But where could she have met this man, whom she had married almost immediately on landing in England?  Cecil looked again at the address—­“Right Honourable Lord Bromley.”  She had heard that name somewhere, but could not recall any connecting associations.

Harry lingered some time, his life frequently despaired of; and he would probably have succumbed had it not been for the untiring energy and care of the hospital nurse.  Her anxiety could not have been exceeded by Bluebell herself, for Cecil’s disposition was generous, and she never more truly forgave her ci-devant enemy than when thus labouring to return good for evil.

At last the turning-point was reached and Dutton lifted from the very gates of the grave.  A wound in his leg was now the chief retarding circumstance; and as it seemed incapable of healing at Scutari, he was ordered on sick leave to England.

In the mean time, a lively friendship had arisen between him and Cecil.  Directly she admitted her name and former intimacy with Bluebell, Harry took her entirely into his confidence, and, encouraged by the evident interest with which she listened, related how he had first met and fallen in love with Bluebell on the steamer, and subsequently persuaded her to elope with him.

He did not deny the interested motives which had afterwards induced him to conceal the marriage; but Cecil’s upright mind recoiled at the unworthy deception, and the strong view she took of it made short work of the extenuating circumstances advanced by Harry.

The dying appeal to Lord Bromley had, of course, been burnt since its writer’s recovery; but Dutton, now thoroughly ashamed of his shabby policy, vowed to Cecil that he would abandon all thoughts of inheritance, and boldly acknowledge his marriage to Lord Bromley as soon as he should set foot in England.

This was their last interview; for, as he had now approached convalescence, she had no further excuse for ministering to Harry.

It was some time since he had received tidings from his wife, having purposely kept her in ignorance when he volunteered into Peel’s brigade.  Then he was wounded and laid up at Scutari, so whatever letters she might have written would be on board the “Druid.”

Now he must apprise her of his approaching return and explain his long silence.  As it happened, a homeward-bound steamer sailed within a few days of the one which carried this letter, and Dutton, obtaining a passage in the former, which happened to the faster of the two, arrived in England almost simultaneously.

Without further notice, he rushed down to Wimbledon, and, had she been there, would speedily have solved the mystery that had so exercised Mrs. Markham.  But, lo! on reaching Heatherbrae, he beheld with a sinking heart a conspicuous board on the garden-gate, with the words, “To be let, furnished,” legibly inscribed thereon.