"Why remind me of my misfortunes, Miss Windsor?"
"Come and help me, then."
"I wish I might be your helpmate forever," he said. She turned and looked at him, slightly disconcerted, and then said: "I was wrong. The women of to-day need no help from any one."
She gave the beam a strong wrench, as though to vindicate her assertion. It yielded and disclosed a kind of box or recess set into the wall. She plunged therein her hand, and drew forth a handsome sword of rich and subtle workmanship and antique design. "There," she cried, "am I not right?"
Maggie took it to the light. Around the hilt was wrapped a scroll, which she was about to read, when, with a sudden fancy, she paused and said, "What am I doing? These are family secrets, and meant, perhaps, only for your eyes, Lord Brompton."
"Read it, I beg," said he. She obeyed him. In a faint, feminine hand, which resembled a field of corn bowed by the wind, were written these words:
"My grandfather's sword. Marian Ripon."
"The ghost—it is the ghost's own work," they cried together.
"And this sword," said he, "belonged to my namesake, the cavalier."
"But look—look." Maggie had been staring at the opposite side of the paper.