with the intimation of my return. Two days
only before my departure from Paris, I received another letter from her.
I was weak enough to be almost afraid to open it. Her writing to me
again, when she knew that we should be re-united at such an early date,
suggested that she must have some very startling news to communicate. My
mind misgave me that it would prove to be news of the worst sort.

I summoned courage to open the envelope. Ah, what fools we are! For once
that our presentments come right, they prove a hundred times to be wrong.
Instead of distressing me, the letter delighted me. Our gloomy prospect
was brightening at last.

Thus--feeling her way over the paper, in her large childish
characters--Lucilla wrote:

"DEAREST FRIEND AND SISTER,--I cannot wait until we meet, to tell you my
good news. The Brighton doctor has been dismissed; and a doctor from
London has been tried instead. My dear! for intellect there is nothing
like London. The new man sees, thinks, and makes up his mind on the spot.
He has a way of his own of treating Oscar's case; and he answers for
curing him of the horrible fits. There is news for you! Come back, and
let us jump for joy together. How wrong I was to doubt the future! Never,
never, never will I doubt it again. This is the longest letter I have
ever written.

"Your affectionate,

"LUCILLA."

To this, a postscript was added, in Oscar's handwriting, as follows:--

"Lucilla has told you that there is some hope for me at last. What I
write in this place is written without her knowledge--for your private
ear only. Take the first opportunity you can find of coming to see me at
Browndown, without allowing Lucilla to hear of it. I have a great favor
to ask of you. My happiness depends on your granting it. You shall know
what it is, when we meet.

"OSCAR."

This postscript puzzled me.

It was not in harmony with the implicit confidence which I had observed
Oscar to place habitually in Lucilla. It jarred on my experience of his
character, which presented him to me as the reverse of a reserved
secretive man. His concealment of his identity, when he first came among
us, had been a forced concealment--due entirely to his horror of being
identified with the hero of the trial. In all the ordinary relations of
life, he was open and unreserved to a fault. That he could have a secret
to keep from Lucilla, and to confide to me, was something perfectly
unintelligible to my mind. It highly exc