"That the truth may be revealed and my death-bed repentance accepted of Heaven, I pray, humbly.
"Clarence Stuart, Senior."
Suddenly a cold little hand touched his own.
"I saw you," said Irene, in a low, strange voice. "What does it mean?"
"A great deal, or—— nothing," he answered, in a voice as strange as her own.
She read it slowly over. The fragmentary words and the proud name seemed to burn themselves in on her memory.
"Who is Clarence Stuart?" she asked, wonderingly.
"I intend to find out," he answered. "When I do, I shall tell you, little Irene."
In his heart there was a deadly suspicion of foul play. Who had torn from old Ronald Brooke's hand the letter whose fragmentary ending he grasped within that clenched and stiffened hand? Had there been murder most foul?
He went back and looked attentively at the corpse. It was true there was no sign of violence, but was that the face of one who had died from one instant's terrible heart pang, who must have died before he had realized his pain? No, the face was drawn as if in deadly pain, the open eyes stared wide with horror.