"Nothing. If, after reading them, I find you really received, from the
pure and noble lady who is now my wife, a promise of marriage, I will
give you some compensation. I will give you two thousand pounds,
although I know that promise to have been drawn from her by fraud,
treachery and cunning."

Allan Lyster began to see, in his own phrase, that the game was up. He
unlocked the door of a little cabinet, and took from it a bundle of
papers. He gave them to Lord Atherton, who, still standing, read them
word for word.

"It is as I thought," he said, when he came to the last. "It is the
worst case of fraud, deception and cowardice I have ever met. Nothing
could be more mean, more dishonorable, more revolting. Still, as the
promise is true, I will give you a check for two thousand pounds when
you have destroyed them."

Very slowly and deliberately Allan Lyster tore the letters into the
smallest shreds, until they all were destroyed, then Lord Atherton,
taking a check book from his pocket, wrote him out a check for two
thousand pounds.

Allan took it sullenly enough.

"If I had my rights," he said, "I should have more than that every
quarter."

"That is as it may be," said Lord Atherton, quietly. "You may have
deceived a very young and inexperienced girl; but you would not,
perhaps, have been so successful when that same girl was able to compare