ry was so completely taken in by her to start with," I
said.

"I don't," replied Charles. "I have even heard of elderly men being
taken in by young ones. Besides, suspicious people are always liable to
distrust their own nearest relatives, especially their prepossessing
nephews, and then lay themselves open to be taken in by entire
strangers. She wanted to get Ralph married, and she took a fancy to this
girl, who was laying herself out to be taken a fancy to. In short, she
trusted to her own judgment, and it failed her, as usual. I wrote very
kindly to her from abroad, telling her how sincerely I sympathized with
her in her distress at finding how entirely her judgment had been at
fault, how lamentably she had been deceived from first to last, and how
much trouble she had been the innocent means of bringing on the family.
I have had no reply. Dear Aunt Mary! That reminds me that she is in
London now; and I think a call from me, and a personal expression of
sympathy, might give her pleasure." And he rose to take his leave.

I had let Charles go without contradicting a word he had said, because,
unfortunately, I was not in a position to do so. As I have said before,
I am not given to suspecting a friend, even though appearances may be
against him; and I still believed in Carr's innocence, though I must own
that I was sorry that he never answered any of the numerous letters I
wrote to him, or ever came to see me in London, as I had particularly
asked him to do. Of course I did not believe that he was married to
Aurelia, for it was only on the word of a stranger and a
police-inspector, while I knew from his own lips that he was engaged to
a countrywoman of his own. However, be that how it may, my own rooted
conviction at the time, which has remained unshaken ever since, is that
in some way he became aware that he was unjustly suspected, and being,
like all Americans, of a sensitive nature, he retired to his native
land. Anyhow, I have never seen or heard anything of him since. I am
aware that Jane holds a different opinion, but then Charles had
prejudiced her against him--so much so that it has ended by becoming a
subject on which we do not converse together.

* * * * *

I saw Charles again a few months later on a sultry night in July. I was
leaving town the next day to be present at Ralph's wedding, and Jane and
I were talking it over towards ten o'clock, the first cool time in the
day, w