Rosa rang, and sent for her little boy.

Mr. Falcon admired his beauty, and said quietly, “I shall keep my vow.”

He then left her, with a promise to come back early next morning with the letter.

She let him go only on those conditions.

As soon as her father came in, she ran to him with this strange story.

“I don’t believe it,” said he.  “It is impossible.”

She showed him the proof, the ruby ring.

Then he became very uneasy, and begged her not to tell a soul.  He did not tell her the reason, but he feared the insurance office would hear of it, and require proofs of Christopher’s decease, whereas they had accepted it without a murmur, on the evidence of Captain Hamilton and the Amphitrite’s log-book.

As for Falcon, he went carefully through Staines’s two letters, and wherever he found a word that suited his purpose, he traced it by the usual process, and so, in the course of a few hours, he concocted a short letter, all the words in which, except three, were facsimiles, only here and there a little shaky; the three odd words he had to imitate by observation of the letters.  The signature he got to perfection by tracing.

He inserted this letter in the original envelope, and sealed it very carefully, so as to hide that the seal had been tampered with.

Thus armed, he went down to Gravesend.  There he hired a horse and rode to Kent Villa.

Why he hired a horse, he knew how hard it is to forge handwriting, and he chose to have the means of escape at hand.

He came into the drawing-room, ghastly pale, and almost immediately gave her the letter; then turned his back, feigning delicacy.  In reality he was quaking with fear lest she should suspect the handwriting.  But the envelope was addressed by Staines, and paved the way for the letter; she was unsuspicious and good, and her heart cried out for her husband’s last written words:  at such a moment, what chance had judgment and suspicion in an innocent and loving soul?

Her eloquent sighs and sobs soon told the caitiff he had nothing to fear.

The letter ran thus:—­

My own Rosa,—­All that a brother could do for a beloved brother, Falcon has done.  He nursed me night and day.  But it is vain.  I shall never see you again in this world.  I send you a protector, and a father to your child.  Value him.  He has promised to be your stay on earth, and my spirit shall watch over you.—­To my last breath, your loving husband,

Christopher Staines.

Falcon rose, and began to steal on tiptoe out of the room.

Rosa stopped him.  “You need not go,” said she.  “You are our friend.  By and by I hope I shall find words to thank you.”

“Pray let me retire a moment,” said the hypocrite.  “A husband’s last words:  too sacred—­a stranger:”  and he went out into the garden.  There he found the nursemaid Emily, and the little boy.