For hours longer the conversation ran on Roland Bayard and the net of circumstances that had caught him in this perilous false position. They were still talking when the two gentlemen returned, and reported that they had found comfortable lodgings for the travelers, who might take possession of their new quarters that evening. “Where is Abel Force?” inquired the captain, as they all went down to luncheon. “Papa sent word down that he did not need luncheon, but would join us at dinner in the evening,” replied Odalite. And they began the meal. And meanwhile where was Abel Force? CHAPTER XXIII TOO GREAT A BURDEN Abel Force went into the little room he had engaged, adjoining the sick chamber of his wife. It was no more than a closet, and had evidently been used as a dressing room attached to the large chamber before the exigencies of war had rendered space in the house too valuable for the little place to be used for any purpose but a bedroom. It was furnished very simply, with an iron bedstead, a washstand with a glass above it, a single chair, and half a dozen wooden pegs on the door to hang clothes. Mr. Force turned the back of the only chair to the window that was opposite the door and overlooked the yard; and he sat down and drew the packet he had taken from his wife’s room, and again looked at the superscription. Yes, it was directed in a firm hand to: “Abel Force, Esq.” It was tied up with cord and sealed with wax. But under the cord a little note had been slipped, and this also was addressed—but in a weak and tremulous hand—to: “Abel Force, Esq.” He opened the note to read it. It was without date; yet he felt sure that it must have been written on that very morning before the sudden fall of the woman had prevented her flight. The note ran as follows: “The hour has come when I must drop the mask of deceit and show myself in my true colors—a living lie, a hypocrite, though never, never happy in falsehood and hypocrisy. Your love and trust have wounded and tortured me; the reverence of children has humiliated me. No, never for a moment happy or at ease in my disguise. It is almost a relief now to throw it off and reveal myself as I am, even though the revelation must banish me from your presence and my children’s forever in this world, and perhaps in the next. Yet, I repeat, it is a relief to throw off the disguise which has suffocated me like a heavy cloak these many years; and has been more than that—has been like Medea’s robe of fire for the last few years since Anglesea’s first visit to us.