ng
with him. I only made up my mind to-night, but I have thought of
something like this a long, long time. I cannot bear it any longer. I
think and think about things--that another man loved you and you loved
him--and I nearly go mad. Even when people meet me and ask how you are,
I am reminded of it; for weeks now I haven't thought of anything else;
it just seems to rise up wherever I go.

"I think it will be better when I don't see you.

"I have been sitting here with my head in my hands, wondering if there
is any way in which I can spare you the pain of reading this letter, but
it's no use, it's impossible to go back and bluff about it.

"Collins spoke to me about the change in me; he said he thought it was
that touch of the sun in September. I wish to God it was!

"I will take the course with Atkins, and then let you know. He wants to
go to Benares for some reason or another, and perhaps I will go with
him, or perhaps come home to you. But I don't think I will come back
under a year.

"You hear of men all your life who do this, but I feel as if it was
killing me, and you, too. I wish there was some other way.

"I have written Harry at the Crocker; my account there is to be
transferred to your name. I don't know exactly what it is, but the money
from the San Mateo lots went in there, and so there is plenty. For God's
sake spend it, don't hesitate about getting anything you want. Why
shouldn't you keep the house, until April anyway; some one would stay
with you, and then you could go to San Rafael.

"I'm not going to try to tell you how I feel about all this, because you
know. It all seems to me a bad dream. Every little while I try to make
myself think that after a while it will all come right, but it seemed to
me all dead and buried after that time on the steamer, and of course it
wasn't!

"Tell people what you please, I leave all that to you.

"Chadwick will sell the car, and send you the bill of sale and the
money. He knows what I want sent; he'll do all that.

"I've written and rewritten this ten times; my head is splitting. It
seems strange to think it is you and me.

"God bless you always, and our little girl.

"_Jim_."

Julia finished it with a little grinding sound, like a groan, heard
herself make a dramatic exclamation, an "Ah!" of agonized unbelief. She
sat down, got up again to take a few irresolute steps toward her desk,
and finally went to her bedside telephone, and took down the receiver