venturing into details. She knew, by experience,
the form of letter which might be trusted to produce
an effect on him, and she now wrote it, in
these words:

Dear Mr. Noel,—Sad news has reached me from
Switzerland. My beloved brother is dying, and his
medical attendant summons me instantly to Zurich.
The serious necessity of availing myself of the earliest
means of conveyance to the Continent, leaves me but
one alternative. I must profit by the permission to
leave England, if necessary, which you kindly
granted to me at the beginning of my brother's illness;
and I must avoid all delay, by going straight
to London, instead of turning aside, as I should have
liked, to see you first at St. Crux.

Painfully as I am affected by the family calamity
which has fallen on me, I cannot let this opportunity
pass without adverting to another subject,
which seriously concerns your welfare, and in which
(on that account) your old housekeeper feels the
deepest interest.

I am going to surprise and shock you, Mr. Noel.
Pray don't be agitated! pray compose yourself!

The impudent attempt to cheat you, which has
happily opened your eyes to the true character of
our neighbours at North Shingles, was not the only
object which Mr. Bygrave had in forcing himself on
your acquaintance. The infamous conspiracy with
which you were threatened in London, has been
in full progress against you, under Mr. Bygrave's
direction, at Aldborough. Accident—I will tell you
what accident when we meet—has put me in possession
of information precious to your future security.
I have discovered, to an absolute certainty, that the
person calling herself Miss Bygrave, is no other than
the woman who visited us in disguise at Vauxhall
Walk.

I suspected this, from the first; but I had no
evidence to support my suspicions: I had no means
of combating the false impression produced on you.
My hands, I thank Heaven, are tied no longer. I
possess absolute proof of the assertion that I have
just made—proof that your own eyes can see; proof
that would satisfy you, if you were judge in a Court
of Justice.

Perhaps, even yet, Mr. Noel, you will refuse to
believe me? Be it so. Believe me or not, I have
one last favour to ask, which your English sense of
fair play will not deny me.

This melancholy journey of mine will keep me
away from England for a fortnight, or, at most, for
three weeks. You will oblige me—and you will
certainly not sacrifice your own convenience and
pleasure—by staying through that interval with
your friends at St. Crux. If, before my return,
some unexpected circumstance throws you once more
into the company of the Bygraves; and if your
natural kindness of heart inclines you to receive the
excuses which they will, in that case, certainly
address to you—place one trifling restraint on yourself,
for your own sake, if not for mine. Suspend
your flirtation with the young lady (I beg pardon
of all other young ladies for calling her so!) until
my return. If, when I come back, I fail to prove
to you that Miss Bygrave is the woman who wore
that disguise, and used those threatening words, in
Vauxhall Walk, I will engage to leave your service
at a day's notice; and I will atone for the sin of
bearing false witness against my neighbour, by resigning
every claim I have to your grateful remembrance,
on your father's account as well as on your
own. I make this engagement without reserves of
any kind; and I promise to abide by it—if my
proofs fail—on the faith of a good Catholic, and the
word of an honest woman. Your faithful servant,
VIRGINIE LECOUNT.

The closing sentences of this letter—as the
housekeeper well knew when she wrote them—
embodied the one appeal to Mr. Noel Vanstone,
which could be certainly trusted to produce a deep
and lasting effect. She might have staked her
oath, her life, or her reputation on proving the
assertion which she had made, and have failed to
leave a permanent impression on his mind. But
when she staked not only her position in his
service, but her pecuniary claims on him as well,
she at once absorbed the ruling passion of his
life in expectation of the result. There was not
a doubt of it, in the strongest of all his interests
— the interest of saving his money—he would
wait.

"Check-mate for Mr. Bygrave!" thought Mrs.
Lecount, as she sealed and directed the letter.
"The battle is over—the game is played out."

While Mrs. Lecount was providing for her
master's future security at Sea View, events
were in full progress at North Shingles.

As soon as Captain Wragge recovered his
astonishment at the housekeeper's appearance on
his own premises, he hurried into the house, and
guided by his own forebodings of the disaster
that had happened, made straight for his wife's
room.

Never, in all her former experience, had poor
Mrs. Wragge felt the full weight of the captain's
indignation, as she felt it now. All the little
intelligence she naturally possessed, vanished at
once in the whirlwind of her husband's rage.
The only plain facts which he could extract from
her were two in number. In the first place,
Magdalen's rash desertion of her post, proved to
have no better reason to excuse it than Magdalen's
incorrigible impatience: she had passed a
sleepless night; she had risen feverish and
wretched; and she had gone out, reckless of all
consequences, to cool her burning head in the
fresh air. In the second place, Mrs. Wragge
had, on her own confession, seen Mrs. Lecount,
had talked with Mrs. Lecount, and had ended by
telling Mrs. Lecount the story of the ghost.
Having made these discoveries, Captain Wragge
wasted no more time in contending with his
wife's terror and confusion. He withdrew at
once to a window which commanded an uninterrupted
prospect of Mr. Noel Vanstone's house;
and there established himself, on the watch for
events at Sea View, precisely as Mrs. Lecount
had established herself, on the watch for events
at North Shingles.

Not a word of comment on the disaster of
the morning escaped him, when Magdalen returned,
and found him at his post. His flow of
language seemed at last to have run dry. "I
told you what Mrs. Wragge would do," he said
—"and Mrs. Wragge has done it." He sat
unflinchingly at the window, with a patience