ce to the lady's own wishes
and that the lady should accept the situation without protest is very
amazing. However, our conjectures were set at rest by a visit from
Stapleton himself that very afternoon. He had come to offer apologies
for his rudeness of the morning, and after a long private interview with
Sir Henry in his study the upshot of their conversation was that the
breach is quite healed, and that we are to dine at Merripit House next
Friday as a sign of it.

"I don't say now that he isn't a crazy man," said Sir Henry; "I can't
forget the look in his eyes when he ran at me this morning, but I must
allow that no man could make a more handsome apology than he has done."

"Did he give any explanation of his conduct?"

"His sister is everything in his life, he says. That is natural enough,
and I am glad that he should understand her value. They have always been
together, and according to his account he has been a very lonely man
with only her as a companion, so that the thought of losing her was
really terrible to him. He had not understood, he said, that I was
becoming attached to her, but when he saw with his own eyes that it was
really so, and that she might be taken away from him, it gave him such a
shock that for a time he was not responsible for what he said or did.
He was very sorry for all that had passed, and he recognized how foolish
and how selfish it was that he should imagine that he could hold a
beautiful woman like his sister to himself for her whole life. If she
had to leave him he had rather it was to a neighbour like myself than to
anyone else. But in any case it was a blow to him and it would take him
some time before he could prepare himself to meet it. He would withdraw
all opposition upon his part if I would promise for three months to let
the matter rest and to be content with cultivating the lady's friendship
during that time without claiming her love. This I promised, and so the
matter rests."

So there is one of our small mysteries cleared up. It is something to
have touched bottom anywhere in this bog in which we are floundering.
We know now why Stapleton looked with disfavour upon his sister's
suitor--even when that suitor was so eligible a one as Sir Henry. And
now I pass on to another thread which I have extricated out of the
tangled skein, the mystery of the sobs in the night, of the tear-stained
face of Mrs. Barrymore, of the secret journey of the butler to the
western lattice wi