The bright sunlight of a December afternoon, ten days after the close of the trial, crowned with a shining halo the heads of Harold Scott Mainwaring and his wife as they stood together in the tower-room at Fair Oaks. But a few hours had elapsed since they had repeated the words of the beautiful marriage service which had made them husband and wife. Their wedding had been, of necessity, a quiet one, only their own party and a few of their American friends being present, for the ocean-liner, then lying in the harbor, but which in a few hours was to bear them homeward, would carry also the bodies of the Mainwaring brothers and of Ralph Mainwaring to their last resting place.
Here, amid the very surroundings where it was written, Harold Mainwaring had just read to his wife his father's letter, penned a few hours before his death. For a few moments neither spoke, then Winifred said brokenly, through fast falling tears,—
"How he loved you, Harold!"
"Yes," he replied, sadly; "and what would I not give for one hour in which to assure him of my love! I would gladly have endured any suffering for his sake, but in the few moments that we stood face to face we met as strangers, and I have had no opportunity to show him my appreciation of his love or my love for him in return."
"Don't think he does not know it," she said, earnestly. "I believe that he now knows your love for him far more perfectly than you know his."
He kissed her tenderly, then drawing from his pocket a memorandum-book, took therefrom a piece of blotter having upon it the impress of some writing. Placing it upon the desk beside the letter, he held a small mirror against it, and Winifred, looking in the mirror, read,
"Your affectionate father,
"HAROLD SCOTT MAINWARING."
Then glancing at the signature to the letter, she saw they were identical. In answer to her look of inquiry, Harold said,—
"I discovered that impress on the blotter on this desk one morning about ten days after the tragedy, and at once recognized it as my father's writing. In a flash I understood the situation; my father himself had returned, had been in these rooms, and had had an interview with his brother! I knew of the marked resemblance between them, and at once questioned, How had that interview ended? Who was the murdered man? Who was the murderer? That was the cause of my trip to England to try to find some light on this subject. I need no words to tell you the agony of suspense that I endured for the next few weeks, and you will understand now why I would not—even to yourself—declare my innocence of the murder of Hugh Mainwaring. I would have bourne any ignominy and dishonor, even death itself, rather than that a breath of suspicion should have been directed against my father's name."
"My hero!" she exclaimed, smiling through her tears; then asked, "When and how did you learn the real facts?"