eathbed, but that you would know. She died very penitent, and
leaving her love to all friends. She was very well liked in the company,
though she joined it not so very long ago. A few things that she left
behind she requested you to have the choice of, if you cared for any
keepsake to remember her by, and sent you her forgiveness freely, as
she hoped to be forgiven by you. The funeral is to be on Sunday, at two
o'clock; and I think she would have taken it kind as a mark of respect
if she had thought you would come. I leave that to your own sense of
what is best."

This was the letter which fell like a bomb into Dick's life. It was long
before he could command himself enough to understand anything but the
first startling fact. She was dead. In his heart, by his thoughts, had
he killed her? was it his fault? He did not go beyond this horrible idea
for some long minutes. Then there suddenly seized upon him a flood of
gladness, a sensation of guilty joy. God had stepped in to set the matter
straight. The miracle which we all hope for, which never seems impossible
in our own case, had been wrought. All lesser ways of making wrong right
were unnecessary now. All was over, the pain of retrospection, the painful
expedients of law, the danger of publicity, all over. The choice of her
poor little leavings for a token to remember her by! Dick shuddered at
the thought. To remember her by! when to forget her was all that he
wished.

It was long before he could do anything save think, in confused whirls
of recollection, and painful flashes of memory, seeing before his hot
eyes a hundred phantasmal scenes. But at last he roused himself to a
consideration of what he ought to do. Prudence seemed to suggest an
immediate journey to Liverpool, to satisfy himself personally that all
was effectually winded up and concluded in this miserable account; but
a dread, a repugnance, which he could not overcome, held him back. He
could not take part by act or word in anything that concerned her again;
not even, poor creature, in her funeral; not from any enmity or hatred
to her, poor unfortunate one, but because of the horror, the instinctive
shrinking, which he could not overcome. Dick determined, however, to
send the man who had charge of his chambers, a man half servant, half
clerk, in whom he could fully trust. It was Friday when he received
the letter. He sent him down next day to Liverpool with instructions to
represent him at the funeral, to