in Mr Chester's eyes, but he dashed them
hurriedly away, as though unwilling that his weakness should be known,
and regarded her with mingled admiration and compassion.

'I never until now,' he said, 'believed, that the frivolous actions of a
young man could move me like these of my own son. I never knew till now,
the worth of a woman's heart, which boys so lightly win, and lightly
fling away. Trust me, dear young lady, that I never until now did
know your worth; and though an abhorrence of deceit and falsehood has
impelled me to seek you out, and would have done so had you been the
poorest and least gifted of your sex, I should have lacked the fortitude
to sustain this interview could I have pictured you to my imagination as
you really are.'

Oh! If Mrs Varden could have seen the virtuous gentleman as he said
these words, with indignation sparkling from his eyes--if she could have
heard his broken, quavering voice--if she could have beheld him as he
stood bareheaded in the sunlight, and with unwonted energy poured forth
his eloquence!

With a haughty face, but pale and trembling too, Emma regarded him in
silence. She neither spoke nor moved, but gazed upon him as though she
would look into his heart.

'I throw off,' said Mr Chester, 'the restraint which natural affection
would impose on some men, and reject all bonds but those of truth and
duty. Miss Haredale, you are deceived; you are deceived by your unworthy
lover, and my unworthy son.'

Still she looked at him steadily, and still said not one word.

'I have ever opposed his professions of love for you; you will do me
the justice, dear Miss Haredale, to remember that. Your uncle and myself
were enemies in early life, and if I had sought retaliation, I might
have found it here. But as we grow older, we grow wiser--bitter, I would
fain hope--and from the first, I have opposed him in this attempt. I
foresaw the end, and would have spared you, if I could.'

'Speak plainly, sir,' she faltered. 'You deceive me, or are deceived
yourself. I do not believe you--I cannot--I should not.'

'First,' said Mr Chester, soothingly, 'for there may be in your mind
some latent angry feeling to which I would not appeal, pray take this
letter. It reached my hands by chance, and by mistake, and should have
accounted to you (as I am told) for my son's not answering some other
note of yours. God forbid, Miss Haredale,' said the good gentleman, with
great emotion, 'that there shoul