will say the same. If I mistake not you still love
her."

"I am not here to discuss such points," said Mr. Western angrily.

"Think of the severity of the punishment which you are inflicting
upon one whom you love; and of the effect it must have on her
feelings. I tell you that you have no right to do this,--unless she
has been guilty as you confess she has not." Then he seated himself
in his arm-chair, and Mr. Western left the chamber without saying
another word.

He went out into Lincoln's Inn, and walked westward towards his Club,
hardly knowing in his confusion whither he was going. At first his
breast was hot with anger against Mr. Gray. The man had called him
wicked and cruel, and had known nothing of the circumstances. Could
it be wicked, could it be cruel for him to resent such treachery
as that of which he had been the victim? All his holiest hopes had
been used against him for the vilest purposes and with the most fell
effect! He at any rate had been ruined for ever. And the man had told
him about the world! What did he in his misery care for the world's
judgment? Cecilia had married him,--and in marrying him had torn his
heart asunder. This man had accused him of cruelty in leaving her.
But how could he have continued to live with her without hypocrisy?
Cruel indeed! What were her sufferings to his,--hers, who had
condescended to the level of Sir Francis Geraldine, and had
trafficked with such a one as that as to the affairs of their joint
happiness! To such a woman it was not given to suffer. Yes; she was
beautiful and she looked as a lady should look. Mr. Gray had been
right enough in that. But he had not known how looks may deceive, how
noble to the eye may be the face of a woman while her heart within is
ignoble, paltry, and mean. But as he went on with his walk by degrees
he came to forget Mr. Gray, and to think of the misery which was in
store for himself. And though at the moment he despised Mr. Gray, his
thoughts did occupy themselves exactly with those perils of which Mr.
Gray had spoken. The woman had trusted herself to his care and had
given him her beauty and her solicitude. He did in his heart believe
that she loved him. He remembered the last words of her letter--"Oh,
George, if you knew how I love you!" He did not doubt but that those
words were true. He did not suppose that she had given her heart to
Sir Francis Geraldine,--that she had truly and sincerely devoted
herself to one so mean as