“That was the story as he told it to me and as he believed it to be. But I saw that something was behind it that in his sweetness and generosity he had never suspected. I myself learned the truth. By means of a few inquiries made by letter to a friend in San Francisco, I found that an old school-friend of the girl had made the trouble. It was a case of malicious revenge. The girl whom my friend loved had innocently and unconsciously received the love of a man for whom she cared nothing, as her whole affection was with my friend. This man was very rich, and for that and other reasons was regarded as a prize. It appears that before losing his heart to this loveliest of girls he had been devoted to her old school-friend, a beautiful and dashing belle, who expected to marry him. When she found that she had lost him, she planned revenge. She was utterly without heart or principle. So she traded on her old school-mate’s confidence in her, and used that friendship to separate the lovers with lies and cunning. She succeeded. The girl died of a broken heart, and my friend’s life was ruined.” A look of unutterable horror settled upon the young woman’s face, and she sat upright and rigid, staring helplessly at him. “I never told him what I had learned,” resumed the physician. “It might have broken his heart, and he had suffered enough. I did not want him to know that malice, revenge, and murder had played their part in his story.” The young woman’s face bore so singular an expression that the physician marvelled. She was white, and deep and unaccustomed lines marred her beauty. “He knows the whole truth,” she said, quietly, and with a strange hardness. “He knows that I am the woman who brought about their separation. He learned it from me long ago in his cabin.” What Dr. Malbone might have done under the spur of the horror and amazement that filled him was checked by a violent fit of coughing with which his patient had been seized. His physician’s training instantly sent him to the bedside. “Help me here!” he cried, as he raised the sufferer. The young woman staggered to the bed. Dr. Malbone shot a malevolent glance at her, but she did not heed it. He raised his hand to thrust her back, but she grasped it, and quietly and firmly said,-- “I am going to help you.” He yielded, and told her what to do, and she did it. The cough was checked, and the sufferer was laid back upon the pillow. His eyes were open, and he looked from one of the watchers to the other as they stood on opposite sides of the bed. At first he was puzzled, and then a bright look of recognition lighted up his face. He smiled as he extended a feeble hand to each. “You are safe,” he faintly said to the young woman. “I am glad. Dr. Mal-bone will be kind to you.” To the physician he said, his voice tremulous with affection, “My dear old friend, always true, always kind.”