She scarcely dared to open it, but she feared to appear to hesitate.

Slowly she broke the seals, and found a tiny morocco case and a note.

She hardly looked at the case, the note would be Maurice's farewell, and she did not know whether it would bring reproach or forgiveness with it.

It was not long--even with her dazzled eyes, she was not more than a minute reading it.
"My dear old playfellow and pupil"-- it began--"I cannot leave Paris without saying 'Good-bye,' and asking you to forgive me, not for what I said this morning, but for the way in which I said it.

If you cannot love me (and I understand now that you cannot) it is not your fault; and I ought to have remembered that, even when it seemed hardest.