‘I wanted to tell you,’ Amy wrote to her mother in the note left on her dressing table.  ’I wanted to tell you and be married at home, but Mr. Hastings would not allow it.  It would create trouble, he said, between himself and Mr. Tracy, who I may confess to you in confidence, asked me twice to be his wife, and when I refused, without giving him a reason, for I dared not tell him of my love for his friend, he was so angry and behaved so strangely, and there was such a look in his eyes, that I was afraid of him, and it was this fear, I think, which made me willing to go away secretly with Harold and be married in New York.  We are going to Europe; shall sail to-morrow morning at nine o’clock in the Scotia.  The marriage ceremony will be performed before we go on board.  I shall write as soon as we reach Liverpool.  You must forgive me, mother, and I am sure you would not blame me, if you knew how much I love Mr. Hastings.  I know he is poor, and that I might be mistress of Tracy Park, but I love Harold best.  It is ten o’clock, and the train, you know, passes at eleven; so I must say good-bye.

    ’Yours lovingly,

    ’Amy Crawford, now, but when you read this,

    ‘Amy Hastings.’

This was Amy’s letter which her mother found upon entering her room after waiting more than an hour for her daughter’s appearance at the breakfast, which they always took by themselves.  To say that she was shocked and astonished would but faintly portray the state of her mind as she read that her beautiful young daughter had gone with Harold Hastings, whom she had never liked, for though he was handsome, and agreeable, and gentlemanly as a rule, she knew him to be thoroughly selfish and indolent, and she trembled for her daughter’s happiness when a little time had quenched the ardor of his passion.  Added to this was another thought which made her brain reel for a moment an she thought what might have been.  Arthur Tracy had wished to make Amy his wife, and mistress of Tracy Park, which she would have graced so well, for in all the town there was not a fairer, sweeter girl than Amy Crawford, or one better beloved.

It did not matter that she was poor, and her mother was only a housekeeper.  She had never felt a slight on that account, and had been reared as carefully and tenderly as the daughters of the rich, and if away down, in her mother’s heart there had been a half defined hope that some time the master of Tracy Park might turn his attention to her, it had been hidden so closely that Mrs. Crawford scarcely knew of it herself until she learned what her daughter was and what she might have been.  But it was too late now.  There was no turning back the wheels of fate.

Forcing herself to be as calm as possible, she took the note to Arthur, who had breakfasted alone, and was waiting impatiently in the library for the appearance of his friend.

‘Lazy dog!’ Mrs. Crawford heard him say, as she approached the open door.  ’Does he think he has nothing to do but to sleep?  We were to start by this time, and he in bed yet!’