“What could I do?  I had to look out for myself.  He gave me a page from an old letter as a sample of the handwriting.  It was Mary Barntree’s writing; oh, I knew it well.  I had it perfect in a few minutes.  You know—­I had a rare trick with the pen in those days—­before this cough got me, and my hand got shaky.  The note I wrote for him was a mere line.  ’Meet me at Beasley’s Old Place at three,’ with her initial signed.  That was all.  But he had a sheet of her own special note paper for me to write on (no, I don’t know where he got it!) and of course he knew—­like we all knew—­how fond the two of you were of lovers’ walks out on the cliffs.

“Do you remember how you got that note?  Oh, he was a slick devil.  He thought of everything.  Abel Horn brought it to you—­remember?  He told you, with a wink and a grin, that it was from a lady—­but he didn’t say what lady.  Remember?  Well, Beulah had given him the note, and told him to say that—­not to mention names.  Abel was a good fellow; he wouldn’t gossip. He knew that.

“That wasn’t the only note he had written.  He made Beulah write one, too, addressed to Mary, and asking her to come to the Old Place, and be secret about it.  Ah, now you understand?  But—­I swear I didn’t know what he was leading up to.  No, I didn’t.  I thought it was—­well, all’s fair in love, you know.  And I had to do what he said, I had to!

“Poor little Beulah had to do what he said, too.  I only feared him, but she loved and feared him both.  He owned her completely.  He had made her into a regular echo of himself.  She didn’t want to, she cried about it, but she had to do what he said.

“Mary came, as he knew she would.  Didn’t she have the kindest heart in the country?  And there he was, with Beulah, with his eyes on her, and his soft, sly words making her lie seem more true.  I heard it all.  I was upstairs.  He placed me there, in case Mary didn’t believe; then I was to come in and tell about seeing you and Beulah together in Boston, and how she begged me to bring her home.  But—­for God’s sake!—­I didn’t do it.  I didn’t have to.  Mary believed.  How could she help believing—­the gossip, and poor little Beulah sobbing out her story.  Beulah said it was you who got the best of her.  She didn’t want to say it, she faltered and choked on the lie, but his eyes were on her, and his voice urged her, and so she had to say it.  The very way she carried on made the lie seem true.

“Well, Mary did just what he expected her to do.  She promised to help Beulah; she told Beulah she would make you make amends.  Then she rushed out of the house and met you coming along the cliff road—­coming along all spruced up, and with the look about you of one going to meet a lady.  Just as he planned.