Agnes handed back the letters — so suggestive of the penalty paid already
for his own infatuation by the man who had deserted her! — with feelings
of shame and distress, which made her no fit counsellor for the helpless
woman who depended on her advice.
'The one thing I can suggest,'
she said, after first speaking some
kind words of comfort and hope,
'is that we should consult a person of
greater experience than ours. Suppose I write and ask my
lawyer (who is also my
friend and trustee) to come and advise us to-morrow after his business
hours?'
Emily eagerly and gratefully accepted the suggestion. An hour was
arranged for the meeting on the next day; the correspondence was left
under the care of Agnes; and the courier's wife took her leave.
Weary and heartsick, Agnes lay down on the sofa, to rest and compose
herself. The careful nurse brought in a reviving cup of tea. Her quaint
gossip about herself and her occupations while Agnes had been away,
acted as a relief to her mistress's overburdened mind. They were still
talking quietly, when they were startled by a loud knock at the house
door. Hurried footsteps ascended the stairs. The door of the sitting-room
was thrown open violently; the courier's wife rushed in like a mad woman.
'He's dead! they've murdered him!'
Those wild words were all she could
say. She dropped on her knees at the foot of the sofa — held out her hand
with something clasped in it — and fell back in a swoon.
The nurse, signing to Agnes to open the window, took the necessary
measures to restore the fainting woman.
'What's this?'
she exclaimed.
'Here's a letter in her hand. See what it is, Miss.'
The open envelope was addressed (evidently in a feigned hand-writing)
to 'Mrs. Ferrari.' The post-mark was 'Venice.' The contents of the envelope
were a sheet of foreign note-paper, and a folded enclosure.
On the note-paper, one line only was written. It was again in a
feigned handwriting, and it contained these words:
