“Yes, ma’am; two hours ago, a’most. You knew he was going, didn’t you, ma’am?”
The old man’s curiosity was excited by Eleanor’s look of surprise.
“Didn’t you know as master was a-going to take Miss Mason away to the sea-side for change of air, ma’am?” he asked.
“Yes, yes, I knew that he was going to do so, but not immediately. Did Mr. Monckton leave no message for me?”
“He left a letter, ma’am. It’s on the mantelpiece in the study.”
Eleanor went to her husband’s room with her heart beating high, and her cheeks flushed with indignation against him for the slight he had put upon her. Yes; there was the letter, sealed with his signet-ring. He was not generally in the habit of sealing his letters, so he must have looked upon this as one of some importance. Mrs. Monckton tore open the envelope. She turned pale as she read the first few lines of the letter. It was written over two sheets of note paper, and began thus:—
“Eleanor,—
“When I asked you to be my wife I told you that in my early youth I had been deceived by a woman whom I loved very dearly, though not as dearly as I have since loved you. I told you this, and I implored you to remember my blighted youth, and to have pity upon me. I entreated you to spare me the anguish of a second betrayal, a second awakening from my dream of happiness.
“Surely, if you had not been the most cruel of women, you would have been touched by the knowledge that I had already suffered so bitterly from a woman’s treachery, and you would have had mercy upon me. But you had no mercy. It suited you to come back to this neighbourhood, to be near your former lover, Launcelot Darrell.”
The letter dropped from Eleanor’s hands as she read these words.