will be kind to her, won't you, for his sake,
and for me, too, who will be dead when you yet this?'

Jerrie was sobbing now, and Maude's arm was around her neck, while Frank
had walked to a window, and, like his wife, was looking out upon the
lawn, which he did not see for the tears which filled his eyes.

'When the money stopped,' the letter went on, 'we grew so poor,
Jerrie and I and Nannine--that is the French woman who lives with me
and whom Jerrie calls Mah-nee. She will bring my child to you when I
am dead; and oh, be kind to her, for a truer, more faithful woman
never lived. She is such a comfort to me, except when she scolds
about Arthur and calls him a _bete noire_, which he is not, as you
will see. He was shut up, I don't know where, but think it was where
they put people with bad heads, and he forget everything till he was
out, and as far as Paris on his way to America. Then he remembered
and wrote me from Liverpool such a letter--full of love and sorrow
for the past, and sent me such lovely diamonds, just like those he
had bought for his sister in America, he said--and he was going home
at such a date on the Scotia, and he wished me to join him in
Liverpool. I send the letter with this to prove that I write true.
But it was too late, for I was too weak to travel; neither could I
write to him, for he gave me no address. 'That was last September,
and I have been dying ever since, for my heart broke when I thought
of what was and what might have been could I have found him. The
money he sent me then I am saving for Nannine and Jerrie to take
them to America when I am dead. All the days and nights I prayed
that Arthur might remember and write me again, and God heard, and he
did; and five days ago I received his letter. So crazy it was, but
just as full of love and tenderness and a desire to see me. He told
me of his lovely home and the Gretchen room, where my picture is in
the window; and in case there should be no one to meet me at the
station when I arrived he sent me directions how to find Tracy Park,
and told me just what to do when I reached New York. He would come
for me himself, he said, only the sea made him so sick and he was
afraid he should forget everything if he did. But you will see in
his letter what he wrote and how fond he was of me; and if he is
alive and too crazy to