Seizing my hands, she actually fell on her knees before me, flashing into my eyes all the loveliness of her pallid, upturned face.

“It was not a coincidence!” she passionately sobbed.  “Why can’t you be frank with me, and tell me how it is that I have killed him?  He said long ago—­do you not remember?—­that I was fatal to him.  He was getting better—­you yourself said so—­till I came, and then he died.”

What could I reply?  The girl was uttering the thoughts which had haunted me for days.

I tried to smile a reassurance, and raising her as gently as I could, I led her back to her chair.  It was on my part a feeble performance.

“You are suffering from a nervous crisis,” I said, “and I must prescribe for you.  My first prescription is that we do not talk about Alresca’s death.”

I endeavored to be perfectly matter-of-fact in tone, and gradually she grew calmer.

“I have not slept since that night,” she murmured wearily.  “Then you will not tell me?”

“What have I to tell you, except that you are ill?  Stop a moment.  I have an item of news, after all.  Poor Alresca has made me his heir.”

“That was like his kind heart.”

“Yes, indeed.  But I can’t imagine why he did it!”

“It was just gratitude,” said she.

“A rare kind of gratitude,” I replied.

“Is no reason given in the will?”

“Not a word.”

I remembered the packet which I had just received from the lawyer, and I mentioned it to her.

“Open it now,” she said.  “I am interested—­if you do not think me too inquisitive.”

I tore the envelope.  It contained another envelope, sealed, and a letter.  I scanned the letter.

“It is nothing,” I said with false casualness, and was returning it to my pocket.  The worst of me is that I have no histrionic instinct; I cannot act a part.

“Wait!” she cried sharply, and I hesitated before the appeal in her tragic voice.  “You cannot deceive me, Mr. Foster.  It is something.  I entreat you to read to me that letter.  Does it not occur to you that I have the right to demand this from you?  Why should he beat about the bush?  You know, and I know that you know, that there is a mystery in this dreadful death.  Be frank with me, my friend.  I have suffered much these last days.”

We looked at each other silently, I with the letter in my hand.  Why, indeed, should I treat her as a child, this woman with the compelling eyes, the firm, commanding forehead?  Why should I pursue the silly game of pretence?

“I will read it,” I said.  “There is, certainly, a mystery in connection with Alresca’s death, and we may be on the eve of solving it.”

The letter was dated concurrently with Alresca’s will—­that is to say, a few days before our arrival in Bruges—­and it ran thus: