Serena's face grew crimson over the reproof, which was certainly well merited. She turned to Bernard Dane.
"My mother and I expect to start for the North to-morrow," she announced. "You have been very kind to us, Mr. Dane, and we are very grateful. Our business here is ended, and—"
She did not finish. The door of the breakfast-room was thrown open, and Mrs. Graves crossed the threshold, looking as pale as if she had just seen a ghost.
"Mr. Dane, oh, Mr. Dane, Miss Beatrix is not here and her bed was not slept in last night! Everything in the room is as usual, only a small hand-bag and some of her plainer clothing are missing. And, if you please, sir, I found this upon the dressing-table."
This was the letter which poor Beatrix had left there addressed to Keith Kenyon.
Pale and trembling with indefinable horror, Keith broke the seal and read these words:
"Keith,—My own, I am going to leave you. With all my heart and soul I love you, but I am going to leave you forever. There is a reason—a bad, black, bitter reason. I can not—dare not write or speak of that now. You will know all too soon, and when you know, your heart will break, as mine has. Do not seek me; I shall be in the very last place that you will think of searching for me. You would as soon think of looking for me alive in the dark and dreary tomb as in the place that is to be my hiding-place hereafter. I have done no wrong, my darling, only in becoming your wife. If I could I would devote all my life, every moment of it, to you, and to making you happy; but fate, cruel and relentless fate, has decreed otherwise, and we must part, never to meet again on earth. I love you with all my heart, but—good-bye. Yours,
"Beatrix."
He read the letter over and over until he knew it by heart, his face as white as the face of a dead man, his eyes full of piteous suffering. Then he arose from the table, the letter clinched in one cold hand, his form shaking like a leaf.
"Uncle Bernard,"—in a low, tremulous voice—"may I see you alone in the library?"