When Starkweather wrote to me, I had no choice but to involve myself in a deception of which I thoroughly disapproved, or to answer in a tone so guarded and so brief as to stop the correspondence at the outset.

I chose the last alternative; and I fear I have offended my good old friend.

You now see the painful position in which I am placed.

To add to the difficulties of that situation, Eustace came here this very day to warn me to be on my guard, in case of your addressing to me the very request which you have just made! He told me that you had met with his mother, by an unlucky accident, and that you had discovered the family name.

He declared that he had traveled to London for the express purpose of speaking to me personally on this serious subject.
'I know your weakness,' he said, 'where women are concerned.