hope and pray that I may
never knowingly meet her, for her heart and life must be--pardon
the expression--as false and as black as hell itself."

There was a look on his face which Miss Carleton had never seen.
Gradually, however, his features softened, and he continued,--

"In accordance with my father's wish, expressed in the letter, that
I should complete my studies in England, I sailed for that country
within a few weeks of my twenty-first birthday; and while there I
learned that part of my story which is of more especial interest to
all parties concerned at the present time.

"I had been but a few months in England when I felt a great desire
to visit, incognito, the old Mainwaring estate. Accordingly, under
the name by which you have known me, I arrived at the estate, only
to learn that the home of my father's boyhood, and of the Mainwarings
for several generations, had passed into the hands of strangers.
My grandfather had died within two years of my father's marriage,
and the younger son had sold the estate and gone to America.
Incidentally, I was directed to an old servant of my grandfather's,
who yet remained on the place and who could give me its whole
history. That servant, Miss Carleton, was old James Wilson, the
father of John Wilson, Ralph Mainwaring's present valet."

"Ah!" ejaculated Miss Carleton, her face lighting with pleasure; "I
have seen the trusty old fellow hundreds of times, you know. Indeed,
he could give you the history of all the Mainwarings for the last
three hundred years."

"He gave me one very important bit of history," Harold Mainwaring
replied, with a smile. "He told me that old Ralph Mainwaring, after
the departure of his son for Australia, failed rapidly. He was
slowly but surely dying of a broken heart, and, though he never
mentioned the name of his elder son, it was evident that he regretted
his own harshness and severity towards him.

"On the night before his death he suddenly gave orders for an
attorney to be summoned, and was so insistent in his demand, that,
when it was ascertained that his old solicitor, Alfred Barton, the
father of the present firm of Barton & Barton, had been called out
of the city, a young lawyer, Richard Hobson by name, who had formerly
been an articled clerk in Barton's office, was called in in his
stead. A little before the hour of midnight, in the presence of his
son, Hugh Mainwaring, Richard Hobson, the attorney, and Alexander
McPherson,