"Van Zandt, I am sorry for you, upon my word!" he said, feelingly. "I used all my eloquence, but I have failed. She gave me this note for you," he added, thrusting the slip of paper into Eliot's hand. He took it in a dazed, lifeless way, opened it slowly, and read the words written in an elegant flowing hand, very different from the cramped, childish one in which Una had penned her farewell to him five years ago. "Oh, forgive me," it ran, "but I can not see you now, or ever again in this world. What I wrote you when I left you five years ago remains unchanged. There is a barrier between us cruel as the grave. You must seek freedom from the nominal tie that binds you to me. Then you will forget me and find happiness with some woman more blessed by fate than I have been. For me, I shall convince you that our separation is irrevocable by returning at once to New Orleans, there to enter a convent and take the veil for life. UNA." The cruel letter fell from his hand, and staggering heavily forward, Eliot dropped into a chair and bowed his face on the table. "Van Zandt!" exclaimed the banker. There was no reply. Rushing to Eliot's side, he lifted his head from the table, and it fell again heavily. The young man's overwrought feelings had culminated in momentary unconsciousness. A sharp peal of the bell brought the servants rushing to the scene, but not so soon but that Mr. Chesterton heard a gasp of terror from behind the curtains that divided the library from a pretty little parlor. Poor Una had crept in there for one stolen glimpse of the face of her beloved. The banker saw the lovely, frightened face peering around the curtain, and said, sharply: "Mrs. Van Zandt, I fear you have killed your husband!" With a stifled wail, she rushed forward and flung herself on her knees beside Eliot's unconscious form, catching his limp hands in both her warm, trembling white ones. "Dead! Oh, no, no, Mr. Chesterton, do not charge me with such cruelty!" she cried, gazing with straining eyes into that pale, handsome face. Her touch, her voice, her gaze, seemed to recall him to life, for suddenly his eyes opened wide on that lovely face. A cry of dismay broke from her lips, and dropping his hands, she rushed through the curtains and disappeared just as two servants entered at the other door. "Bring water and wine," said the banker. "This gentleman is ill." Both disappeared at once, and Eliot Van Zandt struggled up to a sitting posture, gazing wildly around the room. "Una--she was here!" he murmured, faintly. "She has gone," Mr. Chesterton answered, gravely. "Drink this wine, Van Zandt, it will revive you." "No; the water, please." He swallowed a few drops, and rose to go in spite of Mr. Chesterton's entreaties that he would stay until he was better.