Chapter M: N. to Mr. Dane, February 19

"No letter has come.... There is no use in waiting. I do not understand Mr. Hunt's course, nor do I care to understand it.

"The more I think of it, the more I am inclined _not_ to have you do anything about the past. Let the dead bury their dead. It will be only a disagreeable personal affair, whose sole satisfaction will be the money. It will in effect be arguing and claiming a greater value than he has set upon me. For my part, I would a great deal rather let it all go. You just call and get the money that the account says is due. Make as much of a settlement as can be settled; and if he chooses to let everything remain as it is, I choose it also. If he can afford to dispense with an explanation, so can I."

I had given to Mr. Dane an order upon Mr. Hunt for what money of mine he had in his possession.

Mr. Dane called for the money on the 24th of February, and on the same day,--but whether before or after Mr. Dane's call, I can only infer,--Mr. Hunt wrote to me:--

"DEAR M. N.:--

"On my return home on Saturday, I found your note without date, informing me that you had received no reply to your 'note of last Tuesday.' I have not replied to your note of February 11th, because I could not understand the purport of it, and hoped you might be in town soon to explain it.

"In the last letter I received from you, some days before the note referred to above, written in the old friendly spirit and faith, you tell me you have a juvenile book nearly ready, and ask if it shall be sent for publication. I reply, please send it at once; and then comes your note of the 11th inst., with this passage in it: 'I cannot see how it will be for my interest that you should publish any more of my books. Unhappily, it is not necessary that I should give any explanation, since the reason, if it do not exist to your own knowledge, and by your own arrangement, does not exist at all.' Now there must have been something in my note to you (to which this note of February 11th is a reply) which has offended you; else why this sudden change from the sentiments in your long and friendly letter to those of the unhappy note of February 11th? Now, pray let us understand each other; and in all kindness, I ask you to tell me the ground of your sudden dissatisfaction.

"Very sincerely yours,
"R. S. HUNT."

Mr. Hunt's ignorance in face of my letters, his absolute inability to conjecture in what direction the trouble lay, his misgiving that some unremembered sentence in his letter had offended me, seemed to me not a little remarkable. I wrote again.