"Know of what, Cyprian?"

"Why, sister, don't you know that Myrtle Hazard is missing,--gone!--gone
nobody knows where, and that we are looking in all directions to find
her?"

Olive turned very pale and was silent for a moment. At the end of that
moment the story seemed almost old to her. It was a natural ending of
the prison-life which had been round Myrtle since her earliest years.
When she got large and strong enough, she broke out of jail,--that was
all. The nursery-bar is always climbed sooner or later, whether it is a
wooden or an iron one. Olive felt as if she had dimly foreseen just such
a finishing to the tragedy of the poor girl's home bringing-up. Why
could not she have done something to prevent it? Well,--what shall we do
now, and as it is?--that is the question.

"Has she left no letter,--no explanation of her leaving in this way?"

"Not a word, so far as anybody in the village knows."

"Come over to the post-office with me; perhaps we may find a letter. I
think we shall."

Olive's sagacity and knowledge of her friend's character had not misled
her. She found a letter from Myrtle to herself, which she opened and
read as here follows:

MY DEAREST OLIVE:--Think no evil of me for what I have done. The
fire-hang-bird's nest, as Cyprian called it, is empty, and the poor bird