Francis now left me, and if I had little inclination to sleep before, I had less now. All the strange incidents of the story seemed to revolve round myself; though my part in it seemed merely the result of chance, I appeared to myself somehow as a directly-appointed agent for working out some design of Providence. Yet what I was required to do I did not know. I cogitated and recogitated, and came to no conclusion as to how I should act; only I saw no great benefit in the meantime in endeavouring to make any use of the pamphlet for the purpose of recovering the aberrant reason of the poor lady. At length I fell asleep, and next morning awoke to the strange recollections of what had occurred so shortly before. I saw Amelia again; she was depressed and moody; the fiend within her was dormant, but its weight pressed on the issues of thought, and her vacant stare told unutterable woe. I left Redcleugh without much hope, intending to pay another visit shortly afterwards. About three or four days after reaching home, a letter came to me from Francis, inclosing one from Mr. Gordon, the latter of which contained the intelligence that there had been some mistake as to the report of Mr. Bernard's death. A gentleman of the same name had died at Aleppo, but the master of Redcleugh was still alive. A gleam of the sunshine of hope darted through my mind. The dark images of the story were illumined--even the figure of that poor lady enshrined in the gloom of sorrow became bright with lustrous, meaning, intelligent eyes. Within an hour I had a letter posted for Mr. Gordon, informing him of the finding of the pamphlet, and requesting him to send for Mr. Bernard by an express messenger.