know everything. If he would only awaken she would tell him now,
and take the consequences. But Richard did not waken, and at last, with
a noiseless step, she glided back to her own chamber. She would write to
Richard, she decided. She could talk to him better on paper, and, then,
if he did not care to receive her, they would both be spared much
embarrassment.

Ethie's door was locked all the next morning, for she was writing to her
husband a long, humble letter, in which all the blame was taken upon
herself, inasmuch as she had made the great mistake of marrying without
love. "But I do love you now, Richard," she said; "love you truly, too,
else I should never be writing this to you, and asking you to take me
back and try if I cannot make you happy."

It was a good deal for Ethie to confess that she had been so much in
fault; but she did it honestly, and when the letter was finished she
felt as if all that had been wrong and bitter in the past was swept
away, and a new era in her life had begun. She would wait till night,
she said--wait till all was again quiet in the hall and in the
sick-room, and then when the boy came around with the mail, as he was
sure to do, she would hand her letter to him, and bid him leave it in
Governor Markham's room. The rest she could not picture to herself; but
she waited impatiently for the long August day to draw to its close,
joining the guests in the parlor by way of passing the time, and
appearing so bright and gay that those who had thought her proud and
cold, and reticent, wondered at the brightness of her face and the glad,
eager expression of her eyes. She was pretty, after all, they thought,
and even Miss Owens, from New York, tried to be very gracious, speaking
to her of Governor Markham, whose room adjoined hers, and asking if she
had seen him. About him Ethie did not care to talk, and, making some
excuse to get away, left the room without hearing a whisper of the
story which was going the rounds of the Cure, and which Miss Owens was
rather desirous of communicating to someone who, like herself, would be
likely to believe it a falsehood.

CHAPTER XXXV

MRS. PETER PRY TAKES A PACK

Mrs. Pry was in a pack, a whole pack, too, which left nothing free but
her head, and even that was bandaged in a wet napkin, so that the good
woman was in a condition of great helplessness, and nervously counted
the moments which must elapse ere Annie, the bath girl, would come to
her reli