Beatrice Sinclair—that was I. I felt trembling with excitement, all the strangeness of the last three days had got into a focus. This picture of which the name was drawn round with red was what Wilder had sent me down to see. I was going to see my own portrait, of that I felt certain. But stay, there was something more to be read.
"Gerald Wilder slew Beatrice Sinclair in a fit of passion. Why, it was never discovered. They were engaged to be married. He destroyed himself with the poisoned wine which he had given to her, drinking it from the same cup."
This was written in Wilder's scraggy hand-writing.
"Ha!" thought I, "so Gerald Wilder slew me in some past life; well, I don't bear him any grudge, he must have been a horribly wicked man though, for all that. Now, I'll ring for the butler to show me this picture."
I rang, and the old fellow came.
"Get a lamp, please. I wish to look at the picture gallery."
"The picture gallery, ma'am."
"Yes."
"It's very dark, ma'am, at this hour. Hadn't you better wait till morning?"