Cecil was spell-bound; her gaze was fastened
on the little brown left hand. Was that woman
really her brother's wife? His "wife!" Cecil's
head fell on her clasped hands, and but
for her laboured breathing one would have
thought she had fainted. When she recovered
self—possession, she glanced furtively at the
picture, blurred and blotted as it was. There
were Gerald's full brow, his keen blue
uncompromising eyes, his implacable mouth,
his fair hair. Something had been written on
the glass. Cecil laid the broken pieces over
the ivory; the writing had been scrawled across
the woman's face; it was still legible two cruel
words were there—"Curse her!"

Sick at heart, Cecil undid the twine, and
outspread the roll. It contained a few letters
of recent date, written in a woman's cramped
hand, with a pen like a pin. Mechanically she
read the first; it was expressed as though the
writer had thought in a foreign language, and
translated her thoughts into English. It
commenced with my "Idol husband," and ended
with your "Doating wife."

"Wife!" How was it possible? She
scrutinised the date of that letter. He had been
that year in Germany—at Spa she believed—
and had remained there some time. He had
written to his sister that he was there ill; but his
London physician had laughed when she said so,
and observed, "He thought the major was in
the Highlands." She remembered that now.

Her brother married?

What a chaos the bare thought produced!
What a revolution! Ronald! her Ronald not
master of Middleton Lea! Gerald married!

A little longer search with trembling fingers.
A marriage certificate! Marriage solemnised
between Mabel Elizabeth Le Roy and Edward
Gerald Middleton, in Scotland, the place near
Dunkeld, the name of the clergyman, all clear
enough, and a witness Charles Dacre.

"Charles Dacre!" Her brother, Cecil knew,
had had a groom or some servant of that
name, a long time ago; but past and present
were so mingled in her bewildered brain that
she lost all power of distinguishing one from
the other. She clasped her hands over her
eyes to shut out what?

Ay, what, indeed!

Gradually she sank from her seat upon her
knees; her hands still folded over her eyes; her
lips moved by earnest prayer, silent yet
eloquent in entreaty to Him who hears our
thoughts! Her appeal was not in vain. She
had been well practised in self-control, but she
did not now rely on self; she called humbly to
HIM to help her, and help came.

Calmed and strengthened, she arose and
commenced, first turning over and then
steadily reading the letters. She read the
certificate over again. There was no envelope
or direction among the papers, nor had the
writer once named him he was always addressed
as "My own darling," "My heart's idol," or
with some such expression of endearment, even
if reproaches as to absence or neglect followed
the first line. At all events, Charles Dacre had
been present at the marriage.

Gerald had evidently parted from her in
anger, and accused her of want of truth, of
duplicity, of extravagance; told her how necessary
it was that his marriage should be kept
secret, it was so important to his prospects
that it should not be known; and the vain,
frivolous, stormy beauty had still the noble love
to assure him that she would be torn in pieces
by wild horses sooner than betray their secret
until he gave her permission to do so.

Cecil felt herself shivering at her brother's
falsehood; there was no reason connected with
his prospects why his marriage should have
been secret; and this beautiful woman, wanned
into life and love by the temperature of a
tropical sky, when quite a child (for she spoke of
her sixteenth birthday), had become his wife and
his victim. She read on. Under other
circumstances she would have cast the letters aside
as the ravings of an undisciplined, passion-full
girl; but they possessed a fascination she could
not withstand. She held the last in her hand;
the writing was straggling and incoherent it
told of the birth of a child—his boy!

Why had he been angry? Had any one
maligned her to him? her, his faithful, loving
wife—"Little Brown Bess," as he had often
called her, the mother of his child? Why should
he write cruel words now? And the boy was so
like him such a beauty!

Cecil laid down the letter, which had been
torn across. She was quite calm now.

If this were true, if her brother had left a
son, all her prospects had been made into
thin air and vanished. She was no longer
an heiress; she no longer had the power of
restoring her beloved to his position; her
dream of life was over. This knowledge did
not come to her in a mist; it was first the cloud
the size of a man's hand, increasing and
increasing until it grew into a black wall
between her and her husband's triumphs for
evermore. Gerald's wife—Gerald's son—
what had the poor thing done that he should
have scarred her beautiful face with his curse?
And the child where was it? The facts were
clear before her, but the details, the proofs
(were there proofs?), were all confused. One
dreary fact seemed to press on her heart and
brain. Chester—Chester—to whom she had
promised wealth and happiness! Sob after sob
burst from her heaving breast, until her agony
sought relief in words, and she repeated again
and again, "Oh, my love! my love! my love!"

She gradually replaced the papers in their
concealment, locked the desk, and crept stealthily
into the hall. Some undefined suggestion
took possession of her mind that she had no
right to be there.

She met South, who at once saw that some
fresh sorrow had stricken his lady. Instead of
passing on, Cecil paused, and said:

"South, do you remember my brother having
a groom —pad-groom, I think—of the name of
Dacre?"