w darker and more impenetrable; harassing, maddening
suspicions, mixed themselves up in my brain, with thoughts too terrible
for endurance. I saw that, in Sir Gordon's error as to my intentions,
he had unwittingly disclosed the existence of a secret--a secret whose
meaning seemed fraught with dreadful import; that he would never have
touched upon this mysterious theme, save under the false impression my
attempted proposal had induced, was clear enough; and, that thus I had
unwittingly wrung from him an avowal which, under other circumstances,
he had never been induced to make.

I set about to think over every word I had used in our last
interview--each expression I had employed, torturing the simplest
phrases by interpretations the most remote and unlikely, that thereby
some clue should present itself to this mystery: but, charge my memory
how I could, reflect and ponder as I might, the words of his letter had
a character of more deep and serious meaning than a mere refusal of my
proposition, taken in what sense it might, could be supposed to call
for. At moments, thoughts would flash across my brain so terrible in
their import, that had they dwelt longer I must have gone mad. They were
like sudden paroxysms of some agonising disease, coming and recurring
at intervals. Just as one of these had left me, weak, worn out, and
exhausted, a carriage, drawn by four post-horses, drew up to the door of
the Villa, and the instant after my servant knocked at my door, saying,
"La Comtesse de Favancourt is arrived, sir, and wishes to see you."

Who was there whose presence I would not rather have faced?--that gay
and heartless woman of fashion, whose eyes, long practised to read
a history in each face, would soon detect in my agitated looks that
"something had occurred," nor cease till she had discovered it. In Sir
Gordon's absence, and as Lucy was still indisposed, I had no alternative
but to receive her.

Scarcely had I entered the drawing-room than my worst fears were
realised. She was seated in an arm-chair, and lay back as if fatigued by
her journey; but on seeing me, without waiting to return my greeting of
welcome, she asked, abruptly,--

"Where's Sir Gordon?--where's Miss Howard? Haven't they been expecting
me?"

I answered, that Sir Gordon had gone over to the Brianza for a day; that
Miss Howard had been confined to her room, but, I was certain, had only
to learn her arrival to dress and come down to her.

"Is this s