“My Dear Mr Brian,—­Although, when last we parted, it was with the usual understanding that tonight we should meet again; yet subsequent reflection, and the positive injunctions of my parents, have obliged me to decide otherwise.  You are to know, therefore, that, in obedience to the wishes of my father and mother, I have promised to become the wife of the gentleman they have chosen for me.  All correspondence between us must therefore wholly cease, nor must you longer suffer yourself to entertain a thought of me.  It is hardly necessary to add that I shall not expect to see you this evening; your own sense of honor will, I am persuaded, be sufficient to restrain you from keeping an appointment against my wishes.  In concluding, I beg you will not attempt to obtain any further explanation of my conduct; but rest assured that it is the unalterable resolve of cool and earnest deliberation.  “For the last time I subscribe myself “Julia Lorrington.

“Postscript.—­In order to save you any doubt of my entire concurrence in my mother’s wishes, I sign and address this with my own hand, and Virginie, who undertakes to deliver it, will add her personal testimony to the truth of these statements, since she has witnessed the writing of the letter, and knows how fully my consent has been given to all its expressions.”

“With my own hand!” Yes, surely; both signature and address were perfect facsimiles of Julia’s writing!  What wonder that Philip had been deceived into believing her false?  Twice she read the letter from beginning to end; then she laid her lover’s corpse gently down on the snow, and stood up erect and silent, her face more ghastly and deathlike than the face of the dead beside her.

In a moment the whole shameful scheme had flashed upon her mind; Virginie’s treachery and clever fraud; its connection with the torn fragment of paper which Julia had seen only a few minutes before; the deliberate falsehood of which Lady Sarah had been guilty; the bribery, by means of which she had probably corrupted Virginie’s fidelity; the cruel disappointment and suffering of her lover; all these things pressed themselves upon her reeling brain, and gave birth to the suggestions of madness.

Stooping down, she put her lithe hand upon the belt of the dead man.  There was, as she expected, a second pistol in it, the fellow of that with which he had shot himself.  It was loaded.  Julia drew it out, wrapped her mantle round it, and climbed noiselessly into her chamber through the still open window.  Crossing the room, she passed out into the corridor beyond, and went like a shadow, swift and silent of foot, to the door of her father’s study,—­an apartment communicating, by means of an oaken door, with the panelled chamber.