ned, if it lay in human power to discover the mystery.
What his precise motive was he could hardly have told. The trinket might
have been picked up by some vagabond who had wandered into the grounds;
if so there was little hope of ever gaining any tidings concerning it,
but Mellen could not satisfy himself that such was the case; he believed
the jewel would yet be found.

There was some mystery in Elizabeth's life--of that irksome suspicion he
could not divest himself. Twenty times each day he went over in his mind
every event that had occurred since his return, from the moment when he
came upon her wandering so wildly about on that stormy night.

Twenty times each day he convinced himself that there was nothing in the
whole catalogue to awaken the slightest doubt in any mind not given up
to self-torture and jealousy like his; yet, argue as he would, bring
conviction as closely home to his soul as he might, doubts rose up again
and haunted him like ghosts that had no power to speak, but pointed
always towards trouble and blackness which lay in the past.

If the bracelet had been given to a needy person for any reason, it
would undoubtedly find its way to the hands of some pawnbroker--that was
his thought. He reproached himself for indulging it--he called himself
unworthy the love of any woman while he could harbor such suspicions,
but they would not pass out of his mind--the treachery which had wrecked
his youth had sown the seeds of suspicion too deeply in his soul to be
easily eradicated.

Then he compounded with his conscience, and decided that he was right in
taking every step possible to solve these doubts, if only to prove the
innocence of his wife. He kept repeating to himself that this was the
reason which urged him on.

"I want to be convinced," he thought again and again, "of my own
injustice--it is right that I should endure this self-abasement as a
punishment for doubting a woman who is beyond suspicion."

Solacing his self-reproaches a little by such arguments and reflections,
he had gone to work in earnest to make such discoveries as would drive
these harassing doubts away forever.

Among other efforts, he had confided to a leading pawnbroker the details
of the affair, and it was in him that his hopes principally lay. If the
bracelet was not brought to this man's establishment he had means of
discovering if it was carried elsewhere.

That day Mr. Hollywell had news for him; a bracelet similar to th