were at first all for my
niece; but towards the end of the year two came, at different intervals,
directed to my brother. I distrusted the cunning of the writer and the
weakness of Joshua; and I put both those letters into the fire, unread
like the rest. After that, no more came; and Mr. Carr never returned to
Jay's Cottage. In reference to this part of my narrative, therefore, I
have only now to add, before proceeding to the miserable confession of
our family dishonor, that I never afterwards saw, and only once heard of
the man who tempted my niece to commit the deadly sin which was her ruin
in this world, and will be her ruin in the next.

"I must return first, however, to what happened from my burning of the
letters. When my niece found that week after week passed, and she never
heard from Mr. Carr, she fretted about it much more than I had fancied
she would. And Joshua unthinkingly made her worse by wondering, in her
presence, at the long absence of the gentleman of Jay's Cottage. My
brother was a man who could not abide his habits being broken in on. He
had been in the habit of going on certain evenings to Mr. Carr's (and,
I grieve to say, often taking his daughter with him) to fetch the London
paper, to take back drawings of flowers, and to let my niece bring
away new ones to copy. And now, he fidgeted, and was restless, and
discontented (as much as so easy-tempered a man could be) at not
taking his usual walks to Jay's Cottage. This, as I have said, made his
daughter worse. She fretted and fretted, and cried in secret, as I could
tell by her eyes, till she grew to be quite altered. Now and then, the
angry fit that I had expected to see, came upon her; but it always
went away again in a manner not at all natural to one of her passionate
disposition. All this time, she led me as miserable a life as she could;
provoking and thwarting and insulting me at every opportunity. I believe
she suspected me, in the matter of the letters. But I had taken my
measures so as to make discovery impossible; and I determined to wait,
and be patient and persevering, and get the better of her and her wicked
fancy for Mr. Carr, just as I had made up my mind to do.

"At last, as the winter drew on, she altered so much, and got such a
strange look in her face, which never seemed to leave it, that Joshua
became alarmed, and said he must send for the doctor. She seemed to
be frightened out of her wits at the mere thought of it; and declar