d you that I once
had a half-sister, called Constance Glen--older than myself by many
years--who married during my long absence from our native land a
gentleman much older than herself, an Englishman by the name of Monfort,
and, after giving birth to a daughter, died suddenly. These particulars
I gathered from strangers, but there were many wanting which you can
best supply. I know that this gentleman had a daughter, or daughters, by
an earlier marriage--and I can find no clew to the date of my sister's
marriage--which might in itself determine the possible age of her own
daughter. That this child survived I have painful cause to remember. I
had sustained shipwreck, and was in abeyance for clothes and money both,
when it occurred to me to call on my brother-in-law, present to him my
credentials, and remain a few days at his house as his guest, in the
enjoyment of my sister's society, until my needs could be supplied from
certain resources at a distance. The reception I met with from his elder
daughter, and the information she haughtily gave me, determined my
course. I sought no more the inhospitable roof of Mr. Monfort, to find
shelter beneath which I had forfeited all claim by the death of my
sister, then first suddenly revealed to me. Her child, I was told, had
been recently injured by burning and could not be seen, even by so near
a relative, and the manner of the young lady, whom I now identify as
Evelyn Monfort, was such as to lead me at the time to believe this a
mere excuse or evasion, which I did not seek to oppose.

"It is just possible that there may be a third sister, yet I think I
have heard you say you had but one, and this reminiscence is anguish to
my mind. Even more, the careless and unwarrantable allusions of Mr.
Gregory to certain scars, evidently from burns that he had the insolence
to observe on your neck and arms, and remark upon as mere foils to their
beauty, in my first acquaintance with you and before I had a right to
silence him, recurred to me as a partial confirmation of my fears.
Without explaining to him my motives, I questioned him on this subject
again soon after he handed me your note, a proceeding that I should have
shrunk from as gross and unworthy of a gentleman under any other
circumstances. I did not stop to think what impression my inquiries
would leave upon his mind, ever prone to levity and suspicion; but he
must have seen that I was deeply moved, and that no impertinent
curiosity