“What can we do, Marian? Oh, if we could only leave this house, never to see it again!”

“Listen to me, my love, and try to think that you are not quite helpless so long as I am here with you.”

“I will think so⁠—I do think so. Don’t altogether forget poor Fanny in thinking of me. She wants help and comfort too.”

“I will not forget her. I saw her before I came up here, and I have arranged to communicate with her tonight. Letters are not safe in the postbag at Blackwater Park, and I shall have two to write today, in your interests, which must pass through no hands but Fanny’s.”

“What letters?”