letter beginning--"My poor Edith, let bygones be bygones," and inviting
her and her boy to live with him at Raby Hall.

The heart-broken widow sent back a reply, in a handwriting scarcely
recognizable as hers. Instead of her usual precise and delicate hand,
the letters were large, tremulous, and straggling, and the lines slanted
downward.


"Write to me, speak to me, no more. For pity's sake let me forget there
is a man in the world who is my brother and his murderer.

"EDITH."


Guy opened this letter with a hopeful face, and turned pale as ashes at
the contents.

But his conscience was clear, and his spirit high. "Unjust idiot!" he
muttered, and locked her letter up in his desk.

Next morning he received a letter from Joseph Little, in a clear, stiff,
perpendicular writing:


"SIR,--I find my sister-in-law wrote you, yesterday, a harsh letter,
which I do not approve; and have told her as much. Deceased's affairs
were irretrievable, and I blame no other man for his rash act, which may
God forgive! As to your kind and generous invitation, it deserves her
gratitude; but Mrs. Little and myself have mingled our tears together