if she dared. In another instant her face whitened,
the scrap of paper fluttered to the floor, and she would have followed
it but for the support of both Mr. Gridley's arms. He disengaged one of
them presently, and felt in his pocket for the sal volatile. It served
him excellently well, and stung her back again to her senses very
quickly. All her defiant aspect had gone.

"Look!" he said, as he lighted the scrap of paper in the flame. "You
understand me, and you see that I must be answered the next time I ask
my question."

She opened her lips as if to speak. It was as when a bell is rung in a
vacuum,--no words came from them,--only a faint gasping sound, an effort
at speech. She was caught tight in the heart-screw.

"Don't hurry yourself, Miss Cynthia," he said, with a certain relenting
tenderness of manner. "Here, take another sniff of the smelling-salts.
Be calm, be quiet,--I am well disposed towards you,--I don't like to
give you trouble. There, now, I must have the answer to that question;
but take your time, take your time."

"Give me some water,--some water!" she said, in a strange hoarse
whisper. There was a pitcher of water and a tumbler on an old marble
sideboard near by. He filled the tumbler, and Cynthia emptied it as
if she had just been taken from the rack, and could have swallowed a
bucketful.

"What do you want to know?" she asked.

"I wish to know all that you can tell me about a certain paper, or
certain papers, which I have reason to believe Mr. William Murray
Bradshaw committed to your keeping."

"There is only one paper of any consequence. Do you want to make him
kill me? or do you want to make me kill myself?"

"Neither, Miss Cynthia, neither. I wish to see that paper, but not for
any bad purpose. Don't you think, on the whole, you have pretty good
reason to trust me? I am a very quiet man, Miss Cynthia. Don't be afraid
of me; only do what I ask,--it will be a great deal better for you in
the end."

She thrust her trembling hand into her pocket, and took out the key of
the little trunk. She drew the trunk towards her, put the key in the
lock, and opened it. It seemed like pressing a knife into her own bosom
and turning the blade. That little trunk held all the records of her
life the forlorn spinster most cherished;--a few letters that came
nearer to love-letters than any others she had ever received; an album,
with flowers of the summers of 1840 and 1841 fading between its leaves;
two