She shrunk back; she held up her hands with an expression of horror. My God! that look in Eleanor's eyes was enough to kill me. I turned away as hastily as I had come. As I stumbled along the passage, half blind with the terrible surging and throbbing of the blood through me, a soft pair of arms fell about my neck, a cheek wet with tears was pressed to mine--it was Mary. "Never mind what they say about you, Richard," she sobbed. "I don't believe one word of it--not one word! I never shall. I am your friend. I love you; indeed I do. _I_ do not want you to go away," and she kissed me twice or thrice. I took the sweet face in my cold hands, looked into the brimming eyes, hastily kissed the blushing cheek--"God bless you, Mary," said I, and was gone. END OF THE PART FIRST. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ THE DEAD LETTER. PART II. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER I. THE LETTER. The reader can now understand why it was that I turned cold with excitement as I sat there in the dead-letter office, holding the time-stained epistle in my hand. Every word burned itself into my brain. Obscure as it was--non-committal--directed to an unknown person of a neighboring village--I yet felt _assured_ that those vague hints had reference to the sinful tragedy which had occurred October 17th, 1857. Here was placed in my hands--at last!--a clue to that mystery which I had once sworn to unravel. Yet, how slender was the clue, which might, after all, lead me into still profounder labyrinths of doubt and perplexity! As I pondered, it seemed to break and vanish in my fingers. Yet, I felt, in spite of this, an inward sense _that I held the key which was surely to unlock the awful secret_. I can never rightly express the feelings which, for the first few moments, overpowered me. My body was icy cold, but my soul stung and stirred me as with fire, and seemed to rise on "budding wings" of flame with conviction of a speedy triumph which was to come after long suffering. I arose, clutched my hat, and went forth from the Department, to return to it no more, for the present. Half the night I sat in my room at my boarding-place, looking at that letter on the table before me.