‘Nonsense, Phil! I won’t have you do anything romantic and ridiculous. This is a big place, and you will want a lot of money to keep it up. As long as you are not married, I’ll live here and keep house for you; and when you marry, I’ll beg, borrow, or steal one of those dear little cottages at the end of the park, and live there on the remains of my fortune; and you shall keep a horse for me here, and ride out with me once or twice a week; and I’ll stay there an old maid, until somebody as nice as you turns up and makes love to me, and then I’ll marry him. But,’ and here she heaved a melodramatic sigh, ‘I’m afraid there is nobody else in the world half as nice as you.’ ‘Of course not,’ he answered, smiling. ‘Now sit down, Maud, and let us be sensible for once. I do want to find out, if I can, why Mrs. Belassis cribbed that paper. She must have had a motive, and a strong one. She would not have done anything quite so suspicious without.’ ‘That’s true,’ assented Maud; and she returned to a minute examination of the paper. After turning it round and round several times, she proceeded to unfold it, and then her eyes opened wide with a look of comprehension. ‘Look here, Phil! She has been rubbing something out. There was something written in pencil on the inside. What was it?’ Tor looked over her shoulder, and saw plain traces of careful erasure. He pulled at his moustache, and whistled under his breath. ‘By Jove! So she has!’ ‘What was it, Phil?’ asked Maud eagerly. ‘What had old Uncle Maynard written there?’ ‘I don’t know, Maud. I had never unfolded the paper. It never occurred to me that there was writing on the inside.’ ‘No,’ said Maud slowly. ‘I don’t suppose it did. Men are never curious, and there isn’t anything to make anyone turn over. I wonder what it was. Something important, of course, or Aunt Celia would not have troubled to run a risk for it.’ All three faces were grave. Tor felt that through an unconscious blunder of his, some distinct damage might have been done to Phil, though how or why he could not tell. It was not easy to see what harm could ensue from neglect of a few pencilled words—added quite as an afterthought to the letter; but at the same time, Mrs. Belassis’ conduct had made it evident that importance did attach to them; and Tor was disturbed at this discovery. It was useless, however, to try to conjecture what the last message could have been, and lamentations over the casualty were equally purposeless. Tor had some dim hope that he might surprise the truth from one or other of the Belassis’ at some later date, but at present silence was their only course. Maud talked herself sleepy, and went to bed; Mrs. Lorraine was about to follow her example, when Tor asked her to remain a little while longer, as he had something of importance he wished to say to her.