personals, even going back to the very day after they had separated.
Perhaps she had missed one, though she knew that she could not have
done so, for she had looked at them a hundred times. Where was he?
Why did he not answer her message in some way? No one had followed
her. Were they centering their efforts on capturing him?

She haunted the news-stand in the lobby of the beautifully appointed
hotel. Her desire to read newspapers grew. She read everything.

It was just two weeks since they had left New York on their separate
journeys when, on the evening of another newsless day, she was
passing the news-stand. From force of habit she glanced at an early
edition of an evening paper.

The big black type of the heading caught her eye:

NOTED FORGER A SUICIDE

With a little shriek, half-suppressed, she seized the paper. It was
Carlton. There was his name. He had shot himself in a room in a
hotel in St. Louis. She ran her eye down the column, hardly able to
read. In heavier type than the rest was the letter they had found on
him:

MY DEAREST CONSTANCE,

When you read this I, who have wronged and deceived you beyond
words, will be where I can no longer hurt you. Forgive me, for by
this act I am a confessed embezzler and forger. I could not face you
and tell you of the double life I was leading. So I have sent you