predominant place in his thoughts which Mrs. Zant had
assumed--without any discernible reason to account for it? If he
had ventured to answer his own question, the reply would have
been: Never!

All the next day he waited at home, in expectation of Mr. John
Zant's promised visit, and waited in vain.

Toward evening the parlor-maid appeared at the family tea-table,
and presented to her master an unusually large envelope sealed
with black wax, and addressed in a strange handwriting. The
absence of stamp and postmark showed that it had been left at the
house by a messenger.

"Who brought this?" Mr. Rayburn asked.

"A lady, sir--in deep mourning."

"Did she leave any message?"

"No, sir."

Having drawn the inevitable conclusion, Mr. Rayburn shut himself
up in his library. He was afraid of Lucy's curiosity and Lucy's
questions, if he read Mrs. Zant's letter in his daughter's
presence.

Looking at the open envelope after he had taken out the leaves of
writing which it contained, he noticed these lines traced inside
the cover: