Sir Harold groaned heavily. “And they are at Hawkhurst now?” he said, in a voice so altered that Atkins hardly recognized it. “No; they have been away for a month.” “You understand that all these charges are not proved against Lady Wynde?” said Sir Harold. “I shall take my wife back again, Atkins, if she will come, and I will stand between her and the censure of a gossipping world.” “Did you write from India the night before you disappeared, enjoining your daughter by her love for you to marry the son of Craven Black?” demanded Atkins abruptly. “No; how should I? I don’t know Craven Black, nor his son.” Atkins went to his desk, and took out a letter. “Read that, Sir Harold,” he said, returning and presenting it to the baronet. “Lady Wynde gave that letter to Miss Wynde, telling her that it was your last letter to your daughter, written upon the eve of your supposed death.” Sir Harold read the letter to the very end, an awful sternness gathering on his countenance. The tender epithets by which he had called his daughter, his particular modes of speech, and his own phraseology, in that skillfully forged letter staggered him. “I never wrote it,” he said briefly. “It is a forgery!” “Of course. I knew that. But Lady Wynde gave it to Miss Neva, declaring it to be your last letter.” “Who is this Rufus Black?” “A weak-souled, kindly young fellow, the son of a villain, and a ready instrument in the hands of his father. He loves Miss Neva, and proposed to her. She, however, loves Lord Towyn--” “Lord Towyn! My old college-mate?” “No; his son. Arthur has come into the title and property, and is as noble a young man as any in England. Miss Neva favored him, and the result is, Lady Wynde and Craven Black conceived a hatred of your daughter, and determined to bend her to their will. Sir Harold, as God hears me, Lady Wynde is a wicked, unscrupulous woman.” Sir Harold’s face was deathly white. The letter, still held in his trembling hands, was proof of his wife’s wickedness, and he began to be convinced that he had been cruelly deceived by an unprincipled woman. “It would have been better if I had died in India!” he moaned. “Not so. Sir Harold, there is more to hear. Can you bear another blow?” Sir Harold bowed; he was too broken to speak. “A month ago, Lady Wynde, with her new husband and Miss Wynde, went away, ostensibly to Wynde Heights. But they did not go there. A letter came from Brussels to Lord Towyn, purporting to be from Miss Wynde, but Lord Towyn went to Brussels, and discovered that the young lady and her enemies have not been there. We have had detectives at work for weeks; Lord Towyn is at work day and night scarcely knowing rest, and I have done all that I could, but the fact remains. Craven Black and his wife have abducted Miss Wynde, and God alone, besides her enemies, knows where she is.” The baronet leaped to his feet. “Neva missing!” he cried.