“Ah!  I see you do not,” said Mr. Foster, with a visible sneer.  “Olivia is dead.”

“Olivia dead!” I exclaimed.

I repeated the words mechanically, as if I could not make any meaning out of them.  Yet they had been spoken with such perfect deliberation and certainty that there seemed to be no question about the fact.  Mr. Foster’s glittering eyes dwelt delightedly upon my face.

“You were not aware of it?” he said, “I am afraid I have been too sudden.  Kate tells us you were in love with my first wife, and sacrificed a most eligible match for her.  Would it be too late to open fresh negotiations with your cousin?  You see I know all your family history.”

“When did Olivia die?” I inquired, though my tongue felt dry and parched, and the room, with his fiendish face, was swimming giddily before my eyes.

“When was it, Carry?” he asked, turning to his wife.

“We heard she was dead on the first of October,” she answered.  “You married me the next day.”

“Ah, yes!” he said; “Olivia had been dead to me for more than twelve months and the moment I was free I married her, Dr. Martin.  We could not be married before, and there was no reason to wait longer.  It was quite legal.”

“But what proof have you?” I asked, still incredulous, yet with a heart so heavy that it could hardly rouse itself to hope.

“Carry, have you those letters?” said Richard Foster.

She was away for a few minutes, while he leaned back again in his chair, regarding nic with his half-closed, cruel eyes.  I said nothing, and resolved to betray no emotion.  Olivia dead! my Olivia!  I could not believe it.

“Here are the proofs,” said Mrs. Foster, reentering the room.  She put into my hand an ordinary certificate of death, signed by J. Jones, M.D.  It stated that the deceased, Olivia Foster, had died on September the 27th, of acute inflammation of the lungs.  Accompanying this was a letter written in a good handwriting, purporting to be from a clergyman or minister, of what denomination it was not stated, who had attended Olivia in her fatal illness.  He said that she had desired him to keep the place of her death and burial a secret, and to forward no more than the official certificate of the former event.  This letter was signed E. Jones.  No clew was given by either document as to the place where they were written.

“Are you not satisfied?” asked Foster.

“No,” I replied; “how is it, if Olivia is dead, that you have not taken possession of her property?”

“A shrewd question,” he said, jeeringly.  “Why am I in these cursed poor lodgings?  Why am I as poor as Job, when there are twenty thousand pounds of my wife’s estate lying unclaimed?  My sweet, angelic Olivia left no will, or none in my favor, you may be sure; and by her father’s will, if she dies intestate or without children, his property goes to build almshouses, or some confounded nonsense, in Melbourne.  All she bequeaths to me is this ring, which I gave to her on our wedding-day, curse her!”