"I looked at her left hand. There was no ring on the third finger!
"It was, as you, my son, may have suspected, all a mistake (how costly a one you have yet to learn) on my part. The Edith Rawson who had married was not even any relative of my Edith.
"Within three months, though, the latter was a bride.
"In the midst of all my happiness there was one troubling thought that disturbed me more than anyone knew.
"The prophecy contained in the parchment was coming true!
"I mean that prosperity had been promised me for the five-and-twenty years that would elapse before the child which, according to the message sent me in so mysterious a fashion, had then just been born should reach what was evidently considered by his people his majority. Had I not experienced that prosperity in receiving the unexpected legacy and winning for my wife the woman whom I had believed to have proved false to me? But I felt that twenty-five years was a long time. It was no use worrying about a possible calamity in the distant future. And so I forgot the weird prophecy and my connection with India, and settled down to the four years of bliss that were my portion before you, my son, were born, and my darling, in giving you birth, sacrificed her own dear life.
"That was not prosperity, you will say; and I agree to a certain extent. But if she had not died perhaps I might, and then—if there was anything in the prophecy—the doom of the girl Lilla might have fallen upon her instead of upon me. But to proceed with my actual narrative.
"It was nearly four years after my Edith's death when I received a letter bearing an Indian stamp and a blurred postmark that I was unable to decipher. It was addressed to me at the War Office, with instructions to be forwarded, in a shaky handwriting—the work, probably, of an old man; and the sheet contained in the dirty, thin envelope bore the single word—'Remember!'
"My feelings on receiving this epistle from a world that I had come to hope was dead to me were indescribable. I had learned from Sir Bromley some years before that the police believed Lilla was dead, since another queen had been appointed for the district over which my enchantress had held nominal sway, and thus I had put less belief in the prophecy contained in the parchment letter; but now, with the knowledge that my existence had not been forgotten by the Thugs, a great fear for my life came upon me.
"It was impossible for me to change my name, as my friends would have required some explanation of my conduct, and such explanation I should not feel inclined to give. One thing I could do—I could become a civilian, and give up all connection with the army. This I accordingly did. I took the Manse at Northden, in Yorkshire, managed to persuade people to call me and address me as Squire instead of Major Carrington, dropped the latter title altogether, and as my friends died or were lost sight of, I found as years went by that my connection with the Indian Army or any other army was unknown, or, at any rate, forgotten. The name Carrington I knew was no rare one, and I accordingly hoped that I should never be recognised as the Major Carrington who had visited the Madras opium den, and fallen a victim to the charms of the queen of the Thugs.