them. They were without
doubt Olivia's writing:

"I know that, you are poor, and I send you all I can spare--the ring you
once gave to me. I am even poorer than yourself, but I have just enough
for my last necessities. I forgive you, as I trust that God forgives
me."

* * * * *

There was no more to be said or done. Conviction had been brought home
to me. I rose to take my leave, and Foster held out his hand to me,
perhaps with a kindly intention. Olivia's ring was glittering on it, and
I could not take it into mine.

"Well, well," he said, "I understand; I am sorry for you. Come again,
Dr. Martin Dobree. If you know of any remedy for my ease, you are no
true man if you do not try it."

I went down the narrow staircase, closely followed by Mrs. Foster. Her
face had lost its gayety and boldness, and looked womanly and careworn,
as she laid her hand upon my arm before opening the house-door.

"For God's sake, come again," she said, "if you can do any thing for
him! We have money left yet, and I am earning more every day. We can pay
you well. Promise me you will come again."

"I can promise nothing to-night," I answered.

"You shall not go till you promise," she said, emphatically.

"Well, then, I promise," I answered, and she unfastened the chain almost
noiselessly, and opened the door into the street.

CHAPTER THE THIRTY-NINTH.

SAD SEWS.

A fine, drizzling rain was falling; I was just conscious of it as an
element of discomfort, but it did not make me quicken my steps. I
wanted no rapidity of motion now. There was nothing to be done, nothing
to look forward to, nothing to flee away from. Olivia was dead!

I had said the same thing again and again to myself, that Olivia was
dead to me; but at this moment I learned how great a difference there
was between the words as a figure of speech and as a terrible reality. I
could no longer think of her as treading the same earth--the same
streets, perhaps; speaking the same language; seeing the same daylight
as myself. I recalled her image, as I had seen her last in Sark; and
then I tried to picture her white face, with lips and eyes closed
forever, and the awful chill of death resting upon her. It seemed
impossible; yet the cuckoo-cry went on in my brain, "Olivia is dead--is
dead!"

I reached home just as Jack was coming in from his evening amusement. He
let me in with his latch-key, giving me a cheery greeting; but as soo