Bewilderment darkened Io's mind as
she read, to be succeeded by an appalled conjecture; Camilla Van
Arsdale's mind had broken down under her griefs. What other hypothesis
could account for her writing of Willis Enderby as being still alive?
And of her having letters from him? To the appeal for Banneker which,
concealed though it was, underlay the whole purport of the writing, Io
closed her heart, seared by the very sight of his name. She would have
torn the letter up, but something impelled her to read it again; some
hint of a pregnant secret to be gleaned from it, if one but held the
clue. Hers was a keen and thoughtful mind. She sent it exploring through
the devious tangle of the maze wherein she and Banneker, Camilla Van
Arsdale and Willis Enderby had been so tragically involved, and as she
patiently studied the letter as possible guide there dawned within her a
glint of the truth. It began with the suspicion, soon growing to
conviction, that the writer of those inexplicable words was not, could
not be insane; the letter breathed a clarity of mind, an untroubled
simplicity of heart, a quiet undertone of happiness, impossible to
reconcile with the picture of a shattered and grief-stricken victim. Yet
Io had, herself, written to Miss Van Arsdale as soon as she knew of
Judge Enderby's death, pouring out her heart for the sorrow of the woman
who as a stranger had stood her friend, whom, as she learned to know her
in the close companionship of her affliction, she had come to love;
offering to return at once to Manzanita.
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