as long as there was the slightest chance to
sacrifice everything--everybody--and give myself to you.

"Listen! On the second day after you left I was sitting with
mother and Cecile on the terrace. We were quietly discussing the
closing of the house and other harmless domestic matters. All at
once there swept over me such a terrible sense of desolation that
I think I lost my mind; for the next thing I knew I was standing
in my own room, dressed for travelling--with a hand-bag in my
hand.

"It was my maid knocking that brought me to my senses: I had been
going away to find you; that was all I could realise. And I sank
on my bed, trembling; and presently fell into the grief-stricken
lethargy which is all I know now of sleep.

"But when I woke to face the dreadful day again, I knew the time
had come. And I went to mother that evening and told her.

"But, Garry, there is never to be any escape from deception, it
seems; I had to make her think I _wanted_ to acknowledge and take
up life with my husband. My life is to be a living lie!...

"As I expected, mother was shocked and grieved beyond words--and,
dearest, they are bitterly disappointed; they all had hoped it
would b