“You don’t believe me! Very well; I cannot help it. The stuff was placed ready for me on the table, and I drank it.”

Mary sighed, but she kept her cool, soft hand pressed upon her sister’s brow.

“Why do you stop here?” said Leo, at last.

“Because I wish to talk to you—to try and be of some help.”

There was a silence which lasted some minutes, and then Leo turned her fierce dark eyes sharply on her sister.

“You have kept back his letters,” she said sternly.

“His letters!”

“Yes; he has written to me since I have been ill.”

Mary shook her head, and Leo gazed full in her eyes to satisfy herself that this was the truth.

“Has he sent to ask how I am?”