that not a word was to have been spoken as to the matter.
Nothing had escaped from me, at any rate. I fear that
some of your intimate friends at Exeter must have been
indiscreet.

Believe me yours,
With the most sincere admiration,

FRANCIS GERALDINE.

He was not able to start for America immediately after writing this,
but he quitted his Lodge in Scotland, leaving no immediate address,
and hid himself for a while among his London clubs, where he trusted
that the lady might not find him. In a week's time he would be off to
the United States.

Who shall picture the rage of Miss Altifiorla when she received
this letter? This was the very danger which she had feared, but had
hardly thought it worth her while to fear. It was the one possible
break-down in her triumph; but had been, she thought, so unlikely as
to be hardly possible. But now on reading the letter she felt that
no redress was within her reach. To whom should she go for succour?
Though her ancestors had been so noble, she had no one near her to
take up the cudgels on her behalf. With her friends in Exeter she had
become a little proud of late, so that she had turned from her those
who might have assisted her. "The coward!" she said to herself, "the
base coward! He dares to treat me in this way because he knows that
I am alone." Then she became angry in her heart against Cecilia, who
she felt had set a dangerous example in this practice of jilting. Had
Cecilia not treated Sir Francis so unceremoniously he certainly would
not have dared so to treat her. There was truth in this, as in that
case Sir Francis would at this moment have been the husband of Mrs.
Western.

But what should she do? She took out every scrap of letter that she
had received from the man, and read each scrap with the greatest
care. In the one letter there certainly was an offer very plainly
made, as he had intended it; but she doubted whether she could depend
upon it in a court of law. "Don't you think that you and I know each
other well enough to make a match of it?" It was certainly written
as an offer, and her two answers to him would make it plain that it
was so. But she had an idea that she would not be allowed to use her
own letters against him. And then to have her gushing words read as
a reply to so cold a proposition would be death to her. There was
not another syllable in the whole correspondence written by him to
signify that he had in truth intended