theory. It is yours, O ruling Fates of men, whatever you
be, who must support that accusation. Theophil and Isabel loved by the
compelling dispensation of the stars. They fought their destiny, and had
conquered it. It was you, ye stars, not they, that killed Jenny.

And this was true: but still the little figure sobbed at Theophil's
side, as again and again it would come and sob there, till Theophil's
own heart broke,--that old death-crying of Jenny's broken heart.

CHAPTER XXV

JENNY'S POSTE RESTANTE

After Jenny's death two letters had come for her from Isabel, who had no
knowledge of what had been happening to her friends of New Zion.

There is something peculiarly sad about the letters that for a little
time go on coming for the dead. Perhaps nothing more simply brings home
the fact that they are no longer with us. Even little bills, circulars
offering new spring goods at sale prices, come charged with pathos, and
Theophil smiled at his own folly as he kept them all. Sad little _poste
restante_! Will the letters ever be called for?

Theophil did not open the letters, but as days went by and no more came,
he sometimes found himself taking them from their drawer and looking at
them. Isabel's handwriting, though his soul would not confess it to
himself, still held the power of a rune over his heart.

Had no traitor thought ever whispered deep down in the darkness of his
consciousness that the way was now open to Isabel? Such thoughts indeed
had come to him, but unwelcomed, involuntarily, as those foul thoughts
which will sometimes torture the pure, or those base thoughts which may
appal the noble.

The mind, like the body, has its foul humours, which can only be
accepted with patience as a part of the inscrutable mechanism of human
organisms. In moments of anger this filth and poison of the mind
sometimes comes to the surface to wrong us--for it is not us, it is in
truth just all that we are not.

Thus at times in Theophil's mind, that was one prayer of faithful love
for Jenny, the thought of Isabel would steal, like--so his stern
faithfulness pictured it--a fair devil in a church. Yet, if he opened
one of those letters he knew there would ascend from it a cloud of
subtle incense, which would ... well, which he must never again breathe.

So he would replace them in their drawer, and again, some other day,
take them out once more.

Perhaps, after all, it might be his duty, the mere duty of a friend,