This blotting-book, with the same listless, aimless action, Mrs. Wilders presently turned to, and turned over the leaves one by one.

Between two of them she came upon a letter, left there by accident, or to be answered perhaps that day.

The feminine instinct of curiosity Mrs. Wilders possessed in no common degree.  To look at the letter thus exposed, however unworthy the action, was a temptation such a woman could not resist.  She began to read it, almost as a matter of course, but carelessly, and with no set purpose, as though it was little likely to contain matter that would interest her.  But after the first few lines its perusal deeply absorbed her.  A few lines more, and she closed the book, leaving her hand inside, and looked round the cabin.

Mr. Loftus and his assistants were still busily engaged upon their official task.  Neither of them was paying the slightest attention to her.

With the hand still concealed inside the blotter, she folded up this missive which seemed so interesting and important, and, having thus got it into a small compass, easily and quickly transferred it to her pocket.

She looked anxiously round, fearing she might have been observed.  But no one had noticed her, and presently, when Mr. Loftus had completed his work, they again left the yacht for the shore.

So soon as Mrs. Wilders regained the privacy of her own room at Misseri’s, which was not till late in the day, she took out the letter she had laid hands on in the cabin of the yacht, and read it through slowly and carefully.

It was from Lord Lydstone’s father, dated at Essendine Towers, the principal family-seat.

“My dear boy,” so it ran, “your mother and I are very grateful to you for your very full and deeply interesting letter, with its ample, but most distressing, account of our dear Anastasius.  It is a proud, but melancholy, satisfaction to know that he has maintained the traditions of the family, and bled, like many a Wilders before him, for his country’s cause.  His condition must, however, be a constant and trying anxiety, and I beseech you, more particularly on your mother’s account, to keep us speedily informed of his progress.  It is some consolation to think that you are by his side, and it is only right that you should remain at Constantinople so long as your brother is in any danger.

“But do not, my dear boy, linger long in the East.  We want you back with us at home.  This is your proper place—­you who are our eldest born, heir to the title and estates—­you should be here at my side.  There are other urgent reasons why you should return.  You know how anxious we are that you should marry and settle in life.  We are doubly so now.  Your brothers before this hateful war broke out made the succession, humanly speaking, almost secure.  But the chances of a campaign are unhappily most uncertain.  Anastasius has been struck down; we may lose him, which Heaven forbid; a Russian bullet may rob us any day of dear Hugo too.  In such a dire and grievous calamity, you alone—­only one single, precious life—­would remain to keep the title in our line.  Do not, I beseech you, suffer it to continue thus.  Come home; marry, my son; give us another generation of descendants, and assure the succession.