“Deer Miss:  I see your name agin in a Denver paper what Bill brought out frum town ternight, an read thar that you wus goin ter play a piece in Chicago.  I aint seen yer name in ther papers afore fer a long time.  So I thot I ’d write yer a line, cause Bill thinks yer never got it straight bout ther way Biff Farnham died.  He ses thet you an Mister Winston hes got ther whol affair all mixed up, an that maybe it’s a keepin ther two of yer sorter sore on each other.  Now, I dont wanter butt in none in yer affairs, an then agin it aint overly plisent fer me to make a clean breast ov it this way on paper.  Not that I ’m afeard, er nothin, only it dont just look nice.  No more do I want enything whut I did ter be makin you fokes a heep o trouble.  That aint my style.  I reckon I must a bin plum crazy whin I did it, fer I wus mighty nigh that fer six months after—­et least Bill ses so.  But it wus me all right whut killed Farnham.  It wan’t no murder es I see it, tho I was huntin him all right, fer he saw me furst, an hed his gun out, when I let drive.  Enyhow, he got whut wus comin ter him, an I aint got no regrets.  We’re a doin all right out yere now, me an Bill—­ther claim is payin big, but I never aint got over thinkin bout Mercedes.  I shore loved her, an I do yit.  You was awful good to her, an I reckon she ’d sorter want me to tell you jist how it wus.  Hopin this will clar up som ov them troubles between you an Mister Winston, I am Yours with respects,

“WILLIAM BROWN.”

Winston stood there in silence, yet holding the paper in his hand.  Almost timidly she glanced up at him across the back of the chair.

“And you have never suspected who I was until to-night?”

“No, never; I had always thought of Bob’s sister as a mere child.”

She arose to her feet, taking a single step toward him.

“I can only ask you to forgive me,” she pleaded anxiously, her eyes uplifted.  “That is all I can ask.  I ought to be ashamed, I am ashamed, that I could ever have believed it possible for you to commit such a deed.  It seems incredible now that I have so believed.  Yet how could I escape such conviction?  I heard the voices, the shot, and then a man rushed past me through the darkness.  Some rash impulse, a desire to aid, sent me hastily forward.  Scarcely had I bent over the dead body, when some one came toward me from the very direction in which that man had fled.  I supposed he was coming back to make sure of his work, and—­and—­it was you.  Oh, I did not want to believe, but I had to believe.  You acted so strangely toward me, I accepted that as a sign of guilt; it was a horror unspeakable.”

“You thought—­you actually thought I did that?” he asked, hardly trusting his own ears.

“What else could I think?  What else could I think?”

This new conception stunned him, left him staring at her, utterly unable to control his speech.  Should he tell her?  Should he confess his own equally mad mistake? the reason why all these years had passed without his seeking her?  It would be useless; it would only add to her pain, her sense of wounded pride.  Silence now would be mercy.