The Chief Legatee

uded action. Indeed, that gentleman looked greatly changed. He not only gave evidence of a sleepless night but showed none of the spirit of the prev

morning. He interests me and I hope that none of his movements will escape you. But I'm not ready to talk

stiffly. "He's under our thumb at presen

e won't leave him as long as you have con

this morning you are too cold. But it's not for me to complain. You know whe

to the meeting he declined. To see the man-to force from him the truth, seemed the only rational thing to do. But the final words of his wife's letter stood in his way. She had advised patience. If patience would clear the situation and brin

eadfastly at his hotel. He had laid out his future course in these words: "I will extend the time to three days; then if I do not hear from her I will get that wry-necked fellow by the throat and twist an explanation from him." But the three days passed and he found the situation unchanged. Then he set as his limit the end of the week, but before the full time had elapsed

azement as he read the

ht and forget the stra

ied in the street. What Mr. Ransom read in them increased his astonishment, I might say

hearing, some time during her wedding-day, that a sister whom she had supposed dead was really alive and in circumstances of almost degrading poverty. As this sister had been her own twin the effect upon her mind was very serious. To find and rescue this sister she left her newly made husband in the surreptitious manner already recorded in the papers. That she is not fully he

what he had just read; he regarded it as a newspaper story and a great fake; but she had bid him read it, and this fact in itself was very distu

at its inscription and sank staggering into the nearest chair, asking himself if he had the courage to open and read it. For the handwriting, like that of the note handed him in the street, was Georgian's, and he felt himse

If you saw her you would call her Georgian. And she says that she knows you, admires you! and she says it in my voice! I try to shut my ears, but I hear her saying it even when her lips do not move. She is as ignorant as she is afflicted and I cannot leave her. She cannot hear a sound, thou

ionate and

rgi

ared it with that of the note which had been thrust into his hands earlier in the day. There was no difference between them except that there were evidences of faltering in the latter, not noticeable in the

ce; then come directly to me. It's business now and no mistake