"Let me look at the note," said Lord Avonleigh; "I am sure I do not know the hand."
While he was considering the scroll, his son unfastened the miniature. "A picture, too!" exclaimed he; "I wonder whether it be that of our unknown correspondent? She could not have sent a better letter of introduction. Did you ever see so lovely a face?" and he gave the portrait to his father.
Had a spectre risen from the yawning earth at his feet, Lord Avonleigh could not have received a greater shock. He leapt from his seat, and stood gazing, as if spell-bound, on that long-forgotten face. Years flitted by, and Padua's walks and walls seemed to circle him round. The little garden and its moonlight meetings, with the fair girl, the spirit of the place,—all arose as the things of yesterday. A shudder passed over him. What suffering might he not now have to learn! He dreaded to seek the contents of these letters.
He was roused by Albert's cutting the string round the next enclosure. "I believe," said he, in a broken voice, "I must look over these letters myself: they relate to a long-past period of my life, and, perhaps, are ill-suited to meet any eye but mine."
Albert started as he marked the sudden
