"What can it be?" ejaculated Mrs. Harkaway. "Oh, Mr. Jefferson, go and
see, and bring me the news."

"I will. Calm yourself, my dear Mrs. Harkaway; it is very likely to be
good news which thus agitates poor Jack."

Away he went.

"I fear it is the reverse," said Emily, shaking her head.

Jefferson overtook Harkaway and Dick Harvey in the gardens, where an
active search was going forward after the man, or individual of either
sex, who could have thrown the stone with its strange letter.

"Let me see the letter, Jack."

The latter placed it in his hand, and then, to Jefferson's horror and
dismay, he found it contained the following words--

"TO HATED HARKAWAY.

"I have had years and years of patience, and my turn has come at last.
As your eyes glance at these lines, your boy is vainly supplicating for
mercy. Before you reach the signature at foot, your accursed brat will
be dead--mark that--dead! No power on earth can save him. Had you sent
the money demanded as his ransom more promptly, you could have saved
him. May the knowledge of this wring your heart as you have wrung mine
in bygone years.

"HUNSTON."