She was thinking of the one within. "And it is all my fault. I feel sure of that, for it would have been impossible for Rutley to have angered John so much with any other name. I must have been mad ever to have confided in him that it was Constance's ring. "Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do? God forgive me!" she moaned, as she sought solace under a maple. But there was no rest for her. She returned to the house. Mechanically she opened the door and with one longing heartsore purpose--to seek the seclusion of her apartment--to throw herself on the couch and bury her face in her hands in a vain hope to get relief in tears. But there, just inside the door, on the hall table, she saw through moist-swollen eyes, something white. She picked it up. It was a letter addressed to her, in a coarse scrawl. She fled to her room, there she sat on a chair near the window and opened the letter. The characters were bold, but slovenly written, and almost illegible, and then somehow the light did not appear strong or bright as it should be. She bent over close to the window--no better, save that she could make out the word "Virginia." Becoming more interested, she turned on the electric light, and even then her eyes seemed weak, and the letters so run together as to appear blurred. She took up a magnifying glass that lay on the table, and by its aid was at last able to decipher the note. Virginia, ther party as sends er this kin tell yer somethink about er party yer wud lie ter knows, perwiden yer meets me nere the top of the long steps at or eleven ternight--alone, mind yer--alone in ther city park. Yerl be safe if alone. She was at once convinced that the note had a deep significance. She turned it over and over and read and re-read it again and again. It was clearly meant for a clandestine meeting--with whom? Ha! The handwriting was evidently disguised, for it was quite different from that on the envelop, and the illiteracy plainly intended to deceive. Nevertheless the information might be of inestimable value--perhaps John, maybe of Dorothy. Her mind was almost in a state of frenzy at her impotent efforts to undo the mischief she had wrought, and even this "straw" gave a certain measure of relief, by offering work for solution. "I will go!" she said aloud. Having made up her mind to take the risk, her spirits lightened perceptibly. As the envelop bore no postmark, she at once plied the housemaid with questions. Who delivered the letter? How had it come on the hall table? The questions were put in a quiet, indifferent manner, so as not to excite curiosity.