“Trevanion, it is not any doubt of you. But, in the first place, I don’t know where to find her, and then--she did not disclose herself to me. I found her out by accident. Have I any right to dispose of her secret? I will tell you everything I know,” he added hastily, in answer to the look and gesture, almost of despair, which John could not restrain. “Last night your friend, young Hamerton, was talking--injudiciously, I think”--there was a little sweetness to him in saying this, even in the midst of real sympathy and interest--“he was talking of what was going on in your house. I had already seen some one walking about the garden whose appearance I seemed to recollect. When Hamerton mentioned your name” (he was anxious that this should be made fully evident), “she heard it; and by and by I perceived that some one was listening, behind you, just there, in the laurels.” John started up and turned round, gazing at the motionless, glistening screen of leaves, as if she might still be there. After a moment--“And what then?” “Not much more. I spoke to her afterwards. She asked me, for the love of God, to bring her news, and I promised--what I could--for to-night.” John Trevanion held out his hand, and gave that of Rivers a strong pressure. “Come out with me to Bonport. You must hear everything, and perhaps you can advise me. I am determined to put an end to the situation somehow, whatever it may cost,” he said. CHAPTER LV. The two men went out to Bonport together, and on the way John Trevanion, half revolted that he should have to tell it, half relieved to talk of it to another man, and see how the matter appeared to a person unconcerned, with eyes clear from prepossession of any kind, either hostile or tender, gave his companion all the particulars of his painful story. It was a relief; and Rivers, who had been trained for the bar, gave it at once as his opinion that the competent authorities would not hesitate to set such a will aside, or at least, on proof that no moral danger would arise to the children, would modify its restrictions greatly. “Wills are sacred theoretically; but there has always been _a power of_ revision,” he said. And he suggested practical means of bringing this point to a trial--or at least to the preliminary trial of counsel’s advice, which gave his companion great solace. “I can see that we all acted like fools,” John Trevanion confessed, with a momentary over-confidence that his troubles might be approaching an end. “We were terrified for the scandal, the public discussion, that would have been sure to rise--and no one so much as she. Old Blake was all for the sanctity of the will, as you say, and I--I was so torn in two with doubts and--miseries--” “But I presume,” Rivers said, “these have all been put to rest. There has been a satisfactory explanation--”