It was a prize worth scheming for, but, to do her justice, Miss Nugent loved Sir Harold for himself alone. How impatiently she awaited the letter-bag next morning, only to be filled with a disappointment that almost amounted to dismay. There was no letter from Colonel Greyson, and she blamed herself for not insisting upon his London address. Still, it was not too late to give up hoping, and she denied herself several pleasures by remaining at home throughout the day, so that she should immediately receive any news that came. In the evening a boy from the telegraph office delivered the following: MISS MARGARET NUGENT--I have no good news for you, and the less said the better. Time alone can straighten the tangle. I leave London for Paris to-night. Kind regards. GREYSON. Margaret angrily tossed the telegram in the fire. “A miserable evasion,” she muttered. “How much does he suspect? I see through it all. He is taking Harold abroad with him. If I only dared to follow them and nurse my darling back to life! It may be months or years, and with my lady out of the way my devotion is sure to win in the end.” That very night, at a late hour, some terrible news reached the Nugents. The Earl of Seabright was dead, killed while riding over his own estate. His horse had stumbled over some hidden brambles, and my lord was pitched headforemost to the earth. The land steward was with him at the time, and the accident at first appeared to be only a trivial one. The earl had struggled up again, but only to sink back with a groan. The shock had injured him internally, and he was carried to his bedchamber a dying man. “You have only an hour to live, my lord,” the hastily-summoned doctor gravely told him. “If your affairs are not in order there is no time to be lost.” The earl listened incredulously at first. “I suffer no pain,” he said. “Surely you are mistaken! Am I to die because my horse stumbled--I, the maddest rider in the county?” “You are bleeding internally, my lord. No human power can save you,” was the decided reply. Then the earl had wept childishly for a little while, and sent hastily for the nearest lawyer. He wished to make a new will--to appoint fresh executors. The lawyer came and was closeted with the dying earl for half-an-hour. “Now read it over carefully,” the earl said, and the lawyer obeyed him.