Dan took the letter, which was written an an uneven and dirty piece of paper, and read aloud:-- "Master,--Joshua Marvel has run away with a young woman that lives in Daniel Taylor's house--him as trains the birds. They are both of 'em on board the 'Merry Andrew.' I send this by the pilot, and told him that you would pay him for putting it into your hands. My faithful service to you. When I come back, I hope to get what you promised me. "Aboard the 'Merry Andrew.'" "There is no name to it," said Dan. "Who sent it?" "A sailor on the ship," replied Solomon Fewster; "a man who has done odd jobs for me, and whom I have assisted." "But how does he know me?" "Through the birds, and through my telling him of you, I suppose. He has been in the street often, and knows who live in the house. He is a faithful honest fellow, and I dare say thought it his duty to tell me about Miss Kindred, so that I might acquaint her friends." "'When I come back, I hope to get what you promised me,'" said Dan, reading from the letter. "I promised him money if he brought home some foreign birds," answered Solomon Fewster readily, "such as parrots and cockatoos, and other likely birds, for you to train for me." Meanwhile Susan had covered the dead man's face, and sat moaning on the floor. To her Dan addressed himself, calling her by name; but it was not until he had repeated it two or three times that her attention was aroused. She took her hands from before her eyes, and looked at him vacantly. There was no sign of intelligence in her face as she spoke; it seemed as if the light of reason had fled, and as if the words she uttered belonged to a lesson she had learned and was forced to repeat. "I promised him faithfully and sacredly--yes; they are the very words; he made me say them after him, 'Faithfully and sacredly,'--that I would never tell unless his tongue was sealed, and the time came when it was necessary to speak. Is the time come?" "It is, Susan," said Dan, a new fear at his heart; "it is come." "Is the time come?" she repeated, turning to the motionless form on the bed, and waiting for the answer in the awful silence that followed. "I was the only one he trusted. Not a soul but me was to come into the room; and they didn't--no I kept my promise faithfully and sacredly. He said to me, 'If I die, and Joshua Marvel has betrayed my daughter, give this book to Dan, and tell him it contains the words of a dying man.'" She rose to her feet, and taking a book which was lying on the desk, gave it to Dan. "Now you can tell him, when he asks you, that I obeyed him to the last, faithfully and sacredly." A listening expression flashed into her face, and she inclined her body to the door. With feverish haste she ran down stairs and into the street; but returned presently, muttering, "She is not come; there's no sign of her;" and resumed her station by the side of the bed.