“Well, then, the man Campbell, or whatever his real name was. I have a haunting fear that he has prepared those papers for the purpose of wounding and insulting you. He was capable of any malice, any malignity, any atrocity. He may have put into these papers falsehoods that you will be the better for not reading. On the other hand, the papers may be innocent of any such purpose, and it may even be of the utmost importance that you should know their contents. I venture to suggest that you yourself do what I had no right to do; namely, ask Dorothy to examine the packet and tell you whether or not it is well for you to read the papers. You love her and trust her, and her judgment is unfailing, I might almost say infallible. This is only a suggestion, of course. I have no right to press it.” Evelyn sat silent, holding the packet in her hands and nervously turning it over. At last she arose and took a few steps toward the doorway. Then, turning about, she said:— “If it were necessary for any one to read the papers and advise me concerning them, I should ask _you_, Colonel Kilgariff, to stand as my friend and counsellor in the matter. But it is not necessary. _I already know what is in the papers._” She turned instantly and entered the house, leaving Kilgariff alone in the porch. XXIII A LESSON FROM DOROTHY FOR ten days after the surgical operation, Kilgariff lay abed, his head, neck, and shoulders held rigidly immovable by a wooden framework devised for that purpose. Otherwise than as regarded the wound, he seemed perfectly well, and the wound itself healed satisfactorily under Arthur Brent’s skilful treatment. In his constrained position it was impossible for the wounded man to hold a book before his eyes, and so, to relieve the tedium of his convalescence, Dorothy read to him for several hours each day. He had vaguely hoped, without formulating the thought, that Evelyn would render him this service, as she had done during his first illness. But this time she came not. Every day—until the success of the operation was fully assured, she inquired anxiously concerning his condition; but at no time did she visit him, or ask to do so. When at last Arthur so far relaxed the mechanical restraints that Kilgariff was able to sit below stairs in the porch when the weather permitted, and before a “great, bearded fire” in the hallway if it were too cool out of doors—for the autumn was now advanced—he was sorely disappointed to learn that Evelyn was no longer at Wyanoke. She had somewhat suddenly decided to stay at Branton, for a week or ten days, as the guest of Edmonia Bannister.