his remembrance of her as expressed by his gift.

"I observe a passage in your letter to which I have not yet
replied. You ask me if there was any more serious reason for the
persistent hiding of her face under the veil than the reason
which she was accustomed to give to the persons about her. It is
true that she suffered under a morbid sensitiveness to the action
of light. It is also true that this was not the only result, or
the worst result, of the malady that afflicted her. She had
another reason for keeping her face hidden--a reason known to two
persons only: to the doctor who lives in the village near her
father's house, and to myself. We are both pledged never to
divulge to any living creature what our eyes alone have seen. We
have kept our terrible secret even from her father; and we shall
carry it with us to our graves. I have no more to say on this
melancholy subject to the person in whose interest you write.
When he thinks of her now, let him think of the beauty which no
bodily affliction can profane--the beauty of the freed spirit,
eternally happy in its union with the angels of God.

"I may add, before I close my letter, that the poor old father
will not be left in cheerless solitude at the lak e house. He
will pass the remainder of his days under my roof, with my good
wife to take care of him, and my children to remind him of the
brighter side of life."


So the letter ended. I put it away, and went out. The solitude of
my room forewarned me unendurably of the coming solitude in my
own life. My interests in this busy world were now narrowed to
one object--to the care of my mother's failing health. Of the two
women whose hearts had once beaten in loving sympathy with mine,
one lay in her grave and the other was lost to me in a foreign
land. On the drive by the sea I met my mother, in her little
pony-chaise, moving slowly under the mild wintry sunshine. I
dismissed the man who was in attendance on her, and walked by the
side of the chaise, with the reins in my hand. We chatted quietly
on trivial subjects. I closed my eyes to the dreary future that
was before me, and tried, in the intervals of the heart-ache, to
live resignedly in the passing hour.

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE PHYSICIAN'S OPINION.

SIX months have elapsed. Summer-time has come again.

The last parting is over. Prolonged by my care, the days of my
mother's life have come to their end. She has died in my arms:
her last words have been spoken to me, her last look on earth has
been mine. I am now, in the saddest and plainest meaning of the
words, alone in the world.

The affliction which has befallen me has left certain duties to
be performed that require my presence in London. My house is let;
I am staying at a hotel. My friend, Sir James (also in London on
business), has rooms near mine. We breakfast and dine together in
my sitting-room. For the moment solitude is dreadful to me, and
yet I cannot go into society; I shrink from persons who are mere
acquaintances. At Sir James's suggestion, however, one visitor at
the hotel has been asked to dine with us, who claims distinction
as no ordinary guest. The physician who first warned me of the
critical state of my mother's health is anxious to hear what I
can tell him of her last moments. His time is too precious to be
wasted in the earlier hours of the day, and he joins us at the
dinner-table when his patients leave him free to visit his
friends.

The dinner is nearly at an end. I have made the effort to
preserve my self-control; and in few words have told the simple
story of my mother's last peaceful days on earth. The
conversation turns next on topics of little interest to me: my
mind rests after the effort that it has made; my observation is
left free to exert itself as usual.

Little by little, while the talk goes on, I observe something in
the conduct of the celebrated physician which first puzzles me,
and then arouses my suspicion of some motive for his presence
which has not been acknowledged, and in which I am concerned.

Over and over again I discover that his eyes are resting on me
with a furtive interest and attention which he seems anxious to
conceal. Over and over again I notice that he contrives to divert
the conversation from general topics, and to lure me into talking
of myself; and, stranger still (unless I am quite mistaken), Sir
James understands and encourages him. Under various pretenses I
am questioned about what I have suffered in the past, and what
plans of life I have formed for the future. Among other subjects
of personal interest to me, the subject of supernatural
appearances is introduced. I am asked if I believe in occult
spiritual sympathies, and in ghostly apparitions of dead or
distant persons. I am dexterously led into hinting that my views
on this difficult and debatable question are in some degree
influenced by experiences of my own. Hints, however, are not
enough to satisfy the doctor's innocent curiosity; he tries to
induce me to relate in detail what I have myself seen and felt.
But by this time I am on my guard; I make excuses; I steadily
abstain from taking my friend into my confidence. It is more and
more plain to me that I am being made the subject of an
experiment, in which Sir James and the physician are equally


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