“At last, when I could bear the silence and suspense no longer, I wrote to you and asked you to be my wife. You remember what followed. I received a letter, written apparently by you, refusing me with few words. Hermione, I went mad; my love had been so mighty, so powerful, so strong, I could not bear the shock of seeing it all scattered to the winds. I could not bear the refusal. God keep any other man from suffering what I did then! I could not tell you, darling, even if I tried. I do not believe any man suffered so much and lived. A thousand times each day I was tempted to end my own life, but the Alden pride, so strong in the men of my race, forbade me to die because a woman was fair and false. Ah, me! what I suffered! I hated my life; I loathed myself. I tried to drown all memory of my most fatal love in the whirl of fashion, the pursuit of study. My darling, I might as well have taught myself to fly as to forget you. Then there came a time when the sneers of men, the sarcasm of women aroused all the pride of my nature; it should never be said that I was wasting away for the love of one who never loved me. I heard that you were going to marry Kenelm, and I, reckless, despairing, half mad and wholly wicked, married poor Clarice. “I should have been true to you, my love--the sweet, pure love of my youth--I should have been true to you, even though you had never cared for me. When I married Clarice I meant most royally to do my duty, to be kind to her, to make her happy, to indulge her, and I succeeded. I never loved her, but I cannot tell if she found that out. All went on calmly, if not happily, until the day when I met you in the woods. You remember it, Hermione, then my heart leaped up like a burning flame, devouring all before it, and then I learned that most fatal truth, that you had never received my letter and, what was of still more importance, you had not answered it, therefore had never rejected me. Then I learned that you loved me. I wonder that I ever recovered my senses when I remember the madness of my love. You remember our farewell. With your last words ringing in my ears--with your last gentle look haunting me--I swore to myself, like the reckless madman that I was, to find out who had trapped me, who had lured me to destruction, who had taken the letter I wrote to you, and had answered it--imitating your writing and signing your name.