‘There, read it for yourself,’ Rose exclaimed.
It was as follows:
‘Dear Madame,
‘That pore boy as you took from Sloville, is the true son and heir of Sir Watkin Strahan, go to horspitle in the Boro’ where a woman named Sally is hill. She can prove it—but she can’t live long. Hopin’ this will find you in ’elth as it leaves me at this present time, I am yours most respectfully a sincere friend to the pore boy.’
‘Wentworth,’ said Rose energetically, ‘we must leave here by the first boat to-morrow morning.’
‘What a bore. I suppose we must. And so fades away love in a cottage,’ exclaimed Wentworth, as he went indoors to help his wife to pack up.
CHAPTER XXV.
A REVELATION.
No sooner was Rose in London than she made her way to the hospital indicated in the anonymous note which had been the cause of her and her husband’s unwelcome return to town.
She had never been inside a hospital before. There was something bewildering in its vastness and its antiquity. Close by ran swift the current of City life, ever turbid and boisterous. In there all was calm and still. The one thought that brightened and hallowed the spot was the life that had been saved, especially among the poor, to whom our great hospitals are indeed a blessing and a boon.
‘I want to see a patient in the women’s ward,’ said Rose to the porter, as she alighted at the entrance.
The porter expressed his fear that she had come in vain, unless she had a better clue to identification.