“You are abroad now; but I have kept trace of you through all these years. Once or twice your letters have reached me. I know that you have won a high place among men of genius; that your guardianship will be an honor to this proud girl; that even for my own delicate Ruth you will have some fatherly kindness. Am I wrong in asking this? I think not. You are the only friend of the old time that I have left. In our school days, we loved each other; in our manhood the feeling grew and strengthened. After my death, if that should come, you will be mindful of the old love, and kind to those I leave behind me. “One thing you will remember. My wife has the clothes, the coral, and the India shawl, in which little Eva was wrapped that night. She will give them to you, reluctantly, I dare say; no misfortune will ever make her willing to part with the girl; but she will remember my charge, and give them up, at your request. Perhaps they will lead to something in your hands. “Why do I write this now, after so many years of silence? I cannot answer. But this evening, a strange, dark presentiment came over me, and I was impelled to place Eva’s story on paper. It can do no harm. My wife will keep it safe till you come, if I am doomed. Doomed! How absurd all this seems in a man of perfect health and more than ordinary strength. It is strange and wild, but troubled times are coming upon the land, times when these death shadows will not be confined to one man. Yet, somehow, I feel with mournful solemnity, that, after I am dead, you will get this paper, and act upon it in behalf of your old friend, “LEONARD LAURENCE.” CHAPTER XXV. THE PAWNBROKER. Ross never took his gaze from the paper until he had read it through: then he folded the pages back and reperused every word, with a burning, eager question in the eyes, that seemed to devour each syllable as it arose to view. The perusal had left him pale to the lips. He held the pages with a firm, hard grip, as if he feared they would escape him, long after he had mastered their contents. Then he arose, and began to pace the floor, with a slow, heavy tread, pondering over many things in his mind, with a restless burning of the eyes that bespoke a storm at the heart. How was he to appease this craving curiosity? In what way was he to arrive at the truth regarding this girl, whose future had been placed in his hands, by the document still clutched, tightly, there? Laurence was right. Herman Ross was not a man to falter in a case like this. If the girl had claims, he was resolved to search them out, and maintain them after they were found. But something more exciting than mere determination—an almost frenzied wish to learn the whole truth possessed the man. All the proofs that existed he would have at once. Suspense was more than he could bear.